Understanding Terrorism and Political Violence: The Life Cycle of Birth, Growth, Transformation, and Demise [2 ed.] 2020016763, 2020016764, 9780367277109, 9780367277123, 9780429297427

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“This invaluable second edition of Understanding Terrorism and Political Violence builds on the seminal 2008 first edition of the text by rewriting chapters and updating material to reflect changes in the field over the last decade. In these pages readers will find vital background data and current case studies that illustrate the range of political, social, psychological and organizational aspects of contemporary terrorism. The book is ideal for classroom use at both the undergraduate and graduate levels, as well as being a valuable resource for scholars.” – Jeffrey Kaplan, Habib University, Karachi, Pakistan “Armed with the perspective of not one but multiple academic disciplines, Dipak Gupta takes us on an extraordinary journey. This second edition of his groundbreaking book, Understanding Terrorism and Political Violence, is completely updated and proves even more essential for grappling with the complex chaos that is terrorism today.” – John Horgan, Georgia State University, USA Praise for the first edition: “Dipak Gupta’s excellent study of terrorism offers a unique combination of rigorous interdisciplinary analysis, personal experience, and both historical and theoretical scope. It is a most welcome addition to the field. The argument benefits from a unifying framework and consistency of approach not always found in the literature on terrorism, large though it is … Both specialists and non-specialists will profit from reading it.” – Martha Crenshaw, Stanford University, USA “A fascinating, comprehensive, well-written, lucid and critical discussion of the terrorism studies field. It will intrigue academics and students, and is laced with the author’s telling personal experiences. Policy makers and citizens will find that the analysis of the life cycles of terrorist organizations, and the common mistakes governments make over and over again, persuasive and useful.” – David C. Rapoport, UCLA, USA “The book goes well beyond just reporting the history and prevalence of terrorism. Its primary contribution is the explanatory analysis that it offers. Its theoretical analysis provides critical insights into the forces that underly political violence and offers us understanding of more promising routes toward its containment. Without such analytic approaches, the battle against terror will be condemned to rely on counterviolent measures whose effectiveness has repeatedly proven to be disappointing.” – William J. Baumol, New York University,USA

“Highly recommended.”

– R. G. Mainuddin, Choice

“Reading this book, it is clear that it is a labor of love. A combination of personal detail (a terrific opening section that will surprise many familiar with his previous work), literary observations, cross-disciplinary references that never feel clumsily juxtaposed, and examples drawn from across conceptual boundaries provide the reader with a richly potent stew of material to contemplate. What Gupta ultimately provides in his dynamic conceptual framework is a research agenda, rich for potential hypothesis testing. Gupta rises to the challenge laid down by Walter Reich and others in terrorism studies by moving beyond the confines of individual disciplinary perspectives, and for that alone should be praised. That he does so by providing a thoughtful, learned volume is even more reason to read this important and essential book.” – John Horgan, Georgia State University, USA “This is probably one of the most comprehensive books that have been written on political violence and terrorism in recent years in the sense that the author is able to combine rich theory, empirical data about insurgent groups, and even first-hand experience of the phenomenon of terrorism.” – Ignacio Sanchez-Cuenca, Juan March Institute, Madrid, Spain

UNDERSTANDING TERRORISM AND POLITICAL VIOLENCE

This book provides a multidisciplinary approach to understanding human behavior and uses it to analyze the forces shaping the life cycle of violent political movements. This new edition has been revised and updated, with three new chapters added. The second edition takes us deeper inside human motivations, which cause otherwise rational people to join dissident groups, willing to kill and be killed. In doing so, the book draws upon research on brain science, evolutionary biology, and social psychology to help explain pathological collective behavior. From the motivations of individual participants, the book turns to the evolution of terrorist groups by venturing into theories of organizational development. Together, these theories explain the life cycle – the birth, growth, transformation from an ideological group to a criminal syndicate, and demise – of a dissident organization. These hypotheses are supported with detailed case studies of three disparate terrorist movements: the nationalists of the IRA, the communist Naxalites of India, and the religious fundamentalists of al-Qaeda and ISIS. The book’s theory leads to an explanation of the current global trend of rising tribalism and authoritarianism. The author warns that this latest wave of xenophobia and authoritarianism is likely to be exacerbated by climate change and the consequent rise in sea levels, which could displace millions from the areas least able to mitigate the effects of global warming to the countries that can. This book will be essential reading for students of terrorism studies, and of great interest to students of social psychology, political science, and sociology. Dipak K. Gupta is Professor Emeritus at the Department of Political Science, San Diego State University, USA, and a Visiting Professor at the University of San Diego, USA.

POLITICAL VIOLENCE Series Editor: John G. Horgan, Georgia State University, USA Founding Editor: David Rapoport

This book series contains sober, thoughtful and authoritative academic accounts of terrorism and political violence. Its aim is to produce a useful taxonomy of terror and violence through comparative and historical analysis in both national and international spheres. Each book discusses origins, organisational dynamics and outcomes of particular forms and expressions of political violence. Evolutionary Psychology and Terrorism Edited by Max Taylor, Jason Roach and Ken Pease Understanding Apocalyptic Terrorism Countering the Radical Mindset Frances L. Flannery Understanding Terrorism Innovation and Learning Al-Qaeda and Beyond Edited by Magnus Ranstorp and Magnus Normark Terrorist Histories Individuals and Political Violence Since the 19th Century Caoimhe Nic Dháibhéid Secessionism and Terrorism Bombs, Blood and Independence in Europe and Eurasia Glen Duerr Apocalypse, Revolution and Terrorism From the Sicari to the American Revolt against the Modern World Jeffrey Kaplan Understanding Terrorism and Political Violence The Life Cycle of Birth, Growth, Transformation, and Demise Dipak K. Gupta For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/Polit ical-Violence/book-series/SE0196

UNDERSTANDING TERRORISM AND POLITICAL VIOLENCE The Life Cycle of Birth, Growth, Transformation, and Demise 2nd Edition

Dipak K. Gupta

Second edition published 2021 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN and by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2021 Dipak K. Gupta The right of Dipak K. Gupta to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. First edition published by Routledge 2008 British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Gupta, Dipak K., author. Title: Understanding terrorism and political violence : the life cycle of birth, growth, transformation, and demise / Dipak K. Gupta. Description: 2nd edition. | Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2021. | Series: Political violence | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2020016763 (print) | LCCN 2020016764 (ebook) | ISBN 9780367277109 (hbk) | ISBN 9780367277123 (pbk) | ISBN 9780429297427 (ebk) Subjects: LCSH: Terrorism–Social aspects. | Political violence–Social aspects. Classification: LCC HV6431 .G856 2021 (print) | LCC HV6431 (ebook) | DDC 363.325–dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020016763 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020016764 ISBN: 978-0-367-27710-9 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-367-27712-3 (pbk) ISBN: 978-0-429-29742-7 (ebk) Typeset in Bembo by Swales & Willis, Exeter, Devon, UK

To Aishya, Shalini, and Rohan

CONTENTS

List of figures List of tables Preface to the first edition Acknowledgments for the first edition Preface to the second edition

xi xii xiii xix xxi

1

Introduction

1

2

Into the mind of an un-rational being

20

3

Path toward pathology: an individual’s perspective

36

4

Terrorism and political violence: an organizational perspective

69

5

The dynamics of dissent

91

6

Faith, nationalism, and class warfare: birth of a movement

125

7

Growth and longevity

153

8

A marriage made in hell? Terrorism and organized crime

175

9

Demise of dissent

197

x

10

11

Contents

Lands of the fearful: tribalism and authoritarianism, the fifth wave

216

Terrorism’s trap

242

Bibliography Index

263 287

FIGURES

3.1 3.2 4.1 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 5.7 5.8 7.1 8.1 10.1 10.2 10.3

Altruists and pathological altruists Primary motivation Life of a mass movement Root causes of collective action The group structure Escalation and de-escalation of violence Hypothetical representation of a terrorist network Sources of terrorist funding Dynamic interactions and growth and decline of violence Hypothetical impact of TIF and TAF over time Individual and group: a static view of the evolution of terrorist organizations Number of people killed by the IRA Cooperation between terrorist and organized crime groups Voting patterns among white males, 2016 Number of armed conflicts Number of international migrants

42 65 73 97 98 103 111 113 116 119 120 155 190 224 228 229

TABLES

3.1 Collective identity and types of groups 5.1 Comparison of profiles of ten terrorist groups (1980–2002) (% of total activities) 5.2 Principal component analysis of violent activities by selected terrorist groups (1991–2002) 8.1 Terrorist organizations and methods of funding 10.1 Exit poll of US election 2016 10.2 Terrorism in the US, 2002–2017

45 100 101 185 222 223

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

“The years that try a man’s soul”: a personal narrative “Terrorists?” The elderly man looked up in puzzlement. I was explaining to my uncle, one of the gentlest souls I have ever met, the areas of my academic research. In his mid-eighties, he could not reconcile the loathsome figures of the crazed terrorists that he sees in the Western media with his own image from his boyhood days. “I was a terrorist myself,” the frail gentleman told me with a faint smile that did betray a certain pride. My uncle, like many of his generation, was involved in fighting the British colonial rulers of India. They joined secret organizations, carried illegal firearms, and helped carry out attacks not only against the foreign occupants but also their “agents” from the indigenous population. The latter group included many of my other relatives, some of whom were judges, magistrates, government-employed physicians, and even police officers. In fact, I come from a long line of terrorists and their adversaries. Around the beginning of 1900, when Bengal was fast becoming the hotbed of Indian resistance to colonial rule, my paternal grandfather joined a small band of men with the daunting aspiration of driving the foreigners out of his native land. Since it was nearly impossible for them to acquire firearms at that time, my grandfather joined groups who trained in Indian martial arts and dreamed of fighting the armies of the British Empire with nothing more lethal than heavy bamboo sticks. Decades later one of his relatives threw a homemade bomb at the infamous police commissioner of Calcutta, Sir Charles Tegart, but the inefficient device blew up leaving him writhing in a pool of his own blood.1 Indian nationalism, a process by which the disparate people of the vast country started to look upon themselves as a single political entity, began in Bengal nearly fifty years before my grandfather embarked on his quixotic mission. Like everywhere else in the colonial world, it was some of the best and brightest of

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the British-trained intelligentsia, who, in the process of getting exposed to the Western world, developed nationalistic yearnings. But not all. Several members of my immediate family (in the Indian sense of the term) distinguished themselves as public prosecutors, police detectives, and judges. Quite interestingly, when my paternal grandfather was charting his revolutionary course, my maternal grandfather was studying hard to get a law degree and eventually became a judge under the British Raj and, no doubt, handed down sentences to the likes of my paternal grandfather. My family’s involvement on both sides of the law did not disappear after the independence of India. My father was a magistrate in the provincial Civil Service, while one of his cousins was a noted leader of one of several revolutionary Communist parties in Bengal. The American revolutionary leader and polemicist Thomas Paine described his days as “the years that try a man’s soul.” So it was in the crowded streets of Calcutta when I went there to college. The tumultuous sixties rocked Europe and America with rebellious ideas, which left their imprint even on the relatively insulated part of the world where I lived. As the news of student protest and the rise of left-leaning ideologies in the far-away continents started arriving in India, they touched my own life. By the middle of the decade, when I arrived in Calcutta from a remote town in the foothills of the Himalayas to attend a prestigious private college, the air around me swirled with excitement of new ideas and intoxicating ideologies of making the world a better place. A new movement had started. It began as an act of rebellion by a small band of illiterate peasants, led by a small cadre of urban revolutionaries against the oppressive landlords and evil moneylenders in a poor, dusty, and utterly unremarkable village, called Naxalbari, not too far from my home in North Bengal. Books and pamphlets filled the streets of Calcutta with romantic tales of the unlikely heroes. They were the true sons of the soil, who would have the courage to look social injustice straight in the eye and challenge the entrenched power of the establishment. And there were songs; those long lugubrious melodies, which could take you away to a land awash with blood, tears, and sweat of those you have never known in your comfortable middle-class lives, but with whom you felt an inextricable, yet inexplicable, kinship. You have known them through innumerable stories, novels, movies, and plays. You could almost see their darkened faces, hear their sobs, and feel their outrage. Attending endless discussion groups, fraternizing with factory workers and slum dwellers in the depressing city, made me feel alive the way I had never felt before. “Empowerment,” a word that I would come to learn many years from then, was how I would have described my feelings at that moment. The absolute clarity of our collective vision stood in front of me like the mighty Himalayas for everyone to see. It flowed like the holy Ganges in its obvious logical sequence from its beginning to its end. Those who could not see the evident truth were either ignorant or were blinded by the narrow interest of their economic class. I felt myself being part of a much bigger and incredibly coherent picture in an

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otherwise chaotic landscape. A sense of self-ordination into a higher cause imbued me with a feeling of strength that I did not know I – a small-town boy lost in a big city – possessed. My moral certitude painted the world in stark contrasts of black and white, good and evil, right and absolutely wrong! It enveloped me like a mother’s womb, with a ready community of those who agreed with me. My community was formed not only on the basis of our common faith but also in our resentment toward those we agreed to hate. As I look back and question my motivations for aligning myself with the movement, I ask if there were reasons other than the need to belong, facilitated through bonds of friendship. I realize that there. Belonging to a group not only accorded me with psychological comfort, it also provided me with physical security. Calcutta at that time was bubbling with energy and it was dangerous for a young man not to belong to a group. The name Naxalite was itself a deterrent to others from assaults. I simply do not know how far my youthful zeal would have taken me down the path of revolution had it not been for a friend of mine, a comrade in arms, who showed up at my doorstep with a big satchel. “There is a gun in here,” he mentioned in a matter of fact tone that almost made me jump. “You have orders to carry out. You will go to a village that we have already scouted out. The man who is the village moneylender goes to the field every morning to relieve himself. You are to shoot him.” He paused to survey my reaction and added in a deep whisper, “You should be happy because you have been chosen to carry out this ‘action.’ It is an honor.” I stared blankly at the messenger and his frightful cargo. The message hit home. I could quickly see the abyss in front of me and I recoiled. I declined the “honor.” A few months later, I was on my way to the US to get a Ph.D. But by that time, many of my close friends and relatives were caught up in the storm. Some were killed, some sent to prison, some went into exile, and some others – including a number of the most brilliant minds I have known in my life – simply disappeared into the black hole of the massive Indian urban jungle. After a school bombing that produced far more noise than any damage to property or person, police arrested and then tortured my younger brother, a mere boy, yet to use his first razor blade. His inopportune youthful bluster brought him to the attention of the law enforcement. Ironically, the officer in charge of the police station was distantly related to us. So was the mighty Calcutta police commissioner, who brought down the rebellion with brutal force. I saw first hand the devastating effects of political violence not only on individual lives and families but also on the nation as a whole. Indescribable violence and cruelty mixed freely with rampant corruption and degradation of everything we upheld as humanity. The primal emotions, unleashed by an overwhelming sense of threat along with a general breakdown of law and order, depraved every fiber of civil life. Its poison spread through every vein, infected ever sinew, and exposed the worst of human nature like never before. Slowly, the

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entire society grew accustomed to the lowest common denominator of social behavior, as if it were the most normal part of everyday life. During my brief foray into the world of violent political action, I also experienced first hand the motivations of those who took part in the rebellion against an essentially unjust system. Many were totally dedicated to the cause. However, not all “revolutionaries” were inspired by the call of creating a brand new world. They were drawn to the movement by far baser instincts: the prospect of money, mayhem, and every other kind of criminal mischief. Many street thugs promptly learned the revolutionary lingo and climbed the organizational ladder to assume leadership positions within the movement. Quickly – for some of the leadership – hunger for money and power replaced concern for those who were hungry for food and justice. My personal story, typical of so many across time, culture, and geographic space, points to a number of important points of this book. Since the September day of 2001, when the US woke up to the most horrific sight of the destruction of the Twin Towers of New York, the word “terrorism” has entered our vocabulary as an overused and ill-defined term, both in public and private discourse. It has indeed become a label of convenience. Anything that threatens us around the world we can label as “terrorism.” However, the term “terrorism” suffers from a terminal dose of ambiguity. Sowing terror in the minds of the adversaries has been part and parcel of statecraft from the very beginning when individuals formed groups and established territorial claims. Throughout history, groups have attempted to threaten others by deed. The sight of severed heads on the bridges of London were warning to those who might contemplate disobeying the Crown or the Church. The cruelty of Attila the Hun made him memorable in history and prevented others from rising up in arms against him. By this standard the Nazi genocide would qualify as terrorism, as would the Allied firebombing of Dresden and the dropping of the atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. By this definition, the acts of 9/11 would be seen as terrorism, as would the actions of my uncle, fighting an unjust colonial ruler. During the 1980s the US supported the Mujahideens in Afghanistan and the Contras in Nicaragua. The dictatorships in Latin America and elsewhere – often supported covertly or overtly by the US and the Soviet Union – in the so-called Third World nations ruled their civilian population by the threat of extreme violence and also by systematic surveillance and repression of their political opponents. These acts would be considered terrorism as well. While in the West we describe the murderous orgy spread through the acts of self-immolation as “suicide bombing,” in the Arab/Muslim world they are called acts of martyrdom. The difference between the two terms is as wide as the gulf that separates the two sides. My own uncle’s puzzlement is a reflection of this ambiguity of the term “terrorism.” I mention my personal story to illustrate a number of important points presented in this book. First, my story points to the need for a careful and differentiated definition of terrorism. The old adage “one man’s terrorist is another

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man’s freedom fighter” is indeed true. It is imperative to remember that the language of discourse in part determines the policy prescribed to remedy the “disease”; how we describe a certain event has a lot to do with how we choose to deal with it. It is perhaps more useful to think of terrorism as an epiphenomenon, a minor sideshow of a larger social problem. Terrorism, in this sense, is simply a choice of strategies, tactics, and methods by groups to achieve a common good. Some movements, such as the ones led by Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., used non-violent methods to achieve their political goals. Gandhi called off his movement as soon as violence broke out. In contrast, the leaders of groups we generally call “terrorists” deliberately use violence directed at non-combatant, civilian populations as parts of their larger strategy. And all of these are parts of what in the academic literature is known as collective action, designed to achieve public goods for some particular “community.” Thus, to Gandhi the public good was national independence, to Mao and Lenin it was the establishment of a Communist society, and to Osama bin Laden it is to establish a global Islamic Caliphate, based on a specific interpretation of Islam. This is an important qualification since we must recognize that the term “terrorism” is essentially derogatory. It is a political label attached by those who are opposed to these groups and/or are harmed by their activities. This political nature of terrorism is amply reflected in the shifting annual lists of terrorist groups published by the US State Department. Yet, despite all the shortcomings and confusion, there is a problem of not using the term “terrorism.” Unless we are firm believers of ends justifying the means, there is no other alternative but to accept the disparaging term in describing the horror and grief that are caused by indiscriminate killing and maiming of people. Therefore, in this book, I will use the term terrorism mindful of its full implication. As I reflect upon the days long past, I ask myself, how did I get involved in the movement? There is a simple and astonishing answer, which I presume is true for most people who join violent terrorist groups all around the world. It came slowly, naturally, and even unconsciously. I was drawn to the movement even before I knew much about Karl Marx and his writings. Of course, I knew the names of Lenin and Mao from the cursory glances at the morning newspapers. At first, I simply tagged along with my good buddies in the college who seemed altogether “cool.” These urbane young men were so worldly, so much more in tune with pulse of metropolis, than I was. Through them I became exposed to the revolutionary literature. Through them I came to know the underclass: the slum dwellers, the workers, and the thugs. And through them I met some of the leaders, older men who were already involved in the Communist movement. What struck me most about these men was their level of self-assurance in knowing the “right path.” There was no doubt in their minds about the past, present, or the future of the society. I learnt how India had come out of pure feudalism and colonialism and was in the grip of a semifeudal, semi-colonial system, which would be overcome only when the peasants

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and the workers would rise up against the pervading injustice so deeply imbedded in the very fold of the society. What struck me most was the rigidity of their conviction in an otherwise vacuous world. I was attracted to the assuredness of their vision and desperately wanted to believe in it. My friend and noted psychologist John Horgan is absolutely right in pointing out that in the analysis of terrorism, the question of how one gets involved is far more interesting and instructive than wanting to know why. The question “how?” leads to the process of recruitment and retention. No one wakes up on a fine morning and signs on the dotted line, or even makes a conscious Faustian contract with a violent group. Most are recruited from the hangers-on, those who come in contact with active members through kinship or friendship. Over time, step by step, their involvement gets deeper. Like soldiers in the battlefield, the bond among them sustains them. Their loyalty becomes a collective code that binds them inextricably. We see that among the suicide bombers, such as the team that carried out the 9/11 attacks or the attacks on the London underground in 2005. These men had ample opportunities to defect (a predicted outcome in any economic game theory model), but they did not. Finally, as my story shows, everyone has a choice. My involvement in a violent movement was minimal until the time I came face to face with a fundamental decision. I chose not to pick up the weapon and carry out my assigned task, but some of my friends made a different choice. The streets of Bengal in the early 1970s were full of tales of death, violence, and torture. When the test of time tries a man’s soul, some go one way, some go the other. As social scientists it is our job to find out how and why people make their choices at the crucial junctures of their lives. This book is about understanding the life cycle of dissident organizations. In my youth I saw a movement develop, degenerate, and die. I left India, but could not leave the desire to understand the causes and effects of violence that leave lives shattered and a society in utter chaos. This volume is the outcome of my lifelong quest for answers. Therefore, although the book is written primarily for a scholarly audience, its subject matter remains intensely personal to me.

Note 1 Setting a long family tradition to follow this former terrorist, Nagen Sengupta went to England for higher studies after a mistrial, where a British judge acquitted him due to police misconduct. He returned home to join the “establishment” and became the director of one of the country’s best-known research institutes. In a twist of fate, he was befriended by Lord Lytton, governor of Bengal. After their meeting, in 1925 Lytton announced sweeping legislation and arrested over 150 leaders of the various anarchist and other terrorist groups. Suddenly, in the eyes of many of his countrymen, the hero became a traitor, as the Bengali newspapers dubbed Sengupta “Lytton’s buddy.”

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS FOR THE FIRST EDITION

For this project I have taken a truly audacious path by traversing many academic disciplines. In the academic world walled by strict disciplinary boundaries, the perils are many. The destruction of the Tower of Babel in academia has made interdisciplinary communication nearly impossible; the methodologies are different, the assumptions are different, and even the language is different. Therefore, it would not have been possible for me to undertake this task without a lot of help from some of the best-known experts from various fields. I am particularly grateful to John Horgan, Alex Schmid, Jerrold Post, Andrew Silke, Mia Bloom, Taradas Bandyopadhyay, Ariel Merari, Michael Stohl, Brian Loveman, Ranjit Gupta, Andy Ray, N. Monoharan, James Dingley, M. Narayan Swami, Partha Ghosh, Brian Adams, Lei Guang, Ajay Mehra, Niaz Shah, Ignacio Sanchez Cuenca, Rogelio Alonso, Leonard Weinberg, and many others. Khaleel Muhammad’s help in understanding Islamic tradition is much appreciated. Apart from the help I received from the scholars and the experts in the field, a number of friends kept me honest by constantly raising extremely difficult questions during many social gatherings. Among them, I must mention Pradip Sur. Help from friends and colleague cannot fully compensate for deep understanding of each discipline. I can simply hope that in trying to develop a coherent story from fields afar, I have not made too many egregious errors. I am grateful to Andrew Humphrys of Routledge for keeping up the pressure to complete this work. I am truly honored that Martha Crenshaw agreed to write a foreword to this book. It is impossible to conduct serious research in the field of terrorism without Crenshaw’s path-breaking work. The research for this book was funded by a generous gift from the United States Institute of Peace. During the course of my research, I traveled to

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a number of troubled spots of the world. I interviewed a large number of prominent terrorism experts, academics, journalists, police, and intelligence officers. Their insights have formed the backbone of this volume. In this book I will not present this information in a systematic way, but it will be subsumed in the discussion. Finally, I must acknowledge my wife, Munia. Without her active help, support, and love this book simply could not have been written.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION

I began writing the second edition of my book with a modest aim to update the previous version with events that transpired since its publication in 2008. It proved to be much harder than I thought. I realized how much the academic world had changed over the past decade. Terrorism and conflict behavior are now parts of a much larger disciplinary concern than ever before. As a result, my scholarship and understanding of the behavioral aspects of terrorism and political violence have evolved. I have rewritten every chapter and added new ones. I have expanded the discussion on understanding motivations of those who risk everything, including their own lives, to achieve political goals by including the latest research in the areas of cognitive science and evolutionary psychology. Our brains have evolved to accommodate our survival needs by forming groups. Our cooperative brain separates us from the rest of the animal world. As human brains reward us for working as a group, on the one hand, we create what we recognize as “civilization,” while on the other hand, we get involved in destructive behaviors, varying from terrorism to genocide. Both of these efforts are undertaken to achieve collective goods. Since these two impulses are rooted in the same fountainhead of motivation, we find it impossible to define terrorism. In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, most of the scholarship on terrorism was concerned with its birth. However, over time, we turned our focus to its transformation and demise. I have addressed the question of the life cycle of dissident organizations also from an organizational perspective. I have argued that other than its extra-legal status, terrorist groups are no different from commercial firms. I have added a chapter explaining their evolution by using standard theories of organizational development. If the terrorist mindset is abhorrent but not aberrant, so are the organizations that engage in indiscriminate

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violence. In this book, I show that other than being extra-legal and therefore clandestine, a terrorist organization is no different from a commercial venture. They both thrive and wither by the same rules. Death may be certain, clear, and final for all of us mortals, but it is complicated when it comes to terrorism. We must differentiate between a group and a movement. In the past two decades, we have witnessed the metamorphosis of the now almost defunct al Qaeda Central into various groups around the Islamic world. Finally, I have written a new chapter on the prospect of a new wave of political violence, perhaps the fifth one, where the world faces the perils of increased tribalism and the rise of authoritarianism. I argue that several factors are increasing peoples’ anxiety from economic, cultural, and demographic changes. Global climate change is likely to exacerbate these anxieties as significant parts of the world face its calamitous effects. When we face politically motivated violence, barbarity stuns us. Bewildered, we seek quick answers, which often lead us to the path which exacerbates the endless cycles of outrage followed by recrimination. The 9/11 attacks were one of those defining moments in modern history. The nation cried out for revenge, one that would be decisive, violent, and immediate. With unprecedented public support, President George W. Bush invaded Afghanistan and then Iraq, in pursuit of the terrorists, who killed about 3,000 of our citizens on our soil. He promised to root out terrorism from the face of the earth. War casualties are notorious for their inaccuracy. However, by any measure, the cost has been enormous. By some estimates, the US-led coalition lost the lives of nearly 3,500 of its soldiers and contractors. The figure on the other side is between 300,000 and 800,000, most of whom are innocent civilians. The US has spent several trillions of dollars in its continuing war efforts. These mindboggling figures do not include the incalculable costs of damaged bodies, minds, and dreams. Furthermore, the invasions unleashed long-simmering destructive forces throughout the Islamic world, reinforcing the prejudicial views in Western minds against Islam and its adherents. The cycle of anger and retribution keeps on churning. Witnessing the unwise move to invade Afghanistan and Iraq without much afterthought or planning, we may ask, when are we going to free ourselves of our addiction to failure? When shocked by the cruelty of terrorist attacks, would we ever ponder the lessons of history? Most importantly, when we face the next assault – which seems inevitable given who we are as a species – overwhelming us with grief and anger, would we have the wisdom to pause and plan out our course of action that truly prevents a repetition of our past mistakes? The topics of terrorism and political violence can be approached from the ground level by interviewing those who take part in the acts of political defiance or more remotely, from a historical perspective. In this book, I have attempted to view the issue as if from the International Space Station. The problem with such a broad view is that it obliterates ground-level granularities. Hence, I have paid special attention to three different groups. These are the nationalist IRA in

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Northern Ireland, the Communist Naxalites in India, and the religious fundamentalists of al Qaeda. In preparation for this daunting undertaking, I am grateful for extremely useful suggestions from my son Rohan and daughter Shalini. I am also grateful to my editor Andrew Humphrys for his patience. The series editor John Horgan not only paved the path to my understanding of the issues through his past research but also encouraged me and gave me excellent suggestions. Finally, I have to mention my extraordinary debt of gratitude to Jeffrey Kaplan. He read the entire manuscript and provided me with invaluable suggestions covering many of the logical holes of my arguments. The remaining errors reflect my own shortcomings. For the sake of brevity, I left out some materials from the printed edition of the book. I have a new chapter on life after death of terrorist groups, which I have posted on my website dipakgupta.com. I also posted the two mathematical appendices that were in the first edition. Anyone interested in a formal presentation of the proffered hypothesis can look those up on my website. The readers needing these materials can also contact me by email: [email protected]. In the pursuit of a broader understanding of terrorism and political violence, I have taken a long journey across multiple academic disciplines from philosophy to evolutionary biology, from economics to cognitive science, from history to sociology. In my audacious odyssey across disparate disciplines, I can only hope I did not make any glaring errors.

1 INTRODUCTION

Scrambling for answers “So, what do you think of those terrorists?” the checkout lady at the neighborhood supermarket asked me in a hushed tone. She cracked a wan smile recognizing me from last night’s local telecast, discussing issues of terrorism. Looking at the long line of customers behind me, I simply stared back in hopeless resignation. Sensing my hesitancy, she quickly came to my aid, “let me tell you what I think,” pausing to emphasize her point, she added, “They are a bunch of crazies.” In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, she wasn’t alone. Panicked and bewildered, everyone looked for answers. Searching for the motivations of a handful of men from distant lands, who would give up their lives to kill those whom they had not even met, there were two predictable lines of explanation. Many, including those at the highest rung of policymaking, would readily agree with the lady at the supermarket in questioning their sanity. John Warner, the then chairman of the Armed Services Committee labeled them “irrational.” At a joint session of the Congress, President George W. Bush proclaimed (with a loud bipartisan applause) their evident lunacy: “They hate our freedoms: our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other.”1 Why should we not call them insane, criminal miscreants, or religious fanatics? Aren’t they engaged in mass killing in the name of god? The problem of denying rationality to those who would take up arms as a means of political dissidence is that it opens up to only one solution: incarceration or physical obliteration. President George W. Bush chose the obvious path. By declaring a “Global War on Terror,” he warned that in our fight against evil each country had to decide whether it wanted to be “with us” or “against us.” He promised a quick

2

Introduction

military action in Afghanistan to kill bin Laden, the mastermind of the attacks, and destroy the Taliban regime that protected him. He assured us he would root out terrorism from the face of the earth. Two years later, after an intense bombing of Baghdad, dubbed “shock and awe,” the US-led coalition troops invaded Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. Just as President Wilson plunged the nation into World War I, claiming it was to be the war that would end all the wars, Bush promised an end of terrorism by waging a full-frontal attack on al-Qaeda and its putative benefactors. The show of raw military might was designed to cower into submission those who might be tempted to test our resolve. With a near 90 percent approval rating in many polls, Americans stood firmly behind the president in his use of force as the best answer to the imminent threat emanating from unreasonable religious zealotry in Afghanistan, and then with a somewhat lower margin, in Iraq. After the quick fall of Baghdad, on May 1, 2003, President George W. Bush, dressed in a flight suit, proudly stood on the deck of the aircraft carrier, USS Abraham Lincoln, against the backdrop of a large banner proclaiming “Mission Accomplished” and spoke to a weary nation. The dramatic moment became indelibly imprinted in our collective consciousness. In a 2017 opinion poll by the Pew Research Center revealed the astonishing fact that the US response to the 9/11 attacks remains at the top of events that “made [the Americans] most proud in their lifetime” (19 percent), far surpassing the moon landing (6 percent).2 The problem with calling the terrorists insane is that there is no evidence that they suffer from any kind of diagnosable psychosomatic disorder. A large number of noted psychologists and psychiatrists interviewed those who were associated with radical groups or jailed terrorists who carried out violent attacks against innocent civilians. They were unanimous in their findings: the vast majority of them did not suffer from mental illness.3 Astonishingly, some of them found that on average, the mental health of those who took part in terrorism was better than that in the general public.

The “loser” hypothesis So, if it were not insanity, then what would offer explanation their selfdestructive behavior? While explaining the motivations of the hijackers, some politicians and opinion makers started painting them as “losers.” They characterized the attackers as poor, without much hope for future. One could not blame them. The idea of connecting economic misery with terrorism has a deep root going back millennia. Over 2,000 years ago, Aristotle had famously diagnosed, “Poverty is the mother of revolution and crime.” Following the same line of reasoning, the liberals conjectured that it was poverty and lack of economic opportunities that led these men to undertake such desperate acts of self-immolation. The former

Introduction

3

president of South Korea, Kim Dae-Jung in his acceptance speech of the Nobel Peace prize asserted: “At the bottom of terrorism is poverty.”4 Other luminaries such as Laura Tyson, an economic advisor under the Clinton administration and dean of the Haas School of Management at the University of California Berkeley called for a new Marshall Plan for the impoverished countries as a part of a long-term assault on terrorism and political violence.5 Yet the problem with associating poverty with terrorism is that data demonstrated a clear lack of correlation between the two. The most famous terrorist of our time, Osama bin Laden, was the scion of one of richest men in the world. The father of Farouk Abdulmutallab, the so-called “underwear bomber,” was known as the wealthiest man in Africa. In fact, none of the 9/11 attackers were poor, and nor did they come from the poorest of the nations.

Islam is the religion of intolerance If I were to ask a group of Americans to visualize a terrorist, it would safe to assume that it would evoke the image of a fanatical Muslim young man bent on indiscriminate killing of innocent people. This misconception seeps deep into our cultural ethos and, after some time, we take these as evident facts. As a result, when President Trump, without citing a single example, repeatedly asserted that Islamic terrorists were pouring into the US across its southern border with Mexico, it resonated with a large number of his constituents.6 It came as no surprise when in one of his first presidential acts, on January 27, 2017, Trump issued an Executive Order temporarily banning foreign nationals of seven predominantly Muslim countries from visiting the country. He also suspended entry to the country of all Syrian refugees indefinitely and prohibited any other refugees from coming into the country for 120 days. Trump played into the hands of popular prejudice, completely ignoring the fact that since 9/ 11, the White Nationalist attacks have killed more people than those inspired by Jihadism in the US.7 If you think about it, imagining a terrorist, would you ever picture a Buddhist monk in a saffron robe carrying an assault rifle? One who, without embracing Ahimsa (non-violence) and contemplating nirvana, would engage in indiscriminate killing of unarmed civilians? Yet, if you ask a member of the minority populations in Sri Lanka, Burma, and Thailand, they might think of such a person.8 Hence, terrorism does not automatically imply Islam. The Sinhalese in Sri Lanka, who are primarily Buddhists, view the Hindu Tamils as terrorists. The Hindus in India, during 1980s and 1990s, viewed the Sikhs as terrorists. The Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland call each other terrorists. None of these people are Muslims. However, even within the Islamic nations, such as Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Bahrain, and Pakistan – in countries that are wracked by

4

Introduction

sectarian violence – the Shi’a and the Sunni would call each other with the same sobriquet. In a world full of unknown and unknowable forces, humans have always sought their meaning in the works of the supernatural. When they could not control the forces of nature, they prayed to an omnipotent deity. Over time, these beliefs took the form of organized religions. Religion not only provided a deeper meaning of life to the believers, it served as the primary ingredient for people to work together for a common good, the very foundation of our civilization. However, on the flip side, religion divided “us” from “them,” “good” from “evil,” the “pious” from the “profane.”9 This duality has been the most potent instrument for enemy formation from the earliest days of humanity. Therefore, one can blame religion for many of our conflicts, however, to point out Islam, in particular, does not stand to reason.10 While enmity between Christianity and Islam, the two great religions occupying contiguous geographic spaces, goes back over a millennium, in the immediate post-World War II period, when the cleavage was along the ideological divide, Islam and the Islamists were seen as the true and trusted friends of the West; the resolute defenders against the godless communists. It is the secular nationalists, such as Gamal Abdel Nasser, Hafez al Assad, and Saddam Hussain, who were our enemies. This began to change after the Iranian Revolution, which put the United States in the direct crosshair of the mullahs. In other words, the current conflict between Islam and the West has less to do with religion and more to do with politics.

The policy puzzle It has been nearly two decades after America stormed the gates of Kabul in search of those who were behind the 9/11 attacks. Despite the early optimism for a quick and decisive victory against terrorism, the outcomes of our all-out efforts to eradicate it have produced, at best, a mixed bag. At the time of writing this book, the US is still mired in the war in Afghanistan, the longest in its history. After losing thousands of lives and wasting trillions of dollars, we are desperately seeking a graceful way out, being fully cognizant that such a rapid retreat could bring the Taliban back to power. Iraq, after being liberated from the oppressive regime of Saddam Hussein, is no model for political stability or democratic values. In fact, the destruction of Saddam’s secular regime burst open the long-simmering internecine conflict between the Sunni and the Shi’a in Iraq, which quickly turned into a full-blown civil war, spilling over many Islamic countries, notably, Syria and Yemen. The threats of terrorism on Western soil did not disappear with the deaths of the top leaders of the most offending groups. Military capitulation of al-Qaeda central, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) did not mean an eradication of their ideology. Currently,

Introduction

5

groups – willing to wage religious wars inspired by the call to Jihad against the infidels – are flourishing in a large number of countries in Africa and Asia. This combative ideology saw the formation of many small affiliated organizations in many parts of the world. Some of these radical groups have been able to recruit young men and women not only from their own countries, but also from Europe, Australia, and North America. The new converts have carried out horrific attacks against civilians in London, Paris, Madrid, New York, Mumbai, Nairobi, etc. The confusion about the causes of terrorism is reflected in counter-terrorism policies. During the past 20 years the various US administrations have tried every option to counter the spread of Islamic militancy. Tomahawk missiles, fired from afar, have rained down on terrorist campgrounds in Afghanistan, Syria, and in other countries. The US and its allies forced regime changes in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya. Terrorist groups have suffered decapitation through killing of their leaders. A military operation killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in 2006. In a brazen attack on May 2, 2011, a US SEAL team killed Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan and buried his body in the ocean. An operation by the Special Forces killed Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the head of the ISIS in 2019. We have waged proxy war in Yemen against the Houthi rebels by arming Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Gulf countries. Armed drones have patrolled vast areas of the conflict zones by soldiers operating from secret bases in the US. They have killed hostile actors, sometimes along with innocent bystanders. The US and its Western allies have fought alongside national troops in West Africa against Jihadi groups. We have tried withdrawing troops from Iraq to soothe passions among those who viewed our presence as a direct affront to their religious identity and national sovereignty. The Obama administration even tried soft power by providing economic development assistance to Pakistan instead of military aid. Yet, all of these diverse efforts have failed to produce the outcomes that we desperately desire.

From a trickle to a torrent: academic research on terrorism While the US and its allied governments were scrambling to formulate hard and soft power strategies to counter terrorism, the crises saw an explosion of academic research on the topic. It is interesting to note that Anglo-American scholarship was not interested in studying social conflicts until relatively recently. In 1964, witnessing a rising wave of riots and violent demonstrations, Eckstein, a prominent political scientist, lamented: “When today’s social science has become intellectual history, one question will certainly be asked about it: why did social science, which had produced so many studies on so many subjects, produce so few on violent political disorder?”11

6

Introduction

The situation showed a radical shift when, during the riotous 1960s, an infusion of research grants from the US government made it fashionable for academics to focus on the question of political violence. For the first time, a concerted effort at collecting data on various forms of political dissidence and their statistical analyses started.12 While data on the frequencies of riots, demonstration, fatalities, coup-de-tat, etc., were collected, discussion of terrorism in the 1960s and 1970s was consciously avoided. Until the onset of 1980s it was a topic best left to the former security officers and perhaps, some historians; because of the political value the term implies, many liberal academics shunned its mention. Furthermore, another impediment for social science research was the lack of numerical information. Without data analyses, the historical theories of terrorism and political violence – from Aristotle to Karl Marx – were mere speculation. However, the emerging reality forced the world to pay a closer attention to the issues of terrorism during last decade of the past millennium. And, then came the 9/11 attacks. As a result, since 2000, the number of published books and scholarly articles on terrorism has been simply mindboggling. These efforts were aided by government-funded projects that collected detailed empirical information on all aspects of terrorism. Meanwhile, advancements in computer technologies also paved the road for sophisticated statistical analyses.13

Defining terrorism and political violence: words and their consequences In everyday conversations, as well as in political discourse, we often use the terms “terrorism” and “political violence” without much thought. Since this book is about both of these, I must make clear my understanding of the two over-used yet rarely understood expressions.

Terrorism Words matter as their very use imbeds the user’s perspective, ideology, and prescription for dealing with an issue. Although the word “terrorists” has been used as a weapon thrust against political opponents all over the world for about 70 years, recent decades have seen its routine exploitation as an epithet.14 During his acceptance speech in Chicago with his family, President Barak Obama, as a gesture of victory, touched his wife’s fist with his. Ed Hill, one of the anchors of Fox News, called it a “terrorist fist jab.” Although Mr. Hill lost his job for this unwarranted comment, the purpose behind calling the newly elected president a terrorist should be evident.15 These days, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan routinely calls the Kurds, fighting for an independent homeland,16 “terrorists.” Indian Prime Minister Narendera Modi labels the Kashmiris for using violence the same.17 The Chinese administration has detained very large number of dissenting Uighurs and Tibetans, alleging terrorism.18 The Burmese

Introduction

7

authorities, headed by the Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, brutally expelled the Muslim Rohingyas by calling them “terrorists.”19 The list is entirely too long to fully enumerate. Acts of terrorism evoke high emotional response. In their effort to make the maximum impact on their allies and foes, terrorists fuse extreme violence with public spectacles. Being stunned, we seek an appropriate term to describe such horrific acts. No wonder, sensing a general feeling of shock, revulsion, and fear, the term “terrorist” serves a useful purpose in political polemics. In 1605, a plot was hatched by a group of provincial English Catholics to kill King James I of England, his family, and most of the Protestant aristocracy. The plotters tried to smuggle barrels of gunpowder into the vault underneath Parliament House. The conspirators planned to blow it up during the State Opening, when the king was going to be in the House. The members of the “Gunpowder Plot” had also conspired to abduct the royal children and incite a revolt in the Midlands. The enormity of the conspiracy left Edward Coke, the chief justice of Common Pleas, searching for an appropriate word to describe it. The “reign of terror” (la Terreur) following the French Revolution, which gave birth to the term “terrorism,” would have to wait for almost 200 years to be coined. Coke was at a loss to find a suitable moniker that would adequately capture the revulsion, scorn, and disgust the hatched plot evoked in him. He expressed his bewilderment by stating: “This Treason doth want an apt name.” Alas, 400 years later, we are still looking for an apt name. President Bush searched for an appropriate term to describe those who could plot mass murders on such a scale. He would use terms such as “Islamic terrorists” or “Islamofascist” to express his indignation toward the group of Muslim radicals who carried out the heinous attacks. While President Obama tried a softer approach by eliminating the word “Islamic,” Trump, in his effort at destroying “political correctness” liberally uses the term “Islamic terrorists” to describe any attack by Muslims around the globe. These days, the word “terrorism” is never uttered among those who sympathize with the ideological goals of those who try to inflict pain on their enemies; they refer to these men and women as “Shahid” or “martyr.” The chasm that separates the connotation of the two terms is as wide as the views that separate the two worlds. In the blame game, both sides of a terrorist attack see themselves as the victims. Although the condemnatory label of “terrorism” has become a part of our everyday political lexicon, Rapoport points out that in the past the word enjoyed a more honorable overtone.20 In the aftermath of the French Revolution it was equated with state repression; “terrorism” in support of the Revolution became imbedded in the public mind as just and virtuous.21 In 1888, as Imperial Russia was boiling over with anti-Tsarist rebellion, a young woman, Vera Zasulich, shot and seriously wounded the governor of St. Petersburg in a crowded courtroom and then threw down her revolver to the floor, proudly proclaiming that she was not a “criminal”

8

Introduction

but a “terrorist.” Similarly, since anti-colonial movements had a wide support base among their own people, their armed struggle to sow terror in the minds of their colonial lords was seen as legitimate; they proudly wore the name “terrorist.” The statue of a teenager, cutting a defiant pose, stands in front of the governmental seat of power in Kolkata. This is the image of Khudiram Bose, who, along with another young man, became among the first to oppose the British occupation of India through violence. In 1908, the duo threw a bomb at a carriage that killed two English ladies instead of their intended target, Douglas Kingsford, the chief magistrate of the Presidency Court. Khudiram Bose, proudly adorning the title “terrorist,” went to the gallows for his crime. A hundred years later, his image stands at the center of Kolkata. Similar disconnect is present all over the world. In Belfast, the large murals of the IRA fighters greet the passerby, as do the images of suicide bombers that are prominently placed for all to revere in many Palestinian cities. Although terrorism as a concept is widely condemned, at least three individuals – Yessir Arafat, Menachem Begin, and Nelson Mandela – who were widely regarded or convicted as terrorists, have won the Nobel Peace Prize. However, with time the anti-colonial organizations realized the need for a new name because of its negative connotation, carrying enormous political liability.22 Menachem Begin, the leader of the Irgun gang in the British Mandate of Palestine, was the first to categorically reject the label and instead called the occupying British force the real “terrorists.”23 This new self-description as a “freedom fighter” quickly received global acceptance among its constituents and, since then, no group has called itself “terrorist”. A member of the IRA, despite being convicted of several attempted murders, kidnapping, and arms possession, vehemently denied the categorization: “To me, ‘terrorist’ is a dirty word and I certainly don’t … nor have I ever considered myself to be one, but ah, I remain an activist to this day.”24 To him these were actions of political protest, separate from those of a common criminal or a loathsome terrorist. There is, however, no question about the fact that we need words to describe a crime for legal reasons. Domestic law enforcement officers need a term to prosecute killings in the name of a political ideology, similar to “hate crimes,” just as international bodies need to define “terrorism” to enforce international laws of inter-state engagement. Therefore, we have seen a plethora of definitions being offered by legal scholars and political scientists. Leo Tolstoy, in one of his short stories, tells the tale of a man who wanted to know everything about the sun. As he continued to stare at the sun, his eyesight began to be affected. He saw the sun getting dimmer and, eventually, one day he could not see it anymore. Frustrated, the man concluded that there was no such object as the sun after all. Those of us who have attempted to study and define terrorism can very well relate to this man’s frustration. After 200 years of use and abuse, the Oxford English Dictionary still gives two definitions for terrorism: 1) “government by intimidation as directed and carried

Introduction

9

out by the party in power in France during Revolution of 1789–94,” and 2) “policy intended to strike with terror those against whom it is adopted.” The first definition clearly associates the term with an organized state, while the second offers a very broad characterization, which can include both state and non-state actors. However, these days, actions by the state, such as repression and genocide, are not included in its broad classification. Therefore, while state use of extrajudicial force has killed many multiples of those who lost their lives due to violent action by non-state actors, in this book, we will not examine the former. The term, “terrorism,” as it meandered through history has meant different things to different people. The old saying “one man’s terrorist is another man’s hero” still holds true. Given the ambiguity of the term from its very inception, it is no surprise that there is no consensus about its definition. Schmid and Jongman, in their often-cited work, considered 109 definitions offered by governmental agencies, think tanks, and academic scholars, and saw a singular lack of uniformity.25 This confusion amply reflects the fact that terrorism is a political term. Therefore, it should be no surprise to learn that while Osama bin Laden is despised as a crazed killer and a quintessential terrorist in the West, he is revered as a hero by many in the Islamic world. By culling the diverse definitions presented by Schmid and Jongman,26 it is possible to see the preponderant (but not universal) use of the terms “violence,” “civilian,” “non-state actors,” and “political.” Without getting too bogged down in the analyses of the various definitions,27 let us take a simple definition of terrorism offered by the US State Department, which defines terrorism as “politically motivated violence perpetrated against non-combatant targets by sub-national groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience.”28 Although this definition appears to be value neutral and widely applicable at first glance, there should be no doubt about its political and conceptual implications. This definition of terrorism rests on four factors, which relate to the acts themselves (violent), the actors (non-state groups), the target (non-combatant), and motivation (political). This definition is significant not only in what it includes but also what it leaves out. To be considered as an act of terrorism there must be an actual act of violence or its threat. For instance, if a bomb kills people and damages property it is clearly an act of terrorism. Similarly, if there is a specific threat, such as a phone call announcing the planting of a bomb, it will be considered as terrorism by this definition. Thus, the Gandhian movement or the Civil Rights movement led by Martin Luther King will not qualify as terrorism. Neither would a group be considered as “terrorist” if it simply espouses a radical ideology but makes no specific threat. There may be a problem, however, regarding how to classify those who espouse hate toward another group of citizens without proposing any specific

10

Introduction

action. In the United States, private non-profit organizations, such as the Southern Poverty Law Center or the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith may call them out as “hate groups,” but unless these groups perpetrate actual acts of violence these would not fall within the legal definition of terrorism. Furthermore, this definition does not make it explicit if a threat of violence instead of an actual act would be considered as terrorism. A false threat can disrupt a large part of a city’s life, can cause panic, or even start violence among the populace. The second criterion defining terrorism involves the presence of “groups of non-state actors.” By concentrating solely on non-state actors, it leaves out the handiwork of many governments around the world, where they have suppressed political dissent through brutal acts of repression and gross violation of human rights. It would also not include the bombing of Dresden by the Allied forces during World War II, or the dropping of the atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. By this definition, therefore, the “reign of terror” after the French Revolution, which gave terrorism its name, would not be considered as terrorism. This definition would, therefore, exclude by far the largest source of civilian death in the world: their governments.29 Third, the definition implies that we are not interested in acts of a single individual, the so-called “lone wolves.” However, the concept of a “lone wolf” is problematic. Although some, such as Theodore Kaczynski (the “Unabomber”), can cause a lot of physical damage and spread terror in a community or an entire nation, they are of less importance to us, since we are primarily interested in the life cycle of terrorist organizations and not of a single, disgruntled, often psychologically unstable person.30 However, the problem is that although we may question Kaczynski’s sanity and his belonging to an imaginary group, there is no question that of late, thanks to the wide penetration of the Internet, social media, and cable news, we are witnessing a spate of self-radicalization of individuals all over the world, especially in the Western nations. Fourth, the US State Department definition defines acts of terrorism by their selection of targets. This is the most ambiguous aspect of this definition. The term “non-combatant” covers civilians, but should it also include members of the armed forces not engaged in active combat? If we exclude targeting of military personnel and infrastructure, in the series of the 9/11 attacks, we will have to classify the crashing of the hijacked planes, United Airlines flight #175 and American Airlines flight #11, which struck the World Trade Center towers, and United Airlines flight #93, which crashed in Pennsylvania, clearly as acts of terrorism. However, what about American Airlines flight #77 that hit the Pentagon building? Since the Pentagon is the headquarters of the US armed forces, this definition would not regard this attack as terrorism. If we relax the definition of non-combatant a bit to include military personnel during periods of active hostility, targeting the US patrols by al-Qaeda in Iraq and Afghanistan should not be considered as terrorism, but the attack on the USS Cole off the coast of Yemen should. In that case, what about attacks by groups, such as

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11

Hamas, Palestine Islamic Jihad, or the al-Aqsa Martyr Brigade within Israel, which target off-duty members of the Israeli Defence Force (IDF)? Since there is conscription in Israel, any public place where young men and women congregate can be seen as a gathering place for active duty personnel of the IDF. It is therefore clear that any definition of target selection is going to be arbitrary. To call one attack terrorism and another a guerrilla attack may serve political purposes, but such distinctions do not offer any insight for policymakers or add clarity to academic discourse. The final and perhaps the foremost criterion for an act of violence to be considered as terrorism, is that it must have a political aim. A politically motivated act is one that is undertaken in the name of an entire community. In other words, the organization’s goal must be to achieve a public good. The instrumental goal of a violent act of dissidence is the attainment of a public good that must be shared with the entire community, regardless of the levels of participation by an individual member. The significance of this publicgood aspect of a terrorist organization’s motivation becomes abundantly clear when we compare its goals with those of organized-crime syndicates, the gangbangers,31 or the motivations of a single person embarking on acts of violence for personal revenge. From a behavioural standpoint, a terrorist group attempts to achieve public goods, the benefits of which must be shared with the entire community that the group claims to represent, irrespective of an individual’s participation in the endeavour to procure it.32 In contrast, a criminal gang does not operate out of any apparent “higher calling.” Their predominant motivation is the provision of private or shared goods, which are distributed exclusively among the members of the perpetrating group. Needless to say, as I will argue later, since every one of us operates with mixed motives, these stark claims are simply the ideal types, used for providing conceptual guide posts. History is replete with examples of men and women embarking on acts of violence against important state officials for reasons of personal passion. Despite the fact that these acts may have had significant political implications for a nation, since the motivations behind such acts are not political, we cannot accept them as terrorism. For instance, on June 4, 2001, Crown Prince Dipendra Shah of the Himalayan nation of Nepal, in a fit of drug-induced rage, killed most of the royal family.33 Although there is doubt about the exact circumstances of these killings, if we accept the veracity of the official version, they set in motion a chain of events that had a profound impact on the history of Nepal.34 However, if the acts of violence had no political aim, nobody would classify them as “terrorism.” Today, there is a fierce debate regarding the definition of terms such as terrorism, insurgency, guerrilla warfare, civil war, genocide, etc. Shakespeare once rhetorically asked, “What is in a name?” The fervor of the current debate clearly demonstrates that, in the final analysis, a name we attribute to an act reflects our political motives. The noted scholar Charles Tilly is correct when he points out:

12

Introduction

Some vivid terms serve political and normative ends admirably despite hindering description and explanation of the social phenomena at which they point. Those double-edged terms include riot, injustice, and civil society, all of them politically powerful but analytically elusive. They also include terror, terrorism, and terrorists.35 The political side of the definition is amply reflected in the fact that the United Nations, even in aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, has failed to define terrorism. This inability is not because of its vacuous nature. In the past, the world bodies have been able to come up with definitions of humane treatment of war prisoners, human rights, etc., which are no less fluid than terrorism. The reticence of the UN is the result of its members’ desire of keeping support for dissident groups against hostile nations as a part and parcel of their foreign policy. Otherwise how would Iran justify supporting Hezbollah, Pakistan, Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish e-Mohammad, or the United States, the Kurdish paramilitary force Peshmerga fighting the ISIS in Syria and Iraq? The political context of defining terrorism was on full display in April 2019, when the United States declared the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, the elite force within its military, as a “terrorist organization.” Iran, quickly reciprocated by labelling the entire US military in the Middle East, “terrorists.”36 While defining terrorism we came a full circle. Looking for precision, we systematically chipped away at the definition of terrorism, and in the end, we were left with a rather general statement. The reason for this confusion is similar to that in Leo Tolstoy’s story; indeed, there is nothing that can be defined specifically as “terrorism.” It is a label of convenience that we attribute to the activities of which we do not approve. In the final analysis, among all the non-state groups that are actively involved in a conflict against a much stronger state apparatus, attacks against civilian populations are simply one of many strategies. Their strategies may involve non-violent protest demonstrations or, at times, attacks against the “soft” targets of an assembled civilian population or the symbols of a nation. Depending on their strategic assessment, a group’s tactics would evolve, and, at any single time, may contain many different types of actions. In this book, therefore, I will use the terms “terror,” “terrorism,” and “terrorist” in one of their broadest possible connotations, as “politically motivated violent attacks or its threat by non-state actors”, being clearly mindful of its political implications and the corresponding sundry shortcomings.

Political violence and its various forms Insurgency is often defined as where a dissident group is occupying a specific geographic area. Thus, the Sri Lankan Tamil Tigers (the LTTE), the Colombian FARC, or the ISIS held territories, where they could not only move about with impunity, but also could levy taxes.37 Civil war is between two factions within

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13

a nation with roughly equal strength. Genocide is the mass killing of a member of a certain ethnic, religious groups, or believers in certain political ideology.38 Although this book is about political violence, there is no clear definition of political violence. In the past, it has been used to include riots, coups, assassinations, etc. Political instability can be even broader and, consequently, amorphous.39 It may include a change of government through democratic processes, sustained and crippling industrial action, or something like Brexit, or even the Gandhian non-violent movement or the US Civil Rights movement (although they did cause violence, mostly from the side of the governments). A “movement” is also extremely broad; it can imply the spread of an ideology or various forms of dissidence, taken together. Therefore, Douglas Hibbs, in his pioneering empirical work used the word “anti-systemic activity” interchangeably with political violence.40

Terrorism: misinformation and misconception Before I conclude this chapter, it is important for us to realize that the term “terrorism” is wrapped with political ideology and strong emotional responses. As a result, our discussion can often take a turn away from an evidence-based inquiry and veer into the realm of preconceived notions. In this section, allow me to challenge some of our deeply held misconstructions and mistaken beliefs and place my subsequent discussions in their proper context. The first misconception about terrorism is that those who join terrorist groups do so to escape their miserable, poverty-stricken lives. Yet, throughout history, a vast number of those who volunteered to take part in violence against established governments were from middle- or upper-middle-class families. In The Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx told the workers of the world to unite. He assured them, “You have nothing to lose, but your chains!” Lenin and other communist organizers, however, were keenly aware of the fact that it was extremely difficult to mobilize the downtrodden.41 Popkin showed that in Vietnam, the communists found it difficult to recruit the poor peasants, as they were bound by their seasonal duties; if they missed the time to plant or harvest, they and their families would be certain to face starvation.42 Lenin derisively called the downtrodden, “Lumpen Proletariat.”43 He was correct to point out that the bulk of the revolutionaries would be come from the ranks of the educated middle class. Second, the overuse of the expression “terrorism” has caused other false assertions; even those who are willing to undertake suicide missions in the name of God are not religious scholars or even observant of strict religious rites.44 Some of the 9/11 bombers drank alcohol, gambled, and visited strip bars.45 Those fighting for Communism, by no means come within an arm’s distance of Marx’s Das Capital. Similarly, it is not the historians of antiquity who fight in the name of ethno-national identity. Quite often, the most astounding aspect of their

14

Introduction

participation is their lack of knowledge of their professed ideology. They only have a vague sense of some of their goals and can parrot a few buzzwords and phrases. Third, another consequence of President Bush declaring a Global War on Terror and directing it to the Muslim countries is the misperception that the Americans are the primary targets of the fundamentalists in the Muslim world. In his first official act as the president of the United States, Trump called for a boycott of immigration from some of the Islamic countries. He promised to find out, “what is going on over there.” Trump assured his political base that those who would be allowed to enter the country would have to go through “maximum vetting.” By listening to his political rhetoric, one might get the impression that the US was under siege from swarms of crazed assailants from the Muslim world. The statistics, however, tell a different story. In the ten year period, between 2008 and 2017, 297 people died from terrorist attacks in the United States, giving us an average of slightly less than 30 per year.46 Of these fatalities, 73 percent (about 22 per year) are from right-wing “home-grown” terrorists.47 In comparison nearly 191,000 people died worldwide during the same period with an average of 19,100 per year. About half of these sad statistics originate from the Islamic countries of the Middle East and North Africa.48 That is, if you are from one of these countries, the chances of your dying in the hands of a fellow Muslim is more than a thousand times higher than if you live in the US.

About the new edition Most acts of terrorism are carried out by the ideologically inspired to provoke emotional responses from the target population. Therefore, our everyday discussions as well as policymaking at the highest level are shaped not by solid research but by rage. Everything about terrorism and the terrorists becomes warped by our passion, prejudice, and preconception. In our minds we create the image of an implacable enemy, sinister in its appearance and monstrous in its goals. We convince ourselves that with this enemy, there is no reasoning and no understanding, not to mention compassion. Constructed in the atmosphere of fear, we often comply with what the extremist groups want; we jump in to mete out collective punishment to every member of the community, regardless of culpability. In our blind fury, we seek simple answers to complex questions; our anxiety leads us to the false prophets, promising quick and decisive action. Fear thereby creates an endless cycle of violence with immeasurable loss of life and resources. Since the first edition was published more than a decade ago, the world has altered in significant ways, as has been shown in my own scholarship. Reflecting these changes, I have further refined my theoretical construct and built on a multidisciplinary foundation of explaining the motivations behind an

Introduction

15

individual’s decision to participate in acts of violent political dissidence. Terrorism is a strategy that the dissident groups use to advance their political goals. Acts of terrorism, even those carried by self-radicalized so-called “lone wolves” require a coherent theological, nationalistic, or communist ideology, offered by groups. I argue that a newly formed group is no different than a commercial startup and explain its life cycle, birth, death, transformation, and demise by using theories of organizational development. The world has changed profoundly since the days when Osama bin Laden became a household name. It is hard to imagine a time without connectivity through the instruments of information sharing. Yet, it was only on October 24, 1995, that the Federal Networking Council (FNC) unanimously passed a resolution defining the term Internet.49 Facebook, now considered as the granddad of social media, was founded in 2004, Twitter in 2006. The proliferation of social media fundamentally altered the way we communicate across geographic space. At its inception, the Internet, with its promise of a free and unfettered exchange of information, was hailed as a global unifier. Soon, however, it exposed the dangers of disseminating messages of hate, misinformation, and destruction in an interconnected world. The first edition of this book paid scant attention to the issue of online radicalization and other cyber threats. In this edition, it will take a much more prominent position. The recorded history of terrorism goes back to more than 2,000 years, when the contemporary historian Josephus described the Jewish groups, the Zealots and the Scarii, who carried out an asymmetric warfare against the mighty Roman army. The question of whether Jesus knew about these groups or was sympathetic to their causes has fueled a lively debate among present-day historians.50 The Middle Ages saw the emergence of another famous group: the Order of the Assassins, which carried out clandestine attacks, killing at least two Caliphs and a number of leaders of the Crusaders, leaving behind the term “assassin.”51 The University of California Los Angeles political theorist David Rapoport, argued in his seminal work that the history of modern terrorism began in the 1880s, when dynamite was invented, thereby helping small groups of individuals to carry out large-scale destructive attacks. He further argued that since the 1880s there has been four waves of international terrorism around a common theme, each lasting approximately 40 years.52 The first wave began around the ideology of anarchism. Around the mid-1880s, revolutionary fervor swept much of Europe, starting with extremely corrupt and repressive Tsarist Russia. At first, the committed activists would distribute pamphlets and write incendiary tracts. However, they were ineffective tools for mass mobilization, as Sergey Nechayev dismissed those as “word-spillers” in his manifesto, the Catechism of A Revolutionary.53 A new form of communication was needed, which the destructive power of the dynamite provided. Anarchist Carlos Piscane called such attacks “propaganda by deed,” which in later days would be described as

16

Introduction

violence mixed with theater.54 Thanks to these bloody messages, Anarchism spread from Europe to the United States, where along with many kings, princesses, and other luminaries, it claimed the life of President William McKinley. The energy behind the Anarchists waned after the World War I, with the emergence of a new wave of terrorism fueled by the nationalistic urges for independence in the colonized world. This second wave dissipated around early 1950s, when most of the former colonies gained their political sovereignty. However, with the US became mired in the war in Vietnam, there was a global rise of leftist movements, which included the likes of the Weather Underground in the US, the resurgence of the IRA in the UK, Baader Meinhof in Germany, the Red Army Faction in Italy and Japan, the PLO and the PFLP in the Middle East, and the Naxalites in India. This wave too ebbed after a generation and the 1990s witnessed the birth of religious fundamentalism as the primary driver of violence. Although Rapoport’s Wave Theory has no predictive capability whatsoever and cannot foresee their lifespan, we can argue (or hope) that we may be witnessing the waning of international terrorist movements based on religious fundamentalism. These waves, however, do not come in clear succession, but resemble the ocean: while one wave is cresting, the strong undertow creates a ground swell based on another ideology. I posit that perhaps we are experiencing the swelling of a fifth upsurge in the form of tribalism, populism, and the rise of authoritarianism all across the globe. I will explore this possibility in this book.

Plan of the book The book is divided into five themes. Chapters 2 and 3 dig deep into the motivations for individuals to join dissident organizations risking everything including life. My quest for seemingly irrational behavior takes me into evolutionary biology, cognitive science, and social psychology. While looking for the roots of our need to belong, I do not overlook the tug of the self-utility maximizing homo-economicus. Our confusing behavior is shaped by the push and pull of the altruistic and selfish brains that determine the choices we make. A movement, however, cannot sustain itself with people spontaneously picking up arms at a moment’s notice. For that to happen, political movements need leadership and organization. In Chapter 4, I argue that other than being extralegal and all the adjustments that come with it, there is no difference between a terrorist organization and a corporate venture. I use organizational theory to understand the viability of dissident organizations. Having determined the motivations of the participants and the requirements of dissident organizations, Chapter 5, develops a theoretical construct, explaining the life cycle of a group. My model explains the stages of birth, growth, transformation, demise, and rebirth of a movement or a group. The subsequent four

Introduction

17

chapters use three dissident movements, Islamic extremism, the Irish freedom movement in Northern Ireland, and the Naxalite movement in India, as case studies to provide evidence for my hypotheses. Since these identities are malleable and contextual, a proper understanding of the context, therefore, holds the key to peace and resolution of conflict. Chapter 10 discusses the future threats to global peace. I argue that the rapidly changing transportation and communication technologies are altering the world more than any time in the past. These trends are intensifying fear of losing cultural and demographic identities, creating conditions for demagogues and authoritarian leaders to come to power. This ominous trend is likely to intensify as global warming and consequent sea level rises cause displacement of people from the countries that are least able to mitigate their impacts. The unprecedented levels of intra- and inter-national migration portend darker days to come. While the future may look bleak, we must remember that these collective identities associated with religious faith, national, and sub-nationalism, however, are not permanent. As shown in social psychological research, these are malleable and contextual. Our understanding of terrorism and political violence provides clues to policies for mitigation of their risks. Recalling that it is impossible to eradicate violent outbursts fueled by ideologies, the final chapter outlines some of the counter-terrorism policies.

Summary Sights of extreme cruelty against an organized society have puzzled pundits and plebe alike. In our puzzlement we construct mental images based on prejudice and biased perception. Contrary to our popular view, they are not crazy or “losers.” Not all terrorists come from the Islamic world. One of the biggest impediments of conducting systematic studies of terrorism rests on our inability to define it. Faced with the intractable problem, I define terrorism in broadest possible terms, where the motivations of the group and its followers must be about procuring public goods, ones that must be shared with an entire community. The focus of my book is not only terrorism but also the rise of populism, tribalism, and the rise of authoritarianism in the world.

Notes 1 See the full text: www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/nation/specials/attacked/tran scripts/bushaddress_092001.html. 2 www.people-press.org/2016/12/15/americans-name-the-10-most-significant-his toric-events-of-their-lifetimes/. 3 Taylor (1988); Post (1997, 1998, 2006); Taylor and Horgan (2002); Horgan (2005a, 2005b). 4 Atran (2002).

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Introduction

5 Ibid. 6 Woodward (2019). 7 https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/08/right-wing-terrorist-killings-govern ment-focus-jihadis-islamic-radicalism.html. 8 Lehr (2019). 9 Dawkins (2006). 10 Atran (2003a, 2003b); Juergensmeyer (2003); Bloom (2005, 2011). 11 Eckstein (1964: 1). 12 See Feierabend et al. (1969); Taylor and Hudson (1972); Taylor and Jodice (1982). 13 The most notable of these outfits is the START: The National Consortium For the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism at University of Maryland. www. start.umd.edu. 14 A Google search of the term “terrorism” yielded over 326 million hits. 15 Sweeney (2008). 16 Cagaptay (2017). 17 Rai (2019). 18 Kaltman (2007). 19 www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/09/11/rohingya-militants-inburma-terrorists-or-freedom-fighters/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.9f36e13fffe0. 20 Rapoport (1992). 21 Hoffman (2017: 16). 22 Ibid.: 16. 23 See Begin (1951). 24 Horgan (2005a: 86, emphasis in original). 25 Schmid and Jongman (1988). 26 Ibid. 27 See Naylor (1997: 6, 2002: 14–18). 28 Ruby (2002: 10). 29 See Rummel (1997). 30 For a fascinating look at Theodore Kazcynski, see the book authored by his brother: Kazcynski (2016). 31 See Gambetta (1993); Stanley (1996); Varese (2001). 32 In 1965, the economist Paul Samuelson (1954) defined the term “public goods.” Public goods are generally defined with two important attributes: excludability and exhaustibility. Public goods are for the enjoyment of every member of the community, regardless of their level of involvement in the effort at procuring these goods. Thus, if tax dollars pay for clean air, a destitute person who does not pay any taxes is free to enjoy the benefits of a clean environment. Second, the benefits of public goods do not get exhausted with the increase in the number of users. Therefore, when a new child is born, nobody will worry about her share of the clean air. 33 Hutt (2004: 6–7). 34 Whelpton (2005). 35 Tilly (2004: 1, emphases in original). 36 www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/04/08/heres-why-listing-irans-revolution ary-guard-terrorist-organization-is-bad-idea/?utm_term=.5cf5df2ab55e. 37 Bloom (2005). 38 Prunier (1995, 2005); Gupta (2001a). 39 Gupta and Venieris (1981); Venieris and Gupta (1983, 1985, 1986). 40 Hibbs (1973). 41 Lenin (1969 [1902]). 42 Popkin (1979). 43 Lenin (1969 [1902]). 44 Merari (2010). 45 Hernden (2001).

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46 National Consortium of Terrorism Database (START). 47 www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/01/homegrown-terrorists-2018-werealmost-all-right-wing/581284. 48 https://ourworldindata.org/terrorism. 49 Liner et al. (2016). 50 Aslan (2013). 51 Lewis (1968). 52 Rapoport (2005). 53 Rosenfeld (2011). 54 See Hoffman (2017: 5).

2 INTO THE MIND OF AN UN-RATIONAL BEING

There can be no doubt that a tribe including many members who, from possessing in a high degree the spirit of patriotism, fidelity, obedience, courage, and sympathy, were always ready to aid one another, and to sacrifice themselves for the common good would be victorious over most other tribes, and would be natural selection. Charles Darwin (1859[1936]: 166)

Who is a saint, who is a sinner? Who can really tell? In men they reside side by side, In men, heaven and hell. Author’s translation of a famous Bengali poem by Sheik Fazlul Karim

The inveterate joiner Fate would have guaranteed Osama bin Laden, the scion of a self-made billionaire, a pampered life. Yet, he chose something completely different; some might call it irrational. The most wanted man in the world died in a hail of bullets and lived the life of a fugitive with all the attendant hardships of a man running from the law. Yet, bin Laden certainly isn’t alone in choosing such a seemingly irrational path. Stories from the earliest days of recorded history tell us about people who would take enormous risks to themselves, their families, and the entire communities to challenge an entrenched power. As bin Laden was not the first person to eschew guaranteed comforts of life and to sacrifice everything for what he thought was larger than his own self, he would certainly not be the last person to do so. Neither

Into the mind of an un-rational being

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insanity nor simple criminality can explain such choices. In fact, what compels some of us to turn to terrorism is part of what defines the core of our humanity. Much of what we consider worthy of adoration in human nature, along with much of what repulse us, is rooted in our consciousness as members of a community. On the one hand, our community commitment helps us create what we know as civilization. On the other hand, the same forces give us the horrors of genocide and mindless killings in the name of a god, a nation, an ethnicity, or an economic class. The first century AD was an unsettled time in Jerusalem. The powerful Roman army had taken control of the Holy City and had proceeded to desecrate the Jewish temple by placing the statue of the Caesar where only God should reside. The supine priests were happy being rich from continuing business as usual; the entire Jewish community was beaten into submission by the might of the Roman sword. Roman historian Josephus tells us that in this environment, a small group of “Zealots” wanted to deliver a political message to the occupying Romans, the pliant priests, and to the Jewish community in Palestine.1 In a crowded market, they assassinated the high priest by plunging a small dagger, sicari, into his body. They would also attack isolated Roman soldiers armed with nothing more than this humble weapon, earning the nickname Sicarii, the Dagger Men.2 On the face of it, their acts seemed foolhardy. How could anyone challenge the imperial forces by killing a priest or an odd soldier or two? If they were trying to protect the Jews, they should have known the vengeance of the ruthless Roman army. Sure enough, in retaliation, the brutal occupiers razed the city to the ground, killing, enslaving, or pushing into exile the entire Jewish population.3 Did bin Laden think that the mighty US would remain stuck in grief at the unprecedented acts of mass killing on its soil? Did he believe that his enemies would simply disintegrate with the collapse of the Twin Towers? If not, what was he trying to accomplish? As different as it may appear in time and space, the Zealots, bin Laden, and uncounted multitudes – those who have sacrificed their lives in the pursuit of seemingly implausible goals – have strong bonds in terms of motivations, strategies, and goals. All participants in collective actions, violent or non-violent, see themselves as the ultimate altruists. After all, they are only trying to do what, in their estimation, is best for their community; in the process, they are in the pursuit of something higher than themselves. Kellen is correct to point out that a “terrorist without a cause (at least in his own mind), is not a terrorist.”4 This quest for altruistic goals separates a terrorist from a common criminal. Without understanding the source of altruistic motivation, we simply cannot comprehend terrorism or participation in a political movement. Yet, none of us are without our selfish motivations. We choose to participate in a collective action because it gives us pleasure and promises fame, adulation, money, power and/or perhaps, a place in heaven. Western social sciences, however, tell us precious little about this complex being with mixed motives.

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Into the mind of an un-rational being

Myth of a me-centric world The idea of a me-centric being is so pervasive in our thinking that we define rationality itself with the unrelenting chase to maximize our self-interest, constrained only by the availability of time and resources. If I were to ask someone a question: “What motivates a human being?” I am likely to hear, “money, sex, power,” etc., all of which relate to an individual’s own personal fulfilment. What are the chances of hearing any word that implies seeking welfare of the community? Yet during the course of a day, we engage in numerous acts of altruism. We may give money to the poor, donate to public radio, fill the donation plates at places of worship, volunteer in our children’s school, give our seat in a crowded subway to an elderly person, etc. Why do we act altruistically, sometimes reflexively, sometimes with deliberate considerations? Can we consider those as aberrations to human rationality? In fact, unless we are diagnosed as sociopaths, all of us engage in acts of altruism, large and small, significant and insignificant throughout our lives, without which we would not have a society. Biologist Richard Dawkins created a meme for himself with the title of his book, The Selfish Gene.5 The readers, or those who would only know the book by its title, might conclude that we are selfish down to the DNA, our fundamental building blocks of life. This assertion comfortably comports with the Western liberal tradition, which holds individualism at its nucleus. In fact, we can readily understand aberrant behavior prompted by greed and passion; we can even fathom sudden impulses that cause people to ignore danger to help others. What we have trouble understanding are planned acts of self-sacrifice. It is fascinating to note that until the 1970s most biologists rejected the idea of altruistic aspirations influencing evolutionary biology based on a curious logic of adaptation. They argued that since in a war or during genocide, it is the brave who sacrifice themselves and the cowards who hide, it is the cowards who survive to pass on their genes to the next generation. Therefore, evolutionary process must choose the selfish cowards and not the brave altruists.6 Anyone remotely aware of history should know that not all valiant men and women perish, and every timid person survives during periods of violent conflict. The truth is, when battles end – as they eventually do – it is the surviving heroes who are accorded positions of power, giving them all the opportunities to pass on their genes. Today we take the liberal values of individualism for granted. Similar to breathing in oxygen, we are rarely mindful of its all-encompassing existence. Thus, the philosopher of science Michel Foucault calls the assumption of me-centric individualism “positive consciousness of knowledge,” which he defines as “a level that eludes the consciousness of the scientists and yet is a part of scientific discourse.”7 Although, according to Foucault, the primacy of individualism in the Western thinking emerged fitfully from the penumbra of the collective around the

Into the mind of an un-rational being

23

seventeenth century,8 similar to any radical evolutionary shift in paradigm – from faith to reason – it evolved slowly over many generations of scholarship. The early stirring of individualism, which eventually gave birth to humanistic Protestantism can be traced back to the thirteenth century Catholic theological writings of St. Thomas Aquinas, who saw human intellect as independent of divine revelation.9 These ideas took a more definite shape in the works of Thomas Hobbes. While his conclusions of needing the Leviathan, an all-powerful beast of national government under a benevolent Christian prince, can hardly be regarded as liberal, Hobbesian postulates were highly individualistic. Hobbes explicitly rejected traditional theories based on religious interpretation and deduced societal obligations and political rights from the self-utility of essentially dissociated individuals. This is the notion of a value-neutral being “essentially the proprietor of his own person or capacities, owing nothing to society for them,” which served as the stepping stool for the philosophy of individualism.10 The unquestioned acceptance of a self-serving man as the quintessential rational being is the result of three strong scholarly forces. In 1687, the publication of Isaac Newton’s Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica created a revolutionary change in how we view ourselves in the universe. The early success of physics in developing models based on universal laws of nature placed it at the top of scholarly disciplines. The beauty of the Newtonian logic of the celestial mechanics rests on its ability to express a seemingly complex behavior with the help of a single explanatory variable, gravitational force.11 The exalted position of physics was matched by a revolution in the discipline of economics nearly a hundred years later with the publication of Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations in 1776. Smith argued that the free market, where members, unencumbered by restrictions from government or the church, compete with each other to maximize their own profit, is the most efficient system, where everyone receives what he or she deserves and the wealth of a nation reaches the peak of its potential. Although Smith espoused a more nuanced view of human nature in his earlier writings and far less popular publication, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, the Western world accepted as given the single force that explains human nature: self-interest.12 The perennially self-serving individualism, which forms the foundation of Western philosophy, was further reinforced by the development two other powerful intellectual traditions. Eighty years after the publication of The Wealth of Nations, Charles Darwin (1859 [1936]) published On the Origins of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. His primary premise – particularly as understood by the public at large as well as many in the academic community – was that the iron law of nature compels each living organism, from a single cell amoeba to a human being, to submit to the law of evolution, where the ones that are best able to adapt to the changing environment thrive. Herbert Spencer in 1864 popularized Darwin’s law of evolution with the phrase, “survival of the fittest.” This was a huge contribution to the popular misunderstanding of Darwin as Spencer drew

24

Into the mind of an un-rational being

parallels to his own theory of market economy with the laws of nature. This conflation permanently changed our understanding of the world by mixing evolutionary biology with sociology. The similarity between the evolutionary biology and market economics seems obvious. In a marketplace, individuals try to gain most money, while every commercial enterprise strives to become the next Google, Amazon, or Facebook. Even in our social interactions, consciously or unconsciously, we strive to outbid others in order to make sure that we not only survive, but are also able to provide for our offspring. Similarly, in the animal world each animal tries to be the alpha animal, often through brutal fights, so that they can have the right to mate with the fittest female(s). In the popular storyline of the Lion King, developed in the shadows of Hamlet, Simba’s uncle kills his father, marries his mother, and throws him out of his kingdom. In nature, the victorious lion would immediately kill all the male cubs in order to make sure the bloodline of the fitter and stronger animal prevailed over the old. The naturally protective lionesses, after showing some token resistance, succumb to the law of evolution and happily mate with the new alpha male. By extending the logic through then-recently discovered genetics, Dawkins argued that in the ultimate analysis, all of us are nothing more than receptacles of the DNA molecules.13 In the Preface of his influential book, Dawkins stated: “We are survival machines, robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes. This is a truth which still fills me with astonishment.”14 The DNA molecules attempt to survive by making every organism preserve their own strands. While recognizing altruism within their own lines of kinship and group membership among the herding animals, Dawkins argues that to be selfish is in our genetic makeup. The other stream of influence that placed the individual in its exalted position in the Western intellectual tradition is the result of the overwhelming influence of Sigmund Freud. While economics assumed a one-dimensional man perennially in pursuit of profit, Freudian psychology assumed the single force that drives human nature is sex. While the mainstream economists disregarded behavioral economics, which held human nature to be much more complex than the discipline’s extreme reductionist assumption, the Freudians did the same with their critics. Paul Johnson pointed out, “internal critics like Jung were treated as heretics; extreme ones like Havelock Ellis, as infidel.”15 Although Freudian psychology is based on clinical observations of individual patients, toward the end of his life Freud aimed at explaining social violence and violent rebellions. In his book Civilization and Its Discontents, Freud uses the same tools for individual psychoanalysis and, in effect, puts the whole of society on the couch.16 His macro-level study of conflict was also based on an individual’s primal needs based on id, ego, and superego. Freud saw in rebellion by men against authority figures an expression of the subconscious Oedipal complex, where the multitude rise up in arms as a result of their urge to slay

Into the mind of an un-rational being

25

their father figures, the rulers of a nation. The women revolutionaries join the forces of dissidence out of their penis envy. The confluence of these three great philosophical traditions – in neoclassical economics, Darwinian biology, and Freudian psychology – paved the way for the universal acceptance of the logic of individual utility maximization as the sole definition of human rationality, and ultimately it became what Foucault’s “positive consciousness of knowledge.” Scholars have applied the precept of economic rationality to the action of a single participant in an act of political rebellion,17 or a rebel organization,18 or to a state actor.19 There are several important analytical problems with the assumption of individual short-term selfish utility maximization. The list of critics of the truncated view of human nature since its very inception, however, is long. Economist Amartya K. Sen in his influential essay “The Rational Fools” emphatically states, “Universal selfishness as actuality may well be false, but universal selfishness as a requirement of rationality is patently absurd”.20 However, the most important demonstration of the shortcomings of this fundamental assumption of human rationality came from the work of Mancur Olson.21 He pointed out the logical pitfalls of using economic rationality in explaining the emergence of voluntary associations. Olson’s original intent was to explain why people did not automatically form civic organizations and mobilize to provide public goods. In order to fully appreciate Olson’s reasoning in the context of terrorism and political violence, we must understand the concept of public goods. Economist Paul Samuelson developed the concept of public goods.22 Public goods are generally defined with two important attributes: excludability and exhaustibility.23 Public goods are for the enjoyment of every member of the community, regardless of their level of involvement in the effort at procuring these goods. For instance, tax dollars pay for clean air, yet a destitute person who does not pay any taxes is free to enjoy the benefits of a pristine environment. Second, the benefits of public goods do not become exhausted with the increase in the number of users. For example, when children are born, nobody worries about their share of clean air, a public good. Olson introduced the term “free rider” into the social-science lexicon, where “rational” individuals would argue that since the benefits of a public good are not restricted to those who participate in the attempt to procure it, it would be rational for each individual to free ride and let others pay for it. An example may clarify the dilemma. Many Americans in the 1950s and early 1960s were keenly aware of the injustices of the Jim Crow legislations in the South and wanted to abolish it. Under the leadership of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a large number of African Americans along with many whites joined protest marches across the southern states. The segregationist police and vigilante groups reacted with unprecedented brutality. Suppose I wanted to abolish the Jim Crow system. I could join the protesters or decide to stay

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Into the mind of an un-rational being

home. Each protester was acutely aware of the risk to their life and limb if they went out and joined Dr. King’s movement. Yet that did not deter a lot of people from participating in the acts of non-violent resistance. To a “rational” person, the options should be clear: if I participate, I may be incarcerated, be severely beaten up, or I might even lose my life. I may reason that being only one person, my own participation would not change the course of history. Therefore, I might as well stay home and enjoy a more just world, if and when changes do come. Unfortunately, if everybody reasoned this way, there would be no civil rights legislation. In fact, in a nation full of rational people, no public goods would ever be produced; there would hardly even be a society. Democracy would not exist, as, realizing the insignificance of a single vote, nobody would take the trouble of going to the polling booth. Nor would anybody become a suicide bomber, expecting to establish a global Islamic state by sacrificing his or her life. Nobody would have any reason to contribute to a collective cause. As a result of this impeccable logic, no collective action will ever be undertaken, no war will be fought (and won), and much of what we see around us as public goods within an organized society will cease to exist. While the free-rider problem is acute for large groups, the presence of selective benefits – where each member can equate his effort with the outcome – can explain an individual’s participation in a small-group initiative, such as a coup d’état, far better than it can a grass-roots involvement in a mass movement.24 In economics, these are called “club goods,” (or, “quasi-public goods”) where the benefits are restricted to the members of the core group. History, however, often has a way of injecting irony into academic discourses. While the scholarly community was busy discussing the theoretical implications of Olson’s paradox, much of the Western world saw an explosion of participation by ordinary citizens in demonstrations against the unpopular war in Vietnam. To the astonishment of the proponents of the rational choice school, noted economist Albert Hirschman observed: Astoundingly large numbers of citizens, far from attempting to get a free ride, have been taking to the streets, to the nation’s capital, or to other places where they expect to exert some influence for change. In this connection, it is interesting to note that while economists keep worrying about the free rider problem, political scientists have become increasingly concerned about the “paradox of participation.” What began as a methodological explanation for political inactivity quickly turned into a methodologically driven puzzle questioning why political participation should be as high as it was.25 Then why do economists and many other social scientists still construct their theories based on the faulty assumption of human nature? In her presidential

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address to the American Political Association meeting, Elinor Ostrom unequivocally pointed out the absurdity of the economic assumption of human rationality: Let me start with a provocative statement. You would not be reading this article if it were not for some [of] our ancestors learning how to undertake collective action to solve social dilemmas. Successive generations have added to the stock of everyday knowledge about how to instill productive norms of behavior in their children and to craft rules to support collective action that produces public goods and avoids “tragedies of commons.” What our ancestors and contemporaries have learned about engaging in collective action for mutual defense, child rearing, and survival is not, however, understood or explained by the extant theories.26 Facing the prospect of a direct affront to the fundamental building block of their discipline, economists and the proponents of rational choice theory reacted in a predictable way. They questioned the motives of participants of collective actions and found hidden sources of hedonistic motivations. Thus Tullock flatly asserted that those who take part in a revolutionary movement out of altruistic concerns are either irrational or have ulterior motives of personal gains.27 The most dangerous outcome of Tullock’s proposition is that the only deterrence against political violence is the use of force. Despite the obvious shortcomings of a truncated perception of human motivations, the assumption of economic rationality has become something of a “sacred cow,” a sacrosanct concept that nobody dares to challenge. Some who have come tantalizingly close to attempting a different explanation of the motivations behind participation in collective actions have, in the end, carefully avoided the issue. The single-minded goal of self-utility maximization gives the mainstream economists the most crucial element for building their intricate mathematical edifice. Similar to the Newtonian laws predicting the movements of celestial bodies, explained with gravitational force, the presence of a single motivational factor allows economists to arrive at a unique optimal solution. If we try to obfuscate the objective with multiple goals, without arbitrarily attributing fixed weights to the various aspirations, the models become cumbersome and, perhaps, impossible to reach an elegant solution. Therefore, partly out of convenience and partly out of orthodoxy, the faulty assumption about human behavior, which excludes altruism, persists despite its inadequacies. Rose-Ackerman is quite categorical in admitting that, “Altruism and nonprofit entrepreneurship cannot be understood within the standard economic framework.”28 Olson himself was astute about the illogic of collective action under the assumption of economic rationality. He observed:

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It is not clear that this is the best way of theorizing about either Utopian or religious groups … Where nonrational or irrational behavior is the basis for a lobby, it would perhaps be better to turn to psychology or social psychology than to economics for a relevant theory. The beginnings of such a theory may already exist in the concept of “mass movements.”29 In the end, many scholars like Fiorina realize that the collective action dilemma is the “paradox that ate the rational choice theory,”30 yet accept the notion of a self-utility maximizing homoeconomicus as the only game in town. Ostrom, for example, after pointing out the problems associated with the fundamental assumption of rational choice theory, insists: “While incorrectly confused with a general theory of human behavior, complete rationality models will continue to be used productively by social scientists, including the author.”31

Rationality and emotion René Descartes, the seventeenth century mathematician and philosopher, often held as the “father of modern philosophy,” was in the quest for absolute truth. “Is there an absolute truth?” he asked. His search led him to argue the fact that while we can dispute everything that we see, we cannot deny that we exist. If we deny or doubt our existence, then there is no truth. Thus, he coined perhaps the most famous phrase in philosophy, “Cogito ergo sum,” “I think, therefore I am.” He argued that there is a distinct separation between body and mind. To him, our bodies exist within three dimensions, and are sizeable. The body can be cut, and it can feel pain, joy, happiness, hunger, and all other bodily urges. The mind, by contrast, is one-dimensional, indivisible, and invariant. The mind is rational, which is polluted by bodily emotions resulting from physical needs and impulses. Thus began our unbridgeable divide between mind and body; between rationality and emotion. So, a perfectly rational human being would make the right decisions in life, simply erecting a wall to keep emotions out of our decision-making processes. Hence, the fictional character Mr. Spock, of the popular TV series and movies, Star Trek, is cast as the epitome of rationality. Too bad he is part human and part Vulcan, and can occasionally have his mind clouded because of human frailty. Although Spock is a product of imagination, in him we did find a creature who should have been the most rational being in the world. Science did not stand still after the seventeenth century. As we learned more about brains, the more confused we became. The neuroscientist Antonio Damasio (1994) penned a widely read book, Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain.32 Damasio had a patient, who he named Eliott. He was a successful business executive and a caring family man. Elliott developed a benign tumor on the frontal lobe of his brain. After it was surgically removed, he regained all his faculties, awareness, and speech. However, in a profound way, he was a completely different person; he could

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not make a decision. Damasio discovered that the surgery had damaged a part of his brain tissue, permanently separating the emotional part of his brain from the analytical part. As a result, Elliott could perfectly analyze a complex situation, but he did not have the emotional backing to make the final decision. This is because real life rarely offers a unique optimal option. The complexity of life presents itself as a basket of possible courses, of which we have to make our final choice based on emotion. Without emotion, therefore, rationality is like a bunch of inert chemicals. They only come alive when mixed with the life-giving solution of water.

Altruism: choice or reflex? In the mid-1800s, the French philosopher Augustine Comte constructed the word altruism from the Latin alteri (“others”). He explained this moral calling as placing the needs of others over one’s self-interests. Altruism, therefore, does not seem hard to define. Dictionary.com, however, gives two definitions of altruism, one for humans and the other for animals. The first definition claims that it is the “principle or practice of unselfish concern for or devotion to the welfare of others (as opposed to egoism).”33 As for the animals, the digital dictionary defines it as a behavior “by an animal that may be to its disadvantage but that benefits others of its kind, as a warning cry that reveals the location of the caller to a predator.” It makes a distinction between human and animal altruism because for us, such acts are supposed to be based on choice. For animals, in contrast, acts of selflessness is driven by biology, whereas for humans, altruism is a matter of choice. For example, those who are the “soldiers” in the colony of a species of Malaysian ants (Colobopsis Saundersi) grow a sticky substance in their bodies. When in a battle with another colony or predators, they explode their protective exoskeleton to spray the noxious substance onto their enemies. They are nature’s suicide bombers.34 However, these ants do not sacrifice themselves out of conscious choice, but follow the immovable laws of group selection, where the entire colony acts as a single body.35 In the end, a group is just as strong as the commitment of its members to its collective goals. Darwin called it, “inclusive fitness.” This conflict between individual fitness and group fitness was not lost on Darwin himself. He notes: It must not be forgotten that although a high standard of morality gives but a slight or no advantage to each man and his children over other men in the same tribe, yet that an increase in the number of well-endowed men and advancement in the standard of morality will certainly give an immense advantage to one tribe over another. There can be no doubt that a tribe including many members who, from possessing in a high degree of patriotism, fidelity, obedience, courage, and sympathy, were always ready to aid one another, and to sacrifice themselves for common good, would be victorious over most other tribes; and this would be natural selection.36

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Thus, while selfish behavior favors an individual over others within a group, altruistic behavior by individual members favors a group against other groups.37 Thus, what we call morality, idealism, and altruism are often rooted in our preference of group welfare over our narrowly defined selfish interest. Darwin made clear the equation of morality with group-favoring behavior, as he further adds: At all times throughout the world tribes have supplanted other tribes; and as morality is one important element in their success, the standard of morality and the number of well endowed men will thus everywhere tend to rise and increase.38 Our short-term individual interest often clashes with the long-term group interest, which we recognize as moral dilemma. Zoologists studying animal behavior see a strong parallel between the animal world and human society. Thus, Wyne-Edwards observes: Where the two (individual interest and group needs) conflict, as they do when the short-term advantage of the individual undermines the safety of the race, group-selection is bound to win, because the race will suffer and decline, and be supplanted by another in which antisocial advancement of the individual is more rigidly inhibited. In our own lives, of course, we recognize the conflict as a moral issue, and the counterpart of this must exist in all social animals.39 However, if this sense of moral behavior is not formed by biology, where does moral behavior originate for the apes? The primatologist de Waal40 observes that among chimpanzees and other primates, being generous to others comes as a learned behavior, where unselfish, cooperative behavior is rewarded and those who act selfishly are shunned. In evolutionary biology, altruism is the result of “kin selection theory,” which is closely aligned with Darwin’s notion of inclusive fitness.41 That is, while each member of a group is selfish in its relentless pursuit of a larger portion of food and ability to leave its genetic materials in the next generation, it also realizes that its own survival depends on the strength of the entire group. Therefore, a herding animal would cooperate within the group or clan and act selflessly to protect others with the hope that such actions would be accorded to it when its needs arise. By following this rule, we can explain learned altruism within a small group among our simian cousins, but it falls apart when it comes to humans: our altruistic behavior goes far beyond our immediate family. In fact, we not only sacrifice everything for other humans, our altruism extends to other species as well. The members of Green Peace willingly place themselves in between a whale and a harpoon in the open seas. The legendary tree-hugger, Julia “Butterfly” Hill sat on a 1,500-

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year-old California Redwood tree for 738 days to protect it from the saws of the Pacific Lumber Company. She even named the tree “Luna.”42 Searching for the roots of such altruistic behavior, we must cast a wide net beyond any single academic discipline.

Imagined community Although the exact time of their emergence remains a hotly debated issue, it is clear that for vast majority of the time, Homo sapiens lived in small nomadic bands of hunter-gatherers. Archeological evidence shows that the first large cities at Göbekli Tepe and Çatal Höyük in modern-day Turkey were established less than 10,000 years ago. Over time, these large settlements grew to about 8,000 people. The early inhabitants built these cities by working together, taking care of each other in need, and defending the cities as a group when attacked by outsiders. None of this could have happened if everyone was motivated solely by selfish interest, save for his or her immediate kinfolks. It is altruism beyond biology that built the cities and ultimately what we now recognize as civilization. As culture, religion, and language bound the early humans together, it must have changed the neural circuitry in their brains, where looking beyond their personal wellbeing caused pleasure hormones to secrete, thereby rewarding altruistic acts in their own minds.43 It is no wonder that when we publicly acknowledge people for bravery and heroism, almost without a fail, they express surprise; to them, what they did to help others in need appeared to come naturally. Thus, part of our altruistic behavior can still be linked to our evolutionary brain, where we reflexively help others, putting our own lives at risk. As social animals, we crave togetherness. It is no wonder that when psychologist Abraham Maslow44 proposed his hierarchy of needs, placing belongingness right after the physical needs of keeping body and soul together, it made ready sense to scholars and common folks alike. Therefore, when we form groups of like-minded individuals, we determine our “community.” Being based on imagination, it can include the entire Islamic community for the Jihadis, all caucasians for the white supremacists, sea mammals for the members of Green Peace, and all large trees for the tree-huggers. Having no bounds, our minds allow us to form groups and act upon their interest.

The self and the collective: the eternal trade-off Such is the mindset of an un-rational being. This being is neither completely rational nor irrational. It wants to pursue its selfish goals, yet it can throw everything away for a greater cause. It can be calculating and ponderous, yet it cannot make up its mind without emotions. This complexity precludes us from

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solving the problems of terrorism and political violence. There is no one-sizefits-all understanding, much less a solution. Our confusion becomes acute when we decide to join a group. If we think about it, when we join as association, we must give up some of our rights to adhere to its policies as a member. So, I can legitimately ask, why should I give up my ability to live only by my own whims, wishes, and desires? Group membership, however, comes with its own benefits, which go beyond the “feel good” aspect of our brain chemistry. First, group membership gives us a structure with its stated goals. Most of us look for meaning of our lives, which these groups are able to provide. When we join a specific organization, we agree to strive together to achieve something that benefits the group. If it is a political organization, the definition of the group goes beyond the immediate core affiliates and encompasses the entire community. Second, the membership may also specify codes of personal conduct that differentiate the members from those who are not part of the group. For instance, being a member, we may wear certain colors, eat or not eat certain foods, may temper our sexual urges, and adopt other iconic symbols. These “uniforms” make the members uniform within the group and differentiate us from the rest. “One for all, all for one,” slogan that not only bound the three musketeers into a bond of comradery, it also provided each one with personal security. People join groups for safety and security. Fourth, most groups provide special membership privileges, which may include financial remunerations, varying from employment to part of the loot. Joining a group may also provide intangible benefits, varying from respect of the community to the adulation of prospective mates. The group benefits compete with our aspiration of being “our own person.” Joining a group has its costs, which may vary from financial contributions to physical assistance. The draws of the two permeate the lives of every one of us. I may recognize that joining a group is beneficial to my community, yet the cost of it can seem beyond what I am willing to pay still. This poses a trade-off. We often recognize the trade-off as moral dilemma. We all agonize over it before making up our minds.45

The three types of participants When we hear about terrorists or political activists, we often assume that they are all motivated by the greater good of their communities. This is a common perception. We expect those who are fighting in the name of their god to be religious scholars, the ethno-nationalists to be historians, or the communist activists to be proficient in Marxian philosophy. Yet, when we come face to face, we realize that most of them have only a vague notion of theology,

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history, or philosophy for which they are risking their lives. To most followers, their ideologies become not one to comprehend but to practice in almost ritualistic ways. For them, reason is replaced by ritual. Thus, for nationalists, the definition of a patriot is one who claims, “my country, right or wrong.” They claim their nation’s superiority over all others, shed tears on hearing the national anthem, and salute the flag even when there is nobody to see them. For the religious fanatics, true devotees are those who wear certain clothes, pray at certain times, and claim without hesitation that theirs is the only true religion. For the Marxists, the followers only know a few buzzwords and follow their leaders with unquestioned obedience. And, all of them swear to sacrifice everything for their ideology. How do we then explain the behavior of the true believers? Part of it is explained by our inherent need to follow people in authority. Part of it is based on our proclivity to use heuristics to find solutions to complex problems. That is, we seek some quick method to cut through the complexity of real life and derive a satisfactory conclusion that comports with our belief. This belief may not require quiet contemplation, and nor does it necessitate extensive research. Nandini Sundar narrates an apocryphal story about an illiterate young man who joined the Maoist movement in India. The arresting officer taunted him, “You Naxalites talk so much about Vietnam, show me where it is on the map.” The youth puts his hand on his chest and replied, “It is in my heart.”46 Once we accept an ideological position, we can become the true believers, as shown by Eric Hoffer.47 However, if we look at any dissident organization, we would find participants who are not even true believers. Many have little or no faith in the organization’s primary goal. Take, for instance, the historic case of the Crusaders. The call to Crusade was supposed to be for the glory of the Christendom. The volunteers, which included a broad cross section of the medieval population, from lowly farmers to the exalted princes, were part of a true popular movement, where the faithful responded to the pope’s call to arms against the Muslim occupiers of Jerusalem. Yet, soon the lofty goals were discarded as the crusaders engaged in looting, raping, and committing atrocities so heinous that it left an indelible mark on the minds of many in the Middle East. We find the same turn of events for nearly all of the political movements, where the true believers are mixed with the criminals and other miscreants. This odd mix often changes the ideological orientation of these groups. Although we would never know what the true motivations are for any single participant, we can see them in the revealed preference of a group’s activities, mirroring its inner workings. Beside the true believers and the mercenaries, a group, particularly as it develops strength, attracts those who become members out of fear of noncompliance. These are the captive participants. They have little interest in or understanding of the group’s ideological stance, and neither do they necessarily

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profit from its criminal activities; they join simply because the cost of not doing so is substantial. I argue that in order to fully understand a dissident movement or a terrorist organization, we must look at their composition. I also argue that as the political opportunities change, groups also tend to adapt by changing their orientation.

Summary The reason we are confused about the motivation for joining terrorist groups is because we have created a myth about our own mindset. If we assume human beings are solely motivated by their self-interest, then acts of self-sacrifice for a cause is seen as irrational. Based on recent advancements in cognitive science, evolutionary biology, and social psychology, I argue that the pursuit of self-interest alone cannot be synonymous with human rationality. Our need to belong is inherent and central to our being and rationality cannot be separated from emotion. All human groupings, including religious, nationalistic, or Marxist classism, are based on imagination, while human civilization, including terrorism and political violence, is based on our unique ability to work toward a common goal. Broadly speaking, what we choose to believe and do are the outcomes of the duality of our motivations: self and the collective. The interaction of the duality of motivation creates three ideal types of participants in collective action: the true believers, the mercenaries, and captive participants. Evolutionary biology has played an important role in our cognitive development. Therefore, to participate in the acts of self-sacrifice for the perceived good of the community is an essential part of our psychological makeup. While being altruist is deeply embedded in our psychology, we are also driven by our selfish desires. As a result, all of us find our lives’ choices as a part of a conflicting and confounding trade-off between the two motivations, making us “un-rational” beings. Evolution has imbibed in us the urge to submit ourselves to the dictates of leaders. During times of deep anxiety, we are apt to follow those who are unequivocal in their promises of victory over those who, we are told, are responsible for our state of mind. Like the pied piper and the children, we follow our leaders, sometimes to the path of destruction.

Notes 1 Aslan (2013); Goodman (2019). 2 Goodman (2019). 3 Was Jesus part of this religio-nationalistic movement? Historian Aslan (2013) created a firestorm of debate by elegantly examining Jesus the man in the context of the tumult of the first century BCE. 4 Kellen (1984: 10). 5 By drawing parallels to the mutation of genes, Dawkins (1976) coined the word, meme, as he explained how cultural information spreads through word of mouth or through writings. Later the word became synonymous with mutation of a word, primarily through the Internet. 6 Silvers and Haidt (2008).

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7 8 9 10 11

12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47

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Foucault (1970: xi). Ibid.: xxiii. Smith (1995). Macpherson (1962: 3) calls this “possessive individualism.” Economics, as it started to express its hypotheses through mathematical equations, needed one single explanatory force, akin to Newtonian cosmology. It needed a simplified behavioral explanation, which it readily found in the assumption of a self-utility maximizing actor. Some derisively maintain that economics suffers from “physics envy.” Smith (1937[1759]). Dawkins (1976). Ibid.: i. Johnson (1983: 6). Freud (1930). Lichbach (1995). Chong (1991); Kydd and Walter (2002). Stohl (2005). Sen (1987: 16, emphasis in original). Olson (1968). Samuelson (1938). The characteristic “exhaustibility” is also frequently called non-rivalrous. Mueller (1979: 146). Hirschman (1971: 5). Ostrom (1998: 1). Tullock (1971). Rose-Ackerman (1996: 701). Olson (1968: 161–162). Notice that Olson calls this behavior “nonrational or irrational,” which is in the strict sense of the narrow definition of economic rationality. Fiorina (1990: 334). Ostrom (1998: 9). Damasio (1994). Dictionary.com. Wilson (1975: 44). Silvers and Haidt (2008). Darwin (1859[1936]: 166). See Sober and Wilson (1998: 26). Darwin (1859 [1936]: 166). Wyne-Edwards (1962: 20). De Waal (1996). Sober and Wilson (1998); Oakley et al. (2011). Hill (2000). Sonne and Gash (2018). www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5917043/. Maslow (1968). I provided a formal model for this trade-off in the Appendix of the first edition of this book, which is not included in this one edition. Sundar (2016, xiii). Hoffer (1951).

3 PATH TOWARD PATHOLOGY An individual’s perspective

… to help others, it is not sufficient merely to wish to do so (that is to free others from sorrow and bring about their happiness). Indeed, altruistic thoughts can become an obsession and increase our anxiety … When such good and positive thoughts are combined with wisdom, we know how to help beings effectively and can actually do so. Dalai Lama1

Pants on fire! The story of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab is strange to say the least. On Christmas day of 2009, the then 23-year-old failed to detonate the plastic explosive – a soft Play Dough like substance sewn inside his underwear – as his plane was flying over Chicago on its way from London to Detroit. Although he failed to ignite the device, he suffered extensive burns all over his legs, especially in the groin area.2 Umar was the youngest of 16 children of a Nigerian businessman, often called, the “richest man in Africa.” Umar, a loner and a misfit, turned a devout Muslim at an early age and soon became detached from his family. While attending graduate school in London, he lived in one of the wealthiest areas in a flat owned by his father. Growing up in the lap of luxury, the young man became radicalized through the Internet, especially by the firebrand preacher, the American-born, Anwar Awlaki, espousing the al-Qaeda brand of militant Islam. For hours, he would listen to his sermons and watch graphic videos of suffering of innocent Muslims in the war-torn parts of world, which was seen as the handiwork of the US and its Western allies. In early 2009, Umar went to Yemen, visiting mosques, and he sought out Awlaki, spending three days with him discussing martyrdom and Jihad.3 Impressed,

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Mr. Awlaki introduced him to AQAP’s (al-Qaeda for the Arabian Peninsula) bomb maker, who fitted him with the special underwear. During the flight, some passengers noticed Umar’s pants were on fire. After being wrestled to the floor, when asked what he had in his pocket, the young man replied, “explosive device.” Although he did not succeed in his mission, his failed attempt created “havoc with the U.S. transportation system and the American economy.”4 We can understand sacrificing our lives for the good of our nation, religion, or some other cause. The question that boggles our minds is, how does one convince a young man at the prime of his life to set his crotch on fire to kill untold number of innocent people? If you asked Umar what precisely he was trying to accomplish by his act of extreme self-sacrifice, he might not be able to fully articulate his answer. However, there is one thing for certain: if he was asked why he undertook such the mission, he would surely respond that he was doing it for Islam. Being convinced that Islam was locked in an existential battle with the world of the unbelievers, Umar wanted to strike a blow in the name of Allah that would stun the world. Perhaps, he believed that the spectacle of his rage-filled mass murder would bring about the final battle between good and evil, where the good would ultimately prevail. He might have also thought that inflicting pain was a payback for the murder of his countless coreligionists all over the world. If his diabolical plot had succeeded, he not only would have killed everyone on board, the debris from the crash would have wrought death and destruction to many on the ground. He certainly did not know the people he would have killed or wounded and nor would he have considered them as innocent victims; to him, the real victims were the Muslims harmed by the American infidels. Umar was ushering in the Day of Judgment when, through Devine intervention, the believers would be victorious over the infidels and the apostates. Undoubtedly, he would have seen himself as an altruist, as would those who agree with his worldview. Umar Abdulmutallab did not articulate the logic of his actions, but many others, with similar missions, did. In 2011, in the normally placid Norway, Anders Breivik killed 77 and wounded over 110, many seriously. Most of the victims were Muslim children of South Asian immigrant families attending a summer camp. Breivik was clear about his mission as he wrote a lengthy Manifesto. He wanted to keep Norway white and Christian, free of dark-skinned people from other parts of the world. Berivik felt justified and even morally obligated to save Europe from racial contamination. He saw himself as a soldier fighting for the victims of the unwanted immigrants in his homeland. He also believed his actions would bring about a race war, where the whites would win. There is no doubt that Abdulmutallab, Breivik, and all other countless political dissidents, who thought their community was in peril, could have opted to stay on the sidelines, hoping that someone else would take up the fight. What caused them to overcome their natural inclination to free ride? It was ideological commitment that overwhelmed their selfish proclivities.

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Following this logic, there is no difference between the likes of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab and Breivik on one hand, and Mohandas Gandhi, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and Nelson Mandela on the other, since all of them were selfsacrificing altruists in pursuit of a change in the extant political system.5 While Gandhi, King, or Mandela did not kill, among the pure altruists, there are some who do: themselves. These are the people who give up their lives to make a point or to inspire others without taking another life. Durkheim recognized these acts of solitary self-immolation as “altruistic suicide.”6 On June 11, 1963, Thich Quang Duc, an elderly Buddhist monk, protesting the autocratic rule of Vietnam’s President Ngo Dihn Diem, having carefully planned with his fellow monks and activists, set himself alight at a busy intersection in Saigon. He assumed a lotus position, while other monks doused him with gasoline before he lit the fire. In the statement he left behind, he wrote: “I have the honor to present my words to President Diem, asking him to be kind and tolerant towards his people and enforce a policy of religious equality.”7 His highly publicized death turned the tide of protest movement against Diem and changed the course of history, as did the act of self-immolation by Tarek Mohammad Bouazizi, a humble Tunisian fruit vendor, who, on December 17, 2010, set himself on fire protesting the autocratic rule of President Ben Ali. His death also became the catalyst that started the Tunisian Revolution, which quickly spread to the other Arab countries, dubbed the “Arab Spring.”8 Can the men who carried out their grizzly protests that harmed no one but themselves be considered as egocentric, searching for glory in this or the next life? Biggs is emphatic when he states: “It may be paradoxical to call this the most nakedly ‘self-interested’ motivation, but surely one’s death is a small price to pay for eternal heavenly life or karmic advances … Yet evidence of such a motivation is almost entirely absent.”9 Biggs was speaking of Thich Quang Duc. However, his reasoned conclusion can be extended to others who gave their lives willingly to protect others. It would assuredly assault our sensibilities to equate these men with the likes of the 9/11 suicide attackers, despite the fact that both were prompted by the need to fulfill their perceived community obligations. A number of eminent biologists, however, would differentiate the two groups by calling those who would engage in indiscriminate killings in the name of their god, country, or economic class, “pathological altruists.” The primary aim of the pathological altruists might to increase the welfare of their group members but their actions negatively impact the lives of others. In contrast, we might call Gandhi, Dr. King, and Mandela altruists.

The avengers and the “damaged goods” Acts of pathological altruism often emanate from the perpetrators’ belief system or ideology. However, in some cases, these hateful acts of self-immolation can

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also be explained by personal factors, such as revenge, bonds (e.g., groups in combat), or personal glory.10 For some, revenge can be a strong motivator. On September 1, 2004, the world looked on with helpless horror when a group of terrorists stormed a school in Beslan, a Russian town in North Ossetia, and took over 1,000 hostages, including 777 children. The shock deepened when it was revealed that the hostage takers were mostly women from Chechnya and Ingushetia, two autonomous regions fighting for independence from the Russian Federation. When the siege ended through armed intervention by the state security forces, 334 people including 186 children lost their lives. The press quickly dubbed the female attackers “Black Widows,” a type of spider whose females are known for their lethal venom. Since many of the women were widows of deceased Chechen and Ingush fighters, and they wore black, the metaphor seemed appropriate so it stuck. Therefore, although we don’t know what motivated them to take the lives of so many hapless hostages, it is safe to conjecture that the primary motivation behind their assault could be revenge.11 When we think of mass killers motivated by the desire to avenge injustice, we often think of young men. Ted Gurr called his groundbreaking book, Why Men Rebel.12 Looking at the title, one may ask, what about women? Is political rebellion a game reserved only for men? Certainly, history is unequivocal in pointing out that although women participate in violent acts at a much lower number, they do so at all levels of rebel organizations, with the possible exceptions of orthodox Islamic or Jewish groups, where free mixing between sexes is strictly forbidden. In some rare cases, however, women have to ask for special dispensation from the leadership to be in the company of unrelated males to carry out their mission. In 2015, a middle-aged man and a woman took part in a devastating suicide attack on a wedding party in Amman, Jordan. They went through a marriage ceremony before their mission in order to circumvent the religious prohibition.13 From an organizational standpoint, it makes sense to use women, since in carrying out suicide attacks women could be used as a stealth weapon.14 Raising less suspicion, they are less likely to be suspects or searched. Bloom also observes through compelling case studies that although some of these women volunteer as martyrs, many more have been coerced by physical threats or other means of shame and social control.15 In other words, some of the women terrorists were led to believe that they were “damaged goods.” The best they could do for themselves, their families, and their community was to redeem themselves through the ultimate act of self-sacrifice. People also willingly give up their lives as a part of warfare. They not only willingly accept dangerous missions with high probability of death, but also volunteer for tasks, the success of which require the actors give up their lives. Lord Tennyson has immortalized the self-sacrifice of the British cavalry during the Crimean War in his poem, Charge of the Light Brigade. Facing an impossible task, assigned by mistake by the chain of command, the soldiers charged a well-defended German position,

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fortified with cannons, for the glory of the Flag. Although the Light Brigade took extremely heavy casualties, their death was not guaranteed. It would be so during the Kamikaze missions by the Japanese airmen during the waning days of World War II. In his detailed analysis of those Japanese men who undertook their suicide mission, Hill examines the religious and cultural factors along with military training that made it possible for the imperial forces to recruit the Kamikaze pilots and carry out these attacks.16 What about the prospect of limitless sex in paradise as a reward for selfsacrifice? It has also been widely reported and panned by comedians all over the non-Islamic world that the Koran promises the martyrs for the cause of Allah eternal life in paradise in the company of 72 virgins. There are numerous debates over this controversial claim. However, it is clear that for at least some of those who saw their acts as religious duties, the promise of heavenly sex did not play a significant role.17 Their writings and their final video testaments, however, are evidence that many saw their goals in political terms. Let us now look into the origins of hatred of an individual against the members of another group, which pushes one down the path toward pathological altruism.

Fairness deal: the eternal victims Nothing upsets a child more than the feeling of being treated unfairly. All of us can recall times when a child would loudly complain, “it’s not fair!” The sense of fairness is deeply ingrained in us. From our simian past, we have been acutely aware of inequity in treatment. Primatologist Franz de Waal demonstrated the impact of perception of unfairness by a famous experiment that he replicated years later. In this experiment, two Capuchin monkeys were placed side-by-side in two different cages. The monkeys would be rewarded if they returned a stone from inside the cages to the lab technician. The first monkey placed a stone on the hand of a technician and received its reward, a piece of cucumber, which made it happy. However, the second one, for the same task, was rewarded with a grape, which the monkeys prefer over cucumber. They would have been perfectly content with their recompenses, if those were the same. However, seeing the unfairness, the first animal became agitated; it threw the piece of cucumber back to the lab assistant, and then, as the unfair treatment continued, the offended animal started violently shaking the cage. De Waal had seen this reaction among the animals in the wild as well. The chimpanzees maintain strict hierarchical structure in their groups. And, if a lower ranking animal breaks the strict rules of hierarchy by trying to eat a bigger potion, eating out of order, or trying to mate with another member of the group, the dominant chimp will dole out punishment by biting, pushing, and shoving. After the hapless animal has been violently chastised, some might

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approach it and offer comfort by hugging and grooming. However, occasionally a dominant animal might assault another for no apparent reason. When that happens, the victim draws a more immediate and a bigger show of sympathy from the other troop members.18 De Waal calls this a demonstration of morality, where every primate is keenly cognizant of fairness and learns to empathize with the victims. Therein may rest the origin of our collective political action. This deeper understanding of human motivation has been largely ignored in Western social sciences and is coming more into focus as scholars from various branches of science, from primatology to cognitive science, are making important discoveries about our behavior. According to a recent US Department of Justice report, individuals go through four stages on their way to actually take part in acts of violence without initially belonging to any group.19 In the first stage, they are in a pre-radicalized state, where, being curious, they begin to look for news relating to a specific ideological movement. Soon they immerse themselves into accounts of torture and death of the members of their supposed community as they become disillusioned with the behavior of their country. In the second stage, they increasingly become detached from their old friends and relatives and start changing their behavior. Entrance to the third stage takes place when they actually reach out to the radical groups, either physically or through online connections. Finally, in the fourth stage they carry out an attack. Perhaps the most sophisticated example of a group attempting to recruit volunteers for their cause is the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant’s (ISIL) glitzy online magazine Dabiq, posted on the socalled Dark Web. Figure 3.1 depicts the path, where deep empathy leads to belief, and beliefs lead to either altruism or its pathological variation. The first state of awareness for a certain cause comes when someone becomes cognizant of unfairness, cruelty, or oppression facing a specific group. This awareness is often reinforced through reading news reports, listening to sermons, or watching videos, etc., which prompts them to do something to alleviate the suffering. They may feel inspired to help or may feel a sense of guilt for doing nothing. Within this group, some are motivated to assist the victims, while others seek ways to punish the oppressors. Those who join organizations such as Doctors Without Borders are altruists, and those who become part of a terrorist group to inflict pain on the offending group, regardless of personal culpability, are pathological altruists.

Theories of conflict By the approach of the twentieth century, the world was getting smaller by the day with the inventions of the telegraph, radio, and movies. News from the other parts of the world created the opportunity for the rapid spread of ideas. The full force of these technological changes helped create an educated middle class. At the same time, the unintended part of the technological revolution

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Witnessing others being unfairly treated

Develop empathy for the sufferers

Belief that I am responsible and/or I can help the sufferers

Amend my own behavior by suppressing selfish needs to help the victims: Altruists

FIGURE 3.1

Direct my anger toward the perceived enemies, responsible for unfair treatment: Pathological Altruists

Altruists and pathological altruists

created a yawning gap between the rich and the poor as many traditional jobs started becoming obsolete. While falls in the prices of consumer goods benefitted the rich and nearly rich, those on the bottom rung of the economy were relegated to permanent poverty. The widely felt grievances created an international wave of violence that swept across the world. First came the povertydriven movement in the form of anarchism, beginning around the 1880s. The anarchist movement subsided after the World War I, when a new source of grievance emerged. As the European powers became embroiled in fighting over their colonial holdings, a deep sense of nationalism stirred among the people in the occupied parts of the world. This gave birth to mass revolts in the colonized countries. The anti-colonial movement touched every continent. After World War II, such rebellions came to an end as the exhausted colonial powers relinquished their control and the former colonies gained independence. Meanwhile, the Western world witnessed the longest period of economic expansion, quelling the need and appetite for revolutionary changes. Therefore, in scholarly research just after World War II, the analysis of social conflict was overlooked. Anglo-American academics were happy to assume that social conflicts were associated only with far-away third world countries. World events, however, changed the course of scholarly interest when, in the 1960s, the United States saw politically motivated violence springing up all over the country. This was due to two primary reasons. First, as the African American veterans returned from a racially integrated military, bringing with them a new perspective on the world outside, they refused to live under the cruel Jim

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Crow laws. Racial tension boiled over into violent and non-violent uprisings. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. inspired both blacks and whites to join the civil rights movement, while those impatient with its pace, joined the black militant groups. At the same time, with frustration stemming from a seemingly futile war in Vietnam and the fear of being drafted into the military, student protests spread throughout the US. The demand for racial and economic equality, along with an end to the unjust war in Southeast Asia, gave birth to political violence based on leftist ideologies, which engulfed all major countries of Western Europe and even Japan. It also touched the rest of the world. The IRA in Northern Ireland, the Basques in Spain, the Baader-Meinhoff in West Germany, the Red Brigade in Italy, the IOKA in Cyprus, the Naxalites in India, and the Red Army in Japan created the global wave of international terrorism fueled by a core philosophy. Even groups in the Middle East such as the PLO and the PFLP, including the Baath Party in Iraq and Syria, were not motivated by religion; they espoused secular socialism. The post-World War II period can be defined by a number of technological innovations that promoted the perception of a “rational” self-centered man, at least in the nascent social science literature. The common assumption was that political violence and civil strife were the results of poverty and unemployment that produced these expressions of anger in the third world nations. With too much to lose, the citizens of the wealthy nations should be rational enough to avoid participating in these foolish errands. Befuddled by the sudden spread of political violence, the early explanations of political violence were built on what is known as frustration-aggression theory.20 The frustration-aggression theory argues individuals feel frustrated when they don’t receive what they believe is rightfully theirs. Aggression is the natural outcome of frustration as the aggrieved attempt to remove the source of their dissatisfaction. By extending this simple logic to the societal level, the early theorists argued that if a group of individuals feels deprived, presumably from poverty and income inequality, they will retaliate with violence. The 1950s and 1960s witnessed an unprecedented economic expansion in the so-called “first world” nations, while hunger, poverty, and extreme inequality of income gripped the “underdeveloped” parts of the world. The puzzle was that, following frustration-aggression theory, we could safely conjecture that political peace would prevail in the West, while the third world would be mired in violent conflict. Yet, post-War tranquility was broken in the mid-1960s when violence engulfed the affluent societies.21 The way out of this confusion was based on conventional wisdom that appears clearly in the works of a number of scholars, who proposed the alternative theory of relative deprivation.22 The problem with deprivation (or frustration) as a motivator for mass violence, the proponents of the theory claimed, is that the feeling of deprivation across nations is not absolute but relative.23 That is, we do not feel deprived when everyone around us is on the same boat of

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misery. Consider for instance that when you are caught in a traffic jam, looking at everyone stuck at a standstill, you may feel resigned to your fate of being late for an important appointment. However, your frustration would quickly intensify if you saw the lane next to you was moving but you were still stuck. In other words, how do we define poverty? Consider the absolute level of consumption of a poor person in an affluent society, who might be living in a house with running water, electricity, and assortment of electrical goods, including a TV set, and who also drives a car, albeit an old jalopy. The total amount of consumption would place this individual squarely as middle class in a less developed country. If you are unfortunate to live in such a country, seeing all your friends and neighbors in the same condition, you might not feel as deprived. In contrast, in a rich society, where your friends and neighbors are more affluent than you are, even with a much higher level of consumption, you would feel aggrieved. Recognizing the basic unfairness of your condition, where members of your reference group are doing better than you, you would want to throw a temper tantrum similar to the chimpanzee who did not receive grapes but only cucumbers, unlike its mate in the next cage. As the level of civil unrest intensified in the United States, the decades of the 1970s and 1980s saw a big push toward collecting data for empirical research.24 Until then, from Aristotle to Marx, scholars made pronouncements about the causes of political upheavals without any evidence. Their theories were simply based on conjecture. Now there was a real opportunity to use statistical analyses to test their hypotheses. Along with collection of data, came the advancement in computing technologies. It was now possible to estimate multivariate equations and build more involved econometric models. These two events saw a spate of publications on various forms of political violence and tests for the validity of proffered hypotheses.25 Around this time, a group of academics began working on social psychology, where, breaking from the individual-based variants of Freudian theories, they emphasized the importance of the group in the decision-making processes.26 Their findings went against a “rational” man making decisions, impervious to society, taken as granted in Western scholarship. With time, as problems with terrorism took center stage, scholars from many other fields began contributing to this burgeoning literature. And, in a most welcome boon to future researchers, federal money established the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) at University of Maryland, to collect national and international data on terrorism.27 While this torrent of empirical studies drew many interesting conclusions, one of the most puzzling aspects of the empirical findings was that the link between structural factors of deprivation, such as measures of poverty and income inequality, yielded only confusing or weak correlations with political violence in general, and terrorism in particular.28 Even factors such as individual freedom,

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measured in terms of quality of democracy, correlated feebly with the extent of democracy. I argue that in order to understand the relationship between factors of deprivation and violence, we need to look at another intervening factor. Since participation in collective action requires self-sacrifice, we need to understand the other motivating factor: the role of leadership. While we may feel deprived, angry, and disaffected by the prevailing socioeconomic and political system, we may not know how to respond. That is left to the leaders, who can frame the events according to their ideological perspective and “connect the dots” to create stories that resonate with a number of followers. The leaders not only tell coherent stories that show “us” as the victims, but also clearly point out the oppressors, our shared enemies. Once we accept their perspective, we are on our way toward radicalization.

The groups we join Being inveterate joiners, we join groups of all kinds. We join social clubs, political parties, as well as cultural and religious groups. Some of these groups may hold views that are at variance with what is currently the norm of the society. Most of us join groups following different pathways. Most of these groups are benign and a few are malevolent. Yet, the processes of our becoming a member of a group, regardless of the organization’s goals, are remarkably similar. What makes a difference amongst us is how much our commitment can draw us into supressing our individual interests for the greater good of the community. Since any group formation requires the mental construction of a collective identity, they bring ideas of who we are (“us”) and who our enemies are (“them”). We can classify group identity by the strength of these two factors. Consider Table 3.1 for illustration. When we join a cultural association, such as a book club, we feel a sense of belonging as we are among people of similar interests. However, unless it is a political study group, where a strong ideology permeates the activities or discussions, membership in a book club usually does not come with a readymade image of “us” and “them.” Hence, for these, we have a weak collective identity. On the other hand, joining a group such as Doctors Without Borders and volunteering to go to conflict zones, requires a much more serious ideological commitment, without a strong feeling of hatred toward a specific enemy. Hate

TABLE 3.1 Collective identity and types of groups

Weak Strong

“US”

“THEM”

Weak Cultural associations Humanitarian organizations

Strong Hate groups Violent dissident groups

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groups that spring up in many parts of the world are certain about their enemies, but may be fuzzier about their base community. For instance, an avowed antiLGBTQ group may not have a very well-defined sense of “us,” with a vague notion of their core group as heterosexual men, but will have a clear idea of who they are against. Finally, the last cell of our scheme contains radical groups, including those who we would call terrorists. Their membership requires fully embracing the group’s narrative of a strong and glorified view of their community and a burning hatred for their supposed adversaries. Needless to say, while the presented matrix may look clear cut, reality is much more nuanced. Nevertheless, it can give us an outline of a very generalized model of human association based on the relative strength of “us” and “them.” With this word of caution, let us concentrate only on the cell that produces religious and political extremists, and examine how some people turn pathological while addressing the shared concerns of their communities.

Steps toward radicalization The National Institute of Justice’s Domestic Radicalization to Terrorism program was launched in 2012 with a series of four grants to address the question how individuals in the United States become associated with terrorist groups. Based on their combined effort, Allison Smith published a comprehensive report, shedding light on the process of individual radicalization.29 These four detailed studies, conducted by scholars from different universities, looked at the various aspects of radicalization. The project by Brandeis University collected data on 135 home-grown offenders convicted of planning and/or participating in acts of terrorism. The collaborative project by a team from Indiana University and Victoria University examined the motivations of lone wolf terrorists, with 98 cases. The START Consortium, based at the University of Maryland, studied the processes and trajectories of radicalization motivated by a wide spectrum of ideologies. They considered a total of 1,475 individuals, some of who did not engage in illegal activities. Finally, with a sample size of 465 individuals, the team from Arkansas University tested various theories of radicalization with the real-life data. Despite their differences in methodology and research perspectives, these four studies, with some overlapping samples, gave us a fairly consistent overview on the question of radicalization. In addition to these four studies, other entities also developed their own perspectives on the question of radicalization. The New Work Police Department, after the 9/11 attacks, decided to develop their own taskforce on terrorism. The conclusions of their studies formed the basis of hypothesis testing for the group from Brandeis University. The path to terrorism can be divided in four stages. In the pre-radicalization stage, people are yet to be radicalized, but they start seeking support for ideas that are forming inside their minds. This can happen as a result of dinner table

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conversations among the elders of the family, who may pass their prejudiced views on to the children. Nobody is born with full knowledge of their community’s history and politics. Hating another group of people en masse is a learned behavior. Some of us may develop interest in the history of our ethnic or religious group. Thus, an IRA fighter remarked, “I always had this tremendous interest in Irish history.” He started going the IRA marches. His interest led him to become a member of radical groups: “when the trouble broke out in the six counties that I … found myself … I think in conscience anyway, becoming more and more … committed.”30 When people start getting radicalized, they experience detachment from their previous lives, from family and friends who don’t agree with them. They start becoming increasingly insular within the radical group. In their detachment, they build walls around themselves only to immerse themselves within the echo chamber of their like-minded comrades. Those who hold the strongest views gain currency within the chamber, while those in doubt start peeling off, leaving behind a hardened core of true believers. At this stage, their behavior may change, not only in their choice of attire but in proselytizing to their family, friends, or whomever is willing to listen. They may also start picking fights, defending their strongly held beliefs. The third stage happens when they leave home to join the group to be immersed with their peers. They may get training and become ready for action, which happens in the final stage, where a young man or a woman becomes involved in actual murder. Hamm and Spaaiji, as a part of the Indiana University team, studied the process of online radicalization. The process for a lone wolf to be radicalized without joining a group starts with a set of personal or political grievances.31 Some may feel isolated or be bullied in a society that does not understand or discriminates against a particular religious affiliation, ethnicity, or national origin. Their predicaments cause some victims to seek out like-minded people when they come across groups espousing similar beliefs. Through these groups, the seekers come across “enablers,” who inspire them through their manifestos, declarations, and sermons. Being inspired, they announce their intent over the Internet. Soon, they start writing their own screed and post them on social media. In some cases, they may also broadcast their violent intent. In this state, these individuals remain dormant like unexploded ordinances, waiting for someone or something to provide a spark or a jolt. When there is such a “trigger event,” they are pushed beyond the threshold from talk to action. Some identify the trigger events that caused them to carry out their threats, while, for others, several events accumulated over time that propeled them to carry out their threats.32 The University of Maryland team created PRIUS (Profiles of Individual Radicalization in the United States), which contains information and characteristics of convicted terrorists and non-violent radicalized individuals, who were inspired

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by Jihadi ideology. The PRIUS database indicated that 60 percent experienced personal, political, or religious grievances, 72 percent were affected by identifiable political events (trigger events), and nearly 50 percent were interacting exclusively with insular groups of radicals. Although the National Institute of Justice studies generally confirm findings of radicalization in the US, other than those who join during incarceration, the situation of recruitment in conflict zones around the world is somewhat different. For instance, in the boiling pot of Northern Ireland, children, especially young men, born in certain neighborhoods, joined radical groups as a right of passage. Scholars, who have interviewed the extremists on either side of the warring sides, have talked about growing up in “Republican” or “Unionist” households.33 Similarly, in countries, mired in sectarian violence, such as Pakistan, the birth of a child would often predict an individual’s political orientation.34 Ali al-Durrani grew up in the Saudi city of Khobar in a conservative Sunni family in a conservative town, in the most conservative country in the Islamic world. He joined al-Qaeda as a teenager, met all the top leaders, including bin Laden, and became disillusioned with the group, ultimately becoming a secret agent for the British intelligence services. In his memoire, written under his assumed name, Aimen Dean,35 he talks about his childhood, where radical Islamic ideology came literally with his mother’s milk. He writes: My earliest experiences nurtured a sense of sectarian identity. My mother was constantly scouring the local news channels for reports on the civil war that was tearing her homeland (Lebanon) apart. Watching her furrowed bow and listening to her quietly beseeching salvation for her family made a deep impact on me. I absorbed her obsession for the news … I was six.36 A similar situation prevails in prisons, where an inmate’s association with a radical group is a good predictor of his future mindset.37 People may join violent groups not only seeking spiritual redemption, but also because of peer pressure, or for their personal security. This situation is similar to that of growing up in gang-infested areas, where membership is bequeathed over generations, or is determined by the locality in which a child grows up. There are other personal factors that are unique to certain cultures. For instance, Bloom points out that in traditional Islamic cultures, divorced or windowed women are often recruited by making them feel like “damaged goods.”38 There are also stories where women are recruited through rape or photographed in an intimate relationship with their boyfriends, which could destroy their reputation. Feeling worthless, the only option open to these women could be to join the groups or become martyrs through suicide bombing. In 2005, ISIL recruited Sajida al-Rishawi, a 35-year-old woman, far past her days to find a husband, to be used as a suicide bomber. She was married off

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to a stranger in order not to transgress the strict Islamic law of mixing across the gender line outside of marriage. Together, they went to a posh hotel in Amman, Jordan, where a lavish wedding was taking place. They were fitted with suicide vests. The man exploded his vest and committed the deadliest mass murder the history of the country. Sajida panicked and ran. She was later arrested, still wearing her suicide vest. The following year, the judge sentenced her death. A decade later, when ISIL wanted to trade her for a captured Jordanian pilot, the king immediately ordered her execution.39 It is easy to conjecture that her seemingly “worthless” life as a spinster contributed to her recruitment in the deadly mission.

Sources of collective identity: delusion, illusion, and the ultimate truth As humanity evolved, so did the basis of group formation. Early humans, similar to their evolutionary ancestors, lived in family groups defined by genetic proximity; each member intimately knew everybody else. However, as families grew into clans, tribes, and eventually nations, it became increasingly impossible for anyone to know every member of a community. About 10,000 year ago, the first cities, such as Çatal Höyük, started to appear in what is now southern Anatolia. At its zenith, the Neolithic city boasted about 10,000 inhabitants. The glue that bonded such a large number of people together was a rudimentary moral culture and a similar set of beliefs in the supernatural.40 Haidt points out, “Morality and religion both occur in some form in all cultures and are almost always intertwined with values, identity, and daily life of culture.”41 It was imperative that a man could quickly recognize if a stranger was a friend or a foe. This necessity gave birth to body paintings, wearing of particular amulets, and use of other symbols, which would instantly announce an individual’s group affiliations. Symbols also came to represent belief in the supernatural. Communities adopted their group icons, which represented every member, which bound strangers in an invisible bond. Signa Romanum or the Roman Standard was a symbol of pride and belonging for each member of the Roman legion (infantry) or equites (cavalry). These standards served the same purpose as the cross for Christians or the star and crescent moon for the Islamic army. These otherwise meaningless objects came to be matters of such veneration that the followers would gladly sacrifice their lives to protect them from being desecrated. Throughout history, symbolic use of images, colors, shapes, along with songs and poems has served as mortar for the foundation of our imaginary ziggurats. Once constructed, these demanded unquestioned devotion from every group member. In terrorism studies, we often classify dissident groups as religious, tribal, nationalistic, or economic classists. I will argue that at core, they often get muddled as they truly are formed from our insatiable thirst for belongingness.

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Thus, Islam does not recognize nationalism; the overarching concept for the Muslims is the Ummah, the Islamic community. Yet, even the most ardent Jihadi groups are delineated along the lines of nationality, religious sects, and tribal origin. In Bengal, where exactly two years prior to the date of independence and the partition of India, a riot broke out between Hindus and Muslims, where uncounted thousands were slaughtered. While we may view this as a rise of religious identity for both sides, scholarly research has revealed the underlying class distinction: the resentment of poor and underclass Muslims against the rich and powerful Hindu upper class played a significant role.42 Dictator Pol Pot carried out the gruesome Cambodian genocide, where over two million died in the most appalling conditions in the name of creating a true nation of the proletariat. Yet, in 1997, as dying Pol Pot sat down with a Western reporter, he was firm in his conviction and animosity against the Vietnamese living in his country. He called them “evil,” and defended the bloodshed as acts of self-defense. Hobsbawm pointed out, neither communism nor religion could wipe out nationalism.43 However, I argue that at the core of all three is the human desire to form groups. The opportunists in every society create a witches brew of all three of these ingredients and call it something pure. Therefore, although we may look at identities based on religion, ethnicity, or economic class, when examined closely, they become hopelessly intertwined.

Religion Scott Atran asks an interesting question: why do we trust in gods?44 This heretical question goes to the heart of evolutionary logic. In a primitive society, without much surplus food, where every individual must devote every waking hour to hunting and gathering, why should anyone take time off for seemingly unproductive religious observances? If one group imposes a certain restriction on the behavior of its members, which prohibits them eating certain readily available nutritious food, participating in productive activities on certain days, or engaging in unrestricted pleasurable sexual activities, then does not another group that is unfettered by such restrictions have an evolutionary advantage over the one that imposes such prohibitions? Furthermore, religion presents a counterfactual, counterintuitive world of supernatural agents who manipulate peoples’ existential anxieties caused by an unpredictable future. Therefore, religion apparently poses this evolutionary puzzle: would a group not abiding by any religious constraint not have a greater inclusive fitness? The adherence to religious rites increases a group’s inclusive fitness. This is because religion provides a society full of disparate self-serving individuals with a coherent structure. All herding animals adhere to their group norms, which can vary among prides, parades, pods, and cackles. This allows them to settle disputes and maintain group cohesion based on clear distribution of labor and

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codes of conduct. Similarly, in human groups, religion provides the grist that holds a society together by clearly identifying those who are the members of the community through attire, norms, and rituals.45 It also singles out those who are outside the group. This process of identification allows members to be altruistic toward their own group while providing justification for extreme violence against the non-believers. For these reasons, religion has been one of the most potent sources of collective identity. In the name of God, we are not only ready to make the ultimate sacrifice, we are also ready to kill. Religion promises rewards, which may even be construed as instrumental in the minds of the strict adherents. The case against religion is indeed formidable. Since religion is about faith, to those with unquestioned fealty to every word of the sacred text, there is no compromise. The irreconcilable divide between faith and reason is recognized universally in every religion. While it is not clear whether the need for God is hardwired in the folds of our mysterious brains, there is no question of its allure to most of us.46 All religious-inspired movements define a millenarian concept to their followers. The unquestioned faith in working toward facilitating the returning of the Messiah immensely empowers the adherents. The rewards for the temporal toil come, if not in this life, in the afterlife. This heady notion of the quintessential good and evil allows people to engage not only in the ultimate acts of self-sacrifice but also in direct involvement in the most gruesome killings of the enemies of the ultimate good.47 The suspicion that religion in general and Islam in particular causes terrorism became reinforced at the sight of the religious zealots crashing airplanes to cause widespread death and destruction. Furthermore, it is apparent that despite the repeated denials by President George Bush and many others in positions of power, to many it seems like the enactment of Samuel Huntington’s work, The Clash of Civilizations.48 Facing this question, several lines of arguments have surfaced. Some have argued that, above all, religion and its many violent interpretations create mindsets that breed extreme religiously sanctioned violence. Others have pointed their finger squarely at Islam as the most intolerant religion of our times. Another group of writers has posited that it is not religion that gives birth to violence; concealed underneath the religious pronouncements are goals that are essentially political or territorial. They simply manipulate religious symbols and utilize the language of religion to achieve their true objectives. Some authors argue that religion, by its very nature, creates an imaginary world of the sacred and the profane, the believers and the non-believers.49 It also provides its followers with a supply of religious resources, such as God’s blessings, eternal life, Paradise, and salvation. To the strict adherents of religion, the supply of these resources dwindles as people move away from the “true path” shown in the sacred texts. The leaders of the fundamentalist religious movements claim that these resources were in abundance at some specified “golden time” in the religion’s history; their goal is to bring back those days of

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the Paradise on earth. The only way to achieve this goal is through self-sacrifice and by meting out punishment to the heretics and the other polluters of religious faith, who are the enemies of God. Some point out that it is not religion but religious practices that play an important role in preparing the mind of a terrorist for making the ultimate sacrifice. An alQaeda manual for the 9/11 attackers instructs the operators to “keep busy with repeated invocation of God.” Holmes points out: Prayer is behaviour, not thought. Indeed, prayer is ritual designed to block thought, to prevent the spontaneous upsurge of discordant desires, impulses and inclinations. Prayer is anaesthesia. Chanting, supplications, and religious songs and reciting scripture act as a sedative. It can even induce a trance. And, unlike daydreaming, it is a regulated behaviour. Reading the Koran into one’s palms and then rubbing one’s hands all over one’s body, in a ritual self-blessing, takes time and crowds out other thoughts. Mantras, like counting sheep, are standard techniques, recommended by psychotherapists, for managing anxiety and keeping demons at bay … The danger of last minute faltering can be minimized by shutting down most cognitive functions.50 Other influential scholars, such as Bernard Lewis, have pointed out that not all religions are the same in provoking violence.51 Some religions, like Islam, are much more prone to produce aggression and carnage than others. They argue that this is because, within its sacred text, Islam supplies justification of violence against the non-believers. Religious texts are often contradictory as they were written by different people and at different times in the antiquity. Thus, in the Koran, the Sword Verses, where the faithful are implored to kill the infidels in the battlefield, are directly contradicted by the verses of peace, forgiveness, and reconciliation. Taking a slightly different perspective, Selbourne argues that the current economic and political conditions are creating conditions within the Islamic nations and in the broader Islamic community where a virulent form of the religion can flourish.52 Unless we can take corrective measures in time, we in the West are bound to lose our battle with Islam. Writing a month after the deadly 9/11 attacks, author Salman Rushdie held Islam, or how the religion is understood by the multitude of its adherents, directly responsible.53 In his provocative article in the New York Times, Rushdie took aim at the prevailing “mantra” among the Western intellectuals: “This isn’t about Islam.” He flatly asserted that “[t]he trouble with this necessary disclaimer is that it isn’t true.” Rushdie explains: For a vast number of “believing” Muslim men, “Islam” stands, in a jumbled, half-examined way, not only for the fear of God – the fear more than love, one suspects – but also for a cluster of customs, opinions and prejudices that

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include their dietary practices; the sequestration or near-sequestration of “their” women; the sermons delivered by their mullahs of choice; a loathing of modern society in general, riddled as it is with music, godlessness and sex; and a more particularized loathing (and fear) of the prospect that their own immediate surroundings could be taken over – “Westoxicated” – by the liberal Western-style way of life.54 Rushdie’s criticism, however, does not make a distinction between what the religion truly preaches and how it is understood by many of its followers. The sacred books in every religion speak in mysterious words; the antiquated texts are open to wide variations of interpretation. The term Jihad, for instance, has been in the limelight due to the current wave of Islamic violence. To the outsider, it conjures up the images of a holy war, fought by wild-eyed fanatics. Within Islam, however, a distinction is made between Greater Jihad (conquering the inner weaknesses within one’s own self) and Lesser Jihad (taking up arms against an outside force when Islam is at risk). Even in the latter case, there exists a wide-ranging debate within the Muslim world regarding who can call (fatwa) for an armed response and under what circumstances. Facing this new global wave of terrorism, it is not uncommon to blame the religion itself,55 yet we can readily see that killing in the name of God is not the exclusive domain of Islam. The cruelty of the Crusaders toward nearly everyone they encountered is legendary and, in the Islamic world, the term “Crusade” evokes fear and revulsion. The excesses of religious zealotry gave birth to centuries-long fratricide between Catholics and Protestants. In the Hindu religion, which is generally seen as peaceful and meditative, the revelation of Lord Krishna in Bhagavad Gita exhorts Arjuna, the warring hero of Mahabharata, to engage in the slaying of his kinfolks in the name of Dharma yuddhya (holy war). The Buddhist monks in Sri Lanka, Burma, and Thailand have shown little compassion for the Tamils and have been most vociferous in pressing for war against them. In contrast to those who hold religion itself responsible for violence, Pape, after studying patterns of suicide attacks all over the world, is convinced that religion per se is not at the root of conflict.56 Since suicide attacks are carried out by secular Arab/Muslim groups such as the PFLP, the al-Aqsa Martyr Brigade, the Chechens, as well as secular Hindus, such as the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka, there is no reason to hold religion or, in particular, Islam responsible for these acts. Underlying all these acts of self-sacrifice is the presence of political and territorial claims. When we dig deep into our motivations we quickly discover that it is not religion per se that causes mass violence, but the fact that religion readily offers one of the most potent building blocks of collective identity. Thus Juergensmeyer points out: In looking at the variety of cases, from the Palestinian Hamas movement to al-Qaeda and the Christian militia, it is clear to me that in most cases

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there were real grievances: economic and social tensions experienced by large number of people. These grievances were not religious. They were not aimed at religious differences or issues of doctrine and belief. They were issues of social identity and meaningful participation in public life that in other contexts were expressed through Marxist and nationalist ideologies.57

Tribalism and nationalism The defeated band was about to cross the river when they were captured. At the bank of River Jordan, they were asked if they were Ephraimites. To save their lives, they claimed they were fellow Gileadites. By their looks, it was impossible to know if they were telling the truth. So, as The Book of Judges (Chapter 12) tells the story: the victorious Gileadite tribesmen asked each one of their captives to pronounce “Shibboleth,” a Hebrew word, meaning “husk,” which has no relevance to the story itself. Unfortunately, the captives, being from a different tribe mispronounced it as “Sibboleth,” revealing their identity. They were quickly put to death, all “forty and two thousand” of the Ephraimites. For the next 2,000 years, the word “Shibboleth” has stood for tribalism and sectarian violence. The parable of Shibboleth-Sibboleth also tells us one important aspect of ethnocentrism: our inability to readily identify one’s ethnic origin – we depend on minute variations amongst us. These are the cultural amplifiers, where dissimilarities in our pronunciation, food habit, choice of attire, or color play defining roles in determining identity and serve as instruments of oppression, derision, discrimination, and in extreme cases, genocide. During my fieldwork in Belfast, Northern Ireland, I came to know how the residents of the divided city look for small cues to identify whether a person is a Catholic or a Protestant. Of course, during intense ethnic conflicts, it makes sense to keep our antennae up for such signals out of our need for selfprotection. During the partition of India, where Hindus and Muslims slaughtered each other in abandon, neighborhood gangs would pull down the pants of men passing through their territory to see if they were circumcised, which would identify them as Muslims. It is therefore, no surprise that in the aftermath of the most horrific genocide between the Hutus and the Tutsis, the vice president of the Rwandan National Assembly told a Western journalist, “You can’t tell us apart, even we can’t tell us apart.”58 Generations of living side by side made most of the two tribes indistinguishable by looks, language, and last names. Yet, nearly a million people were killed in Rwanda in the name of ethnic purity, as happened in Bosnia and elsewhere.59 Similar to all other nations, American nationalism was not born immediately with the success of its military campaign for independence. Many remained loyal to the British Crown, others thought themselves as citizens of their own states within the Confederacy. Among the inhabitants of the colonized land, the

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issue of struggle for independence was hopelessly intertwined with the age-old rivalry between the French and the English on both sides of the pond.60 The rise of American nationalism is a complex story, further complicated by the fact that although the vast majority of the population was of European origin, the country in 1776 was already multi-ethnic with African Americans and Mexicans. Because of its English heritage, the common language was English. The myth of a “melting pot” was created much later in 1906, from a popular play by the same name. However, at the time of independence, it would have been absurd to assume that there was a sense of nationalism. Having come out of a bloody struggle with Great Britain, “Britishness” was not celebrated. So a separate nationalism had to be crafted; a new story had to be written, even the language had to be altered. Noah Webster advocated the use of distinctive spellings to differentiate the manufactured nation from British English.61 Lapore argued that this lack of national identity made ratification of the Constitution an uphill task.62 To her, the Federalists, were, in fact, the nationalists. The truism about nationalism in any country is that if you want to promote it, write a new history. A concerted effort was made, especially after the Civil War, to create a new history of the United States. It was mythologized, repeated endlessly during political discourse, taught in schools, and accepted as the only explanation. To the nationalists all over the world, history only poses pesky problems that should be ignored, reinterpreted, or rewritten. Thus, was the mercenary King William of Orange fighting for the glory of Protestants? In the murky history of medieval Europe, self-interested machinations of the potentates mattered more than their religious devotion.63 In current Indian politics, the Hindu nationalists may win political power, claiming Hindu religion as the eternal foundation of the country, but history tells a different story. The name comes from the River Sindhu, which, in the ancient language of Sanskrit means a large body of water. To the neighboring Persians, without having the sound “S,” it became Hindu. “H”, however, is silent in Greek, who pronounced it as Indu or Indus. Thence, came the Western name India. Hindustan, the land of the Hindus, was a geographic term and did not imply a religion. It evolved first as a convenient term to identify the non-Muslims by the British colonialists. The name “Hinduism” became firmly rooted as Indian authors accepted the term in their interactions with the colonialists and other Orientalists.64 Similar colonial characterization divided Rwanda by artificially promoting Tutsi and Hutu nationalism, which a century later paved the way for the genocide.65 Our national, ethnic, tribal, and clan identities are rooted in our primordial desire to form groups and act upon their perceived interests. Alongside religion, such groupings provide a potent source of collective identity. This group identity binds everyone born within a defined community. The members do not have to do anything special to be included in its membership

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and, once included, can bask in its past glories and seethe when remembering its humiliations – factual or mythological.66 By looking around the world, we can see nothing permanent in these groupings. The identities that once propelled groups to engage in extreme savagery are often relegated to history, while new identities are born. In today’s world the ancient enmity between the Scots and the English, the Swedish and the Fins are largely considered anachronistic, reduced to infrequent snide remarks or demonstrations of cultural pride. Today we do not even know the identity of the Canaanites and the Philistines, who were much reviled in the Bible. Few rise up to defend the honor of Prussia or the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Yet, we see bloody struggle for freedom by the East Timorians and the Bangladeshis, who did not exist as separate nations until recently. Once again, similar to religion, ethnicity and tribalism only serve as material for constructed identity. Built upon imagination, the hyper-nationalists and authoritarians look for a pithy slogan, which can dig deep into our imagination about what a nation ought to be. I will offer two examples. Being a pitchman, Donald Trump and his team had the sense for the perfect line to rally his supporters: “Make America Great Again.” Now, if we dissect the line we can see so many imbedded ideas. First, if we say “Great Again,” we conjure up a dream world of when the country was great. When would that be in nearly 250 years of history? The most likely candidate would be in the immediate post-World War II era. This is supposed to be the time when the US ruled supreme in the world with its overwhelming military might, when Europe was still dependent on Marshall Aid to rise from the ashes. Many of the old television shows would take us to the make-believe world of Ozzie and Harriet, and “Leave it to Beaver,” where everything looked perfect, being divorced from the soiled reality of the time. In these shows, dads worked and moms stayed home to raise children. None of the shows made any pretense of the fact that the racial minorities were under Jim Crow rule in the South, or that women had few opportunities to earn money in professional jobs. White men ruled with exclusive privilege over all others, while the lynching of African Americans went on unabated. Internationally, the US was a superpower, but was threatened by the equal military strength of the Soviet Union. Take for instance, the battle cry for the Hindu Nationalist Party, Hindutva, which Oxford English Dictionary defines as the state or quality of being Hindu, or Hinduness. Bhatt defines the term even more broadly: Hindutva is not a word but a history; not only the spiritual or religious history of our people as at times it is mistaken to be by being confounded with the other cognate term Hinduism, but a history in full.67 In other words, it goes far beyond religious affiliation, and provides an allencompassing social, cultural, and political identity of those living in the

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geographic area between the Himalayas and the Indian Ocean. To an ardent believer, however, the term makes ready sense, based on nothing more than intuition. Once again, upon closer inspection, it becomes a vacuous nothing. First, it is debatable whether Hinduism is a single religion. Similar to Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and Judaism, it is fractured along many sects and beliefs. For instance, the primary deity of eastern India (Bengal, in particular) is Kali. For those living in the Hindi-speaking belt in the center of the country, it is Ram. The Maharashtrians venerate Ganesh, and in the South for some, it is Shiva and for others, Vishnu. Although philosophically Hindus accept that all these deities are but expressions of one Supreme Being without form or description, the religious faith, practices, and cultural mores vary widely in India. Yet, as Amartya Sen (1987) points out, the word Hindu is being used as a political weapon, without anyone knowing what it can truly mean. Yet, that is the basis of the alluring, intoxicating, and vicious power of nationalism. When does a group of people start to think of themselves as different from the rest? History shows that while nearly the entire world live in multi-ethnic, multilingual, multi-hued, multicultural societies, factions within each nation define themselves on the basis of a certain misunderstood identity. Anderson points out that a deep division develops between the champions of separate nationalism and those looking from the outside. This division involves: (1) The objective modernity of nations to the historian’s eyes vs. their subjective antiquity in the eyes of nationalists. (2) The formal universality of nationality as a socio-cultural concept – in the modern world everyone can, should, will “have” a nationality, as he or she “has” a gender – vs. the irremediable particularity of its concrete manifestations, such that, by definition, “Greek” nationality is sui genesis. (3) The “political” power of nationalism vs. their philosophical poverty and even incoherence. In other words, unlike most other isms, nationalism has never produced its own grand thinkers: no Hobbeses, Tocquevilles, Marxes, or Webers.68 This conceptual ambiguity of nation and nationalism led a noted scholar, having studied the phenomenon for decades, to ruefully conclude: “Thus I am driven to the conclusion that no ‘scientific definition’ of the nation can be devised, yet the phenomenon has existed and exists.”69 Nationalism, therefore, is truly a mental construct, which creates an imagined community inhabited by likeminded individuals.70 In its most volatile cocktail, nationalism and religion often mix into a deadly concoction of “holy nationalism.” At the time of writing, we are witnessing a global surge in authoritarianism and macho-nationalism in the rise to power of Russia’s Vladimir Putin, Poland’s Jaroslaw Kaczynski, Hungary’s Viktor Orban, Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Philippines’ Rodrigo Duterte, India’s Modi, Brazil’s Bolsonaro, China’s Xi Jin Ping, and the United States’ Donald Trump.

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Marxist class identity Marxist class identity is based on the ownership of the means of production. Marx saw the world in the binary terms of those who owned the means of production (capital) and those who toiled without owning them. To him the conflict between these two classes was the fundamental dialectic that propelled the evolution of capitalism and led to its inevitable destruction. Karl Marx rejected the conceptions of identity based on nationalism, religion, culture, or ethnicity as epiphenomena, a false identity. He essentially argued that belonging to an economic class is determined by birth. In Marxist writings, class-based identity becomes indelible, which the revolutionary leaders attempt to unmask by revealing to the masses the “true nature” of the eternal conflict created as a result of the establishment of the capitalist system. Indeed, the first organized government set up along the lines of Marxist ideology, the Soviet Union, steadfastly refused to give itself a nationalistic name. Thus, it was not the Socialist Republic of Russia, but a large conglomerate of Soviet Republics.71 Despite claims of economic class being the true identity, one of the biggest failures of Marxist theory is its inability to grasp the draw of other sources of identity. As soon as the Soviet Union imploded, like the Russian doll, a new subnational identity came out of the larger national entity in a seemingly endless series of divisions; the Abkakhsians, the Chechens, the Ingushetians began claiming their place in the sun as separate nations. In China – where nationalism has been forcefully foisted on the population, replacing religion – there are definite chasms along the lines of ethnicity, such as between the Hans and the Tibetans and the Uighurs. There is also traceable animosity between the city and the country and between the coastal regions and the inlands. Without a strong central government, the solid Chinese national identity, displayed through careful and constant government propaganda, might shatter instantly into a thousand pieces. We saw that in the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia. If the Chinese Communist Party loses its grip, it may also have the same fate as the erstwhile communist nations.

Call of the collective It feels good to be part of the collective; there is no denying of the fact. The ready acceptance, the cheers, and the steps of the ritual, which everyone in the group knows, fill our brains with pleasure hormone. “All for one and one for all” resonates with nearly every one of us. As intensely social animals, we crave company of like-minded folks, the camaraderie, the mutual support and reassurance. Plato’s vivid description is just as apt today as it was more than 2,000 years ago.72 How can someone resist the gratification of belonging to a group when (t)hey crowd into the seats in the assembly, or law courts or theater, or get together in camp or any other popular meeting places and, with a great deal

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of noise and a lack of moderation, shout and clap their approval, or disapproval, or whatever is proposed or done, till the rocks and the whole place re-echo, and re-double the noise of their boos and applause. Can a young man be unmoved by all these? He gets carried away and soon finds himself behaving like the crowd and becoming one. This is the mob mentality, which has frightened and, at the same time, fascinated scholars throughout history. Roman historian Livy analyzed the causes of Rome’s downfall and pointed the finger at the mob, which he argued sapped the Empire from within of all its energy. Sir Thomas Moore, in his famous screed, Utopia, advocated the need of a “just” Christian king to forcefully suppress the mob. In the perfect society, the death penalty was reserved only for those who would discuss politics outside the walls of the Senate. Gustav Le Bon was captivated and yet repulsed by the sight of mob going through the streets of Paris during the chaotic days of the Revolution, smashing everything that he cherished as a civilized man. Le Bon repeatedly compared their impulsiveness, “incapacity to reason, absence of judgment, and exaggeration of sentiments,”73 as found among inferior minds, such as women, savages, and children. The street mob was a source of fear for those who were at the apex of society when there was no way of communicating across vast distances. However, as technology accorded us with the ability to exchange ideas, the problem of angry protesters, violent or non-violent, became acute. The phenomenon that scholars from Plato to Le Bon described is the working of and hyperactive expression of collective identity, the fight between the community and its implacable enemy. It shows up in many forms from relatively small to those that can change the course of history. There is a sad fact of life: in the US, where the obsession with professional football teams runs deep, police departments across the nation report that after each game the number of calls for domestic abuse shoots up.74 The game of football, played by groups of millionaires employed by billionaires, evokes such a sense of group loyalty that ordinary people take out their disappointments on their own families. This strong identification with sporting teams all over the world simply reflects our evolutionary need to form community bonds and fight against the “enemies.”75 The roots of our national, ethnic, tribal, and clan identities are similarly rooted in our primordial desire to form a group and act upon its interest. Such groupings provide one of the most potent sources of collective identity. This identity embraces everyone born within a defined community.

Roots of faith: a personal encounter The world is too large and too complex for our individual comprehension. Thanks to millennia of observations, we have come to know some of the basic facts that govern our lives: searching for patterns; science and God. We cooperate,

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we try to help each other, and learn from one another. This also leads to illusion and delusion. Why do we believe what we believe? Have we any proof of most of what we choose to believe? We all believe that we need oxygen to live. It is one of the chemicals that we breathe in every minute of our existence. Yet, how many of us have tested the hypothesis by isolating oxygen from the air to see if we can survive? There are some people who believe that the earth is flat. Because what we see all around us is contrary to the scientific explanation. Whether we stand on a mountaintop or stroll by the beach, the earth appears to be flat. Then why do most of us believe that we need oxygen for life or that the earth is round? Sloman and Fernbach76 argue that we acquire knowledge collectively. Our brains can hold at most one gigabyte of information, while my tiny flash drive holds 128; this gap is likely to have grown by the time this book is published. Yet, to survive in the world, we need to gather information without going into details and stitch them all together in a coherent mental world in which we live. It is true for every one of us. In our collective brains, we often hold views that are contrary to the norm. In fact, the most alluring fact of believing in conspiracy theory is that it allows us to believe that we know something that others don’t. This exclusivity gives us power. Thus, as Richard Dawkins, in his much-debated book, God Delusion77 points out, we invented God in our own image because our distant ancestors needed explanations for things that they could not readily explain. If we acquire illusion and get deluded by false ideas, then we must note that it is the same path of finding patterns that led to scientific inquiry. Hence, searching for a terrorist personality, we come up empty handed. The trail that leads to knowledge takes us to blind faith, just as our compassion for others turns some of us into pathological altruists. It was a chance meeting where I recognized a man as Mr. Earnest. He was a popular science teacher at my neighborhood high school. My children had him as their teacher – a caring, learned man, who could make his physics class interesting to his students. He introduced his son John, a polite 19-year-old young man who was an honor student and an accomplished pianist. The three of us chatted for a while. About three weeks later, I was horrified to learn that the polite teenager had shot up a nearby Jewish temple, killing a woman and wounding the Rabbi and a small child. In a statement, the anguished parents stated: Like our other five children, [John] was raised in a family, a faith, and a community that all rejected hate and taught love must be the motive for everything we do. How our son was attracted to such darkness is a terrifying mystery to us, though we are confident law enforcement will uncover many details of the path that he took to this evil and despicable act.78 All my adult life, I have been studying terrorism and terrorists. In my youth, I was part of the Naxalite movement, as was most of my friends and several

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family members. As an academic, I have talked to many former terrorists and read their memoirs. Yet, this chance encounter shook me up as it was too close to my conform zone. John looked like any other teenager, without a hint that he was posting his manifesto online and perhaps was allegedly planning the deadly attack on the synagogue. Police also reported that he was linked to another attack on a mosque. What surprised me about John Earnest’s belief system comes from his on-line Manifesto.79 In 1475, in the mediaeval Italian town of Trent, the murdered body of a two-year-old Christian boy, Simon Unverdorben, was found near some Jewish homes. Immediately, the authorities arrested every Jewish person in the city. After prolonged torture eight Jewish men were beheaded or burned at the stake for the crime.80 Rumor started to spread that Simon was killed in a ghastly ritual of mixing the blood of Christian babies in bread during the Jewish festival of Purim. The Bishop of Trent financed the writing of poems that praised the martyrdom of the toddler and the perfidy of the Jews. Amazingly, nearly 550 years later, my neighborhood boy, John Earnest, in his digital post had dedicated his killing as a revenge for little Simon. If John Earnest’s action surprises us, we should note the astounding ability of the human mind to believe in anything absurd. Consider this bizarre incident. In March of 2016, a conspiracy theory, dubbed Pizzagate by the media, started spreading through the Internet. Members of the alt-right and other opponents of Clinton’s presidential campaign falsely claimed that emails, recently hacked and made public by WikiLeaks, contained coded messages, not for delivering pizza but for sending children for sexual abuse. These messages accused Mrs. Clinton and some high-ranking officials of the Democratic Party of running an alleged child sex ring involving the restaurant and pizzeria Comet Ping Pong, located in Washington, DC. A man from North Carolina traveled to Comet Ping Pong to investigate this conspiracy, during which he fired a rifle inside the restaurant, claiming he was trying save the children. Such is the human mind. Dzokhar Tsarnaev was printed on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine in July 2013, creating a firestorm of criticism in the country.81 Only two months before, Dzokhar along with his brother, Tamerlan, had planted homemade bombs that killed three and physically injured 264 at the Boston marathon and dealt a psychological blow to the entire nation. In this portrait he looked too much like so many other teenagers, who stumbled at the doorstep of adulthood. “How dare they show his human face after what he had done?” The headline of CNN news screamed, “Rolling Stone Cover of Bombing Suspect Called A ‘Slap’ to Boston.”82 When thinking of a mass murderer, like Dzokhar Tsarnaev, we expect to see the face of a monster; like the fictional Rosemary’s Baby, a child is born with the mark of a devil. Unfortunately, terrorists and others who willingly participate in genocidal frenzy are no different from the rest of us. While their acts are heinous, we cannot deny their humanity.

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Janus’s children: a balancing act Janus, the Roman god, is shown with two heads. Symbolizing the beginning – the Roman calendar starts with January, bearing his name – the ancient deity whose symbol adorned the doorway to many Roman homes perhaps also serves as the representation of the duality of our motivations and the fundamental inner conflict between the welfare of our own self and the welfare of the group in which we claim our membership. We all strive for our personal welfare, wealth, prestige, power, love, respect, and rectitude. At the same time, we want to do good for our community, even at the cost of our personal wellbeing. In our actions we are sometime selfish and sometime altruistic. This conflict can sometimes pull us in the opposite directions; and at other times the two faces can merge into a single confusing overlap. I posit that if we are to understand the root motivations of terrorism, we must do so within the context of this eternal duality.83 Thus, I assume that rational beings do not pursue a single goal but, by having a dual motivation, face an eternal trade-off between trying to attain private goods for themselves and public goods for their communities.84 Although the idea of expanding the fundamental assumption of rationality may seem fairly reasonable to those outside the realm of economics and its progeny, the adherents of the “rational choice” theory, for them the idea of selfutility as the sole motivator is held as sacrosanct. As I have noted before, many prominent economists have questioned the validity of the assumption of selfutility maximization, but none has offered an alternative. Thomas Kuhn pointed out that a scientific paradigm that is accepted as “normal science,”85 could not be replaced simply by exposing its conceptual weaknesses. A scientific paradigm is replaced only when a new theory can conclusively prove its superiority over the accepted one. In social sciences, paradigm shifts have come at the dictates of a radically changed political, sociological, or economic reality. The advent of the Industrial Revolution made mercantilism obsolete and gave birth to Adam Smith and neoclassical economics. The Great Depression produced Keynesian economics, which placed the government in the driver’s seat of the national economic engine. The overregulated 1970s saw the resurgence of liberalism. Today, when we face an intellectual challenge in the shape of global terrorism, I believe that it is time to re-examine the basis of some of the fundamental assumptions upon which the current “normal science” of social inquiry is based.

Participants and their motivations Since we are all Janus’s children and experience tension between our two motivations, when we decide to join a group, we do so because we truly believe in its mission, or we may feel that our membership would help us achieve our social or economic goals. Thus, most college-bound students in the United States join charitable organizations. Some join because of their passion, while others to pad their resume for entrée into selective institutions of higher learning.

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The same is true for the dissident groups. If people become members of a radical group, primarily for reasons of religious, nationalistic, or class obligations, we can call them “true believers,” a term popularized by Eric Hoffer in his influential book with the same title.86 Hoffer’s true believers are those who possess many of the following characteristics: • • • • • • • • •

A closed mind with no room for contrary opinions. Define themselves primarily by their ideological orientation (I am a “Hindu,” or a “German,” or a “proletariat”). Total submersion in a belief system, espoused by a certain leader. Complete denunciation of the former members of the group (an “apostate” or a “traitor”). Inability to laugh at themselves or accept even a mild affront to their faith. Acceptance of extreme violence against their enemies, particularly if promoted by the leader. An absolutist view where the world is divided in a binary form: “good” and “evil.” Their personal lives are secondary to their belief system. Adherence to authoritarianism, with the leaders viewed as “infallible.”

The true believers must populate all ideological groups since without them those groups would not be able to sustain their moral orientation. This is especially true when the group is in its infancy and does not have any political clout to provide any private or club goods. Interestingly, Hoffer also noted that among the true believers, we could find “con men,” those who would cloak themselves in the garb of the group’s ideology in the hope of personal gains. In my classification, I call them “mercenaries.” In fact, in any religious or political organization, we would find the criminal elements, those who join a movement with ulterior motives of loot, rape, or some other matter of personal gratification. Finally, in any movement we would find another group of joiners. I call them “captive participants.” These are folks who are coerced into participation; for them, the cost of not joining is too great. Goldhagen, in his controversial book,87 painted the entire German population with the broadest possible brush, calling them “Hitler’s willing executioners.” Yet, there is hardly a doubt that many Germans, living in a society controlled by the Nazis, found ways to work within the system without having any commitment to the prevailing ideology or even a strong hatred toward the Jews, the Gypsies, and others. In his powerful narrative, eminent psychologist Robert Lifton described the mindset of the Nazi doctors who volunteered to work in the concentration camps.88 They were responsible for determining which of the men, women, and children should die in the gas chambers and which ones

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were to be saved. A group of them also took part in gruesome experiments on the prisoners. Yet after an exhaustive study, Lifton determined that many of the doctors saw working in the concentration camps as a career move. Also, since these camps were often away from the front lines, these men saw their appointment as a safe bet for themselves and their families. “Know thyself” is an apocryphal aphorism that sets us on the unattainable path to self-realization. We often do not know when our altruism hides a crass self-serving pursuit. As I mentioned, nobody is a pure altruist who receives no pleasure in helping others, costing their own welfare. In fact, research on happiness shows that people get happier when they partake in altruistic activities.89 Yet, we know every successful dissident group attracts the “criminal elements.” Similarly, we know that when a group becomes powerful, it develops the coercive power to compel those who may not believe in the cause to work for it, since the cost of not joining can be substantial. We see it in neighborhood gangs, as well as in terrorist organizations. Based on the work of Paul Samuleson, economists classify all goods into three classes.90 The “private goods” are those – like all the products you purchase for your own consumption – that provide utility only to yourself. The “club goods” are for the members of a group only, which may vary from a condo association (where the residents are allowed to share the amenities they pay for) to a criminal organization (keeping the ill-gotten money for the members). Finally, the “pure public goods” are those that do not restrict their use to only those who contribute to their production. Thus, being too poor, too young, or a tourist from a different country, you may not have paid taxes for the clean air you breath, the clean water that you drink, or the infrastructure that you use for transportation, yet you are allowed to use them like any taxpayer who paid for them. This is an important qualifier, particularly the goods that are produced and consumed by associating with others – the club goods and the pure public goods – for understanding of a dissident organization. A dissident group aims at achieving a social structure based on its ideological view. The IRA wants Northern Ireland to be part of the Irish Republic, al-Qaeda wants to see everyone live under Sharia law, the Tamil Tigers wanted to carve out a Tamil homeland on the island of Sri Lanka, and the civil rights movement in the US aimed at creating a society that would judge people by the content of their character and not by the color of their skin. If you agree with the political goals of these groups and they are able to achieve them, then presumably, you would be happy. You would be delighted to live in a society that conforms to your ideals, whether you were part of the movement or not. Think, in contrast, of the drug cartel that Pablo Escobar created in Colombia that became incredibly rich. The fruits of their labor did not go to everyone, but only to those who were part of his group. This important distinction separates a political group from a criminal gang. As we are conflicted between our two sources of motivation and often are confused about exactly where we stand, the dissident groups also face the same

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Primary Motivation Ideology

FIGURE 3.2

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Type of Participant True Believers

Personal Gains

Mercenaries

Fear (cost of not participating)

Captive Participants

Primary motivation

the uncertainty. We know that the Colombian group, FARC, became highly involved in coca production and became very close to being a drug cartel. When did they begin this process? Did they recognize their shifting ideological position? What about Sendero Luminoso (The Shining Path) in Peru, the Taliban in Afghanistan, Hezbollah in Lebanon? We cannot answer these questions with any kind of precision, but we can develop a conceptual framework with which we may be able to understand how groups vacillate between their ideological orientation and the lure of making easy money from ancillary illegal activities, from drug manufacturing to human trafficking to gun running. The distinction between ideology and criminality is not binary. Nothing in our social lives is. In this book, I am proposing that in order to understand the motivations of the individual terrorists and their organizations, we must recognize the three kinds of participants: the true believers, the mercenaries, and the captive participants, and on the basis of this albeit imprecise separation, build a theory of the life cycle of a group that captures the essence of their dynamics (see Figure 3.2).

Summary This chapter has examined the reasons behind an individual’s taking part in acts of political dissidence. Acts of political dissidence are rooted in altruism and when our altruistic mind goes beyond serving our community and is based on exacting revenge on the perceived enemy, we call it pathological altruism. In a political conflict, the leaders of all the involved parties claim victimhood and fight for fairness. Our evolutionary disposition to follow leaders compels us to get involved in the fray, often behaving pathologically. Although we classify motivations for terrorism as religious, nationalistic, or Marxist, in reality, they are intertwined and upon closer inspection, we find the lines of demarcation blurred. Despite the fact that in the Western cultural ethos and prevailing academic tradition, we define human rationality as pursuit of self-interest, I argue

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that we resemble the Roman god Janus, with two heads. We are selfish and self-interested, but we are also biologically programmed to be altruistic. This conflicting duality explains our complex nature. Based on our discussion, I develop three ideal types of participants. I call them the true believers, the mercenaries, and the captive participants.

Notes 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39

Quoted in O’Connor et al. (2012: 10). Napolitano (2019). Savage (2012). Soufan (2017: 20). Gandhi (2012). Durkheim (1997). Quoted in Biggs (2005: 173). Willis (2014). Biggs (2005: 198) Atran (2003b); Elster (2005); Kruglanski et al. (2008). Kurtz and Bartles (2007). Gurr (1970). Warrick (2015: 3). Bloom (2011). Bloom, Ibid. Hill (2005). Warraq (2002). De Waal (1982). www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/250171.pdf. Dollard et al. (1939). See Chapter 2 of the first edition of my book for a more detailed discussion of various theories on terrorism. Feierabend et al. (1969); Gurr (1970). For an early warning about people left behind during the period of prosperity, see, John Kenneth Galbraith (1958). Taylor and Hudson (1972); Taylor and Jodice (1982). Hibbs (1973); Gupta and Venieris (1981); Venieris and Gupta (1983, 1985, 1986). Tajfel (1981, 1982). www.start.umd.edu. Krueger and Maleckova (2003). For a more detailed discussion of the poverty, income inequality, and index of democracy with terrorism, see the previous edition of this book. Smith (2018). In Northern Ireland, the decades long sectarian bloodshed is euphemistically known as “trouble” (Horgan 2005a: 86). Hamm and Spaaij (2015: 16). Hamm and Spaaij (2015); Klausen (2015b). Horgan (2005b); Taylor (1988). Murphy (2019). Dean (2018). Ibid.: 8. Ruschenko (2019); Silke and Veldhuis (2017). Bloom (2011). Warrick (2015).

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40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50

51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61

62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77

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Harari (2017). Haidt (2006: 230). Das and Bandopadhyay (1993). Hobsbawm (1996). Atran (2002). This is known as “signaling” in game theory parlance. Dawkins (2006). Juergensmeyer (2003). Huntington (2007). Avalos (2005). Holmes (2005: 151–152, emphasis in original). Are human beings hardwired for God? Neurologists Newberg and Waldman (2006) claim that our brain structure is designed to believe in the supernatural. As a result, regardless of culture, religious experiences appear to be remarkably similar; people experience similar kinds of exuberance after a religious experience. Neurologically, these responses are produced by certain regions of the brains. Scans show that during meditation certain parts “light up,” producing a universal sense of pleasure and exaltation. Atran (2002), however, does not attribute much significance to the neurological claims, and emphasizes the evolutionary need for religion in producing group solidarity. Lewis (2002). Selbourne (2005). Rushdie (2001). Ibid.: 1. For an open indictment of the mainstream Islam as a source of violence, see Hamid (2007). Avalos (2005). Pape (2005). Juergensmeyer (2003: 141, my emphasis). Gourevitch (1998: 50, emphasis original). Rummel (1997). Rapoport (2011). I did my post-doctorate in Belgrade when the language in Yugoslavia was called Serbo-Croatian, which accepted other variations, such as Macedonian and Monte Negran, as its dialects. After the bloody separation, each sovereign nation became busy in constructing its own language. Lapore (2018). Claydon (2002). Pennington (2005). Prunier (1995); Gupta (2001a). Lapore (2018). Bhatt (1997: 186). Anderson (2003: 5). Seton-Watson (1977: 204). O’Brien (1988: 80). See Anderson (2003: 2). Plato (1963: 492). Le Bon (1963: 10). Although the police departments across the nation have reported a surge in domestic abuse following football games in the US, a number of studies have disputed such claims. See, for example, White et al. (1992); Sachs and Chu (2000). For a very interesting description of fan behavior among English soccer hooligans, see Buford (1992). Sloman and Fernbach (2017). Dawkins (2006).

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78 www.cbsnews.com/news/poway-synagogue-shooter-family-of-suspect-john-earnestreleases-statement-on-attack-san-diego-synagogue/. 79 Lavin (2019). 80 Jewish Encyclopedia. www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/13752-simon-simedl-simon cino-of-trent. 81 www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/jahars-world-20130717. 82 www.cnn.com/2013/07/17/studentnews/tsarnaev-rolling-stone-cover/. 83 Gupta (1987, 1990, 2001a, 2005); Gupta and Singh (1992); Gupta et al. (1997). 84 I provided the outline of a more formal presentation of my argument in Appendix A of the previous edition of this book. 85 Kuhn (1970: 10) defines “normal science” as “research firmly based upon one or more past scientific achievements, achievements that some particular scientific community acknowledges for a time as supplying the foundation for its further practice.” 86 Hoffer (1951). 87 Goldhagen (1996). 88 Lifton (1986). 89 Haidth (2006). 90 Samuelson (1954).

4 TERRORISM AND POLITICAL VIOLENCE An organizational perspective

Surprise, surprise! Daniel Coleman, an agent in the Federal Bureau of Investigation, “first heard of him in 1993,” writes Lawrence Wright, when a foreign source spoke about a “Saudi Prince” who was supporting a cell of radical Islamists who were plotting to blow up New York landmarks, including the United Nations, the Lincoln and the Holland tunnels, and even the 26 Federal Plaza, where Coleman worked.1 Yet, nobody in the security community took this threat seriously even when, three years later, bin Laden declared war on America from a remote cave in the mountains of Afghanistan. How could they take seriously a bizarre man uttering nonsense, sitting cross-legged, thousands of miles away in a desolate cavern? How could his man, with his rag tag band of fanatics, pose a threat to the mightiest power in the world? Assuredly, the US intelligence agencies looked elsewhere for credible dangers. The rise of al-Qaeda was a confounding event in the annals of security studies. Yet if we look carefully, history is full of examples of such surprises. We have seen numerous examples, where dissident groups, coming out of nowhere, making global headlines. The mujahedeen in Afghanistan, albeit with help from the US and Pakistan, took on the full force of the invading Soviet army at the zenith of its power and won. The defeat of the Taliban and the quick success of the US military in nearly obliterating the central command of al-Qaeda did not eradicate the ideology that prompted the 9/11 attacks. The same set of beliefs created the AQAP in Iraq, ISIS in Syria,2 Boko Haram in Nigeria,3 and alShabab in Somalia.4 These affiliated groups spread rapidly throughout the world like aggressive cancer cells, confounding everyone.

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These groups, strewn across time and space, had a few things in common: they had strong organizations, with clearly stated goals that resonated with their respective political bases, and large numbers of committed soldiers. And, they had ample resources to carry out their mission. If we want to understand the success of a dissident group, we must understand its organization, regardless of its orientation. Journalist Walter Isaacson once asked Steve Jobs the secrets of his success.5 Isaacson expected to hear about the original Macintosh or the iPhone. Yet Jobs was unequivocal is his assertion that it was the team that he was able to assemble that made Apple one of the most successful companies in the world. Therefore, while in the previous chapter, I examined the reasons for individual actors to join dissident groups, in this chapter I intend to look at the process by which groups communicate their messages and attract devoted members who are ready to sacrifice everything for their cause. Just as being a terrorist is one of the outcomes of our human nature, in this chapter I will strive to demonstrate that all organizations, legal or illegal, business or political, constructive or destructive, when examined at the molecular level, carry the same set of DNA. Any organization, similar to a living organism, is a living body; it evolves over time by adapting to its opportunity sets and capabilities. Those that are able to take full advantage of the existing ecological environment, thrive; while those who fail to adapt, make strategic mistakes, or face insurmountable obstacles, die out. While a radical organization may collapse, unless the core grievances that gave its birth dissipate, others rise up from its ashes with new leaders and slightly altered ideologies and continue their struggle.

The DNA of an organization In a 2003 a story published in USA Today showed how al-Qaeda was obsessed with its members’ expense records.6 The event took place in the remote city of Timbuktu, Mali, when a grocer was horrified to see a convoy of cars carrying the black flag of ISIS pull into his storefront at high speed. To his great relief and surprise, one of the men only wanted to buy a bag of mustard seeds for cooking; the man politely asked for a printed receipt since he needed to file his expense report. After ISIS was driven out of the ancient city, the papers they left behind showed how meticulous the group was about keeping records of its soldiers’ purchases. Other researchers also corroborated that al-Qaeda, in general, and bin Laden, in particular, were fixated on keeping records of what the operatives spent in meticulous detail, using Excel spreadsheets.7 When the news broke of bin Laden using the popular Microsoft program, many found it amusing, including a number of late night comedians. The reason it shocked us is because we don’t expect terrorist organizations to operate like other legitimate enterprises. Yet, when stripped of some of the important details, a terrorist organization is no different than any other organization.

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Let us compare a newly formed terrorist organization with a startup company. In the marketplace, we face needs that the existing products cannot meet. Every innovation that we see around us was designed by some entrepreneur to cater to this unmet demand. With an organizational structure, backed by sufficient funds to support manufacturing and marketing costs, companies were able to establish themselves. When they found a receptive clientele, willing to adopt the new product, the innovation was diffused and the company took off.8 We have seen this in the rise of Amazon, Apple, Google, Facebook, etc.9 As I am writing today, these four companies have a combined market value of over US$3.3 trillion dollars, which would make them the fifth largest economy in the world (measured in gross domestic product), above Great Britain with a paltry $2.8 trillion to its account.10 Since every human enterprise is the same at its core, the rise of private corporations can readily be compared to any of the top terrorist organizations, or for that matter, any large movement, political, religious, or social. While business enterprises cater to market gaps and inefficiencies, widespread grievances within the folds of society create the need for action, which dissident groups attempt to fill. A commercial startup provides products to meet yet unmet specific market demand; a terrorist organization carries a message for a social or political change to meet the yearnings of its political base. Thus, while Twitter started with the idea of broadcasting a short 142 characters message to the world, ISIS stated with its goal of establishing a global caliphate. In the process, they needed financial backing. The founders of a company find money from “angel investors” (friends and relatives), banks, or venture capitalists. A terrorist organization seeks wealthy benefactors, donations from the community, or a friendly government that believes it can use the group for its political purposes. Failing those, these groups might rely on much less reliable methods of raising the required cash by robbing banks, selling drugs, hostage taking for ransom, engaging in human trafficking, etc. Both groups establish organizational structures to turn their visions into reality. They become successful when they can sell their products or their religious or political goals to their target communities. What is true for a terrorist group or a Silicon Valley startup is true for any mass movement, including the starting of great religions. Take for example, Christianity. A poor carpenter in Palestine was born at a time when the area was in a state of flux. Under Roman occupation, the spiritually and physically traumatized Jews needed religious reform and a political solution to their plight. Reza Aslan describes the period in vivid details in his book, Zealot.11 Jesus had a strong message of inclusion and abolition of priestly corruption, which he spread through his early organization, consisting of the apostles and other followers. The message was received well by many Jews, hungry for a way out of their misery. Jesus started a movement of reformation within Judaism, however, he did not establish a new religion. After Jesus’s death, his disciples, the itinerant preachers, spread the Gospel in many parts of the world, including Rome, Constantinople, and Asia Minor, where they began proselytizing among the gentiles. The Christian message of

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equality and a strict moral code proved to be appealing to an increasingly large number of Romans, especially among the slaves, new arrivals from Greece and Asia Minor, and women. These converts rejected the traditional Roman deities, refusing to worship the emperor as a living god. Sensing a threat, first Nero and then Diocletian unleashed perhaps the most extreme state-sponsored purge in the history of Christianity. The nascent religious movement, however, might have become a footnote in history, had it not been for Emperor Constantine’s embrace of Christianity. In 312 CE, only a few decades after the ghastly purges, the fortune of the early Christians dramatically changed. At the Battle of Milvian Bridge over the Tiber, the new emperor reportedly had a vision of the cross in the sky. Being improbably victorious in the battle, the grateful emperor adopted the cross as his state symbol, and had it embossed on every soldier’s shield. Constantine placed the full power of the Roman state behind the movement. Organizationally, however, Constantine performed another important task. As the new religion spread across the land, there were many Gospels that contradicted each other on some of the fundamental foundations of the faith.12 Three years later, Constantine called the Council of Nicea, where the assembled bishops from all over the Christendom gave the religion a coherent structure. They not only gave the dogma a definite shape, but also accepted the edited versions of only four Gospels, rejecting all others as heretical. The newfound organizational structure, with full backing of the Roman military and treasury, helped Christianity to establish itself as a great religion. Finally, the last emperor to rule the unified Roman Empire, Theodosius, gave Christianity its official title as the state religion. The rest is, of course, history.13 We have seen this among other great religions as well. Buddhism might have had a quick nirvana into oblivion if it were not for the efforts (and money) of Emperor Asoka the Great. Thanks to his acceptance of Buddhism as the state religion and sending his own children as monks to other kingdoms to convert their potentates, Buddhism spread throughout the East and Southeast Asia.14 Islam was more fortunate, as Mohammed was himself a king, who preached his new religion. Mohammed established his kingdom on the western edge of the Arabian Peninsula. However, as his message of inclusion spread, attracting fighters from other parts of the region, within a little over a hundred years, the Islamic Empire spread from Spain to the border of India.15 In all these instances, we find the presence of an effective message, highly dedicated followers, a strong organizational structure, and effective methods of communication with the base and prospective converts. Standard theories of organizational development, therefore, can be applied to any movement, as these are forms of organized human association.16 I present the life of a dissident organization in Figure 4.1. A “political entrepreneur” exploits the presence of deep-seated grievances. An organization is formed, which on the strength of commitment of its followers,

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Commitment

Grievances

Entrepreneur And The Product

Capability

Terrorism And Political Violence

Opportunity

FIGURE 4.1

Life of a mass movement

capability of raising money, and the opportunity created by the existing social, political and economic conditions, gains power to challenge government.

Grievances and needs In 2003, an undergraduate student at Harvard, still in his teens, wrote codes for a program that would allow his fellow students to communicate with each other, perhaps mostly for finding a suitable date. He called the program FaceMash.17 Soon it was expanded to other Boston area colleges. That is how Mark Zuckerberg started the social media behemoth Facebook. The reason it caught on so rapidly is because it filled a specific need that everyone, especially a college student, yearns for: an active social life. Today, as I write, there are 2.3 billion users of this innovative product all over the world.18 Through Facebook we network with our current friends and relatives, and reconnect with those we were close to years ago. We let people know of important (or not so important) events in our lives; we use it to exchange ideas or market our products. History is also full of examples of bad product ideas that failed to catch on because consumers did not feel the need to adopt them. On April 23, 1985, after a huge fanfare, Coca-Cola decided to change its fabled formula after 99 years of illustrious history of being the top-selling soft drink in the world. Facing increasing competition from the upstart Pepsi, which claimed its drink as the choice of the new generation, Coke wanted to be with the times. Despite extensive market research, Coca-Cola failed to realize that the consumers felt no need for a “new and improved” taste of their favorite beverage. The company announced that they would replace the “old Coke” with “new Coke.” Almost immediately, there was an unprecedented backlash that threatened the integrity of the company. Known as the worst public relations campaign in history, after only 79 days Coke abandoned the idea of a new taste for its signature product and went back to the original formula.

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Analogously, the birth of any mass movement or terrorism can be traced to a widespread set of grievances. Without grievances, a satisfied populace will reject any incitement. In those countries where the government is too powerful and is ruthless in suppressing dissident voices, their citizens may also not respond to the call for change, aggrieved or not. Grievances can stem from the experiences of the past, current conditions, or fear of the future. In many parts of Africa, the brutal legacy of European colonization still lingers on and can readily inflame passions.19 The denial of the HIV virus as the cause of AIDS took a significant toll on the population of South Africa. In 2000, newly elected President Thabo Mbeki organized a summit of pseudo scientists and political activists who linked the idea to the Western colonialists.20 Having a deep memory of vicious colonial rule and being promoted by the most powerful man in the country, a significant portion of South Africans embraced the idea, causing an untold number of deaths from the insidious epidemic.21 Similarly, the Jihadi movement of Boko Haram in Nigeria is rooted in the shameful history of colonial occupation. The name literally translates as “Western education is forbidden.”22 Its leader, Mohammed Yusuf, rejected everything Western, including education and medicine. Similar to all other Jihadi groups, he wanted to rebuild Nigerian society along the lines of the strict interpretation of the Koran. Extant grievances are also often linked to poverty, inequality in the distribution of income, and economic and political discrimination. The seeds of revolution in Russia, China, and Cuba found fertile soil in their respective unjust societies. In India, the Maoist communists started the Naxalite movement by harnessing the force of resentment, resulting against a political structure that tolerated extreme poverty and exploitation. Times of change can also stoke fires of hatred. Not knowing the sources of their misery, widespread anger is channeled by political entrepreneurs to create xenophobic violence. The leaders proclaim that an identifiable group of enemies pose an existential threat to their communities. Genocides and mass killings ensue. Hitler came to power during a time of uncertainty, when Germans lost parts of their territories and were saddled with massive amounts of reparation for starting World War I. Hitler identified the Jews as the culprits. President Juvénal Habyarimana of Rwanda pointed his finger at the minority Tutsi as the culprits when the prices of tin and coffee, the main sources of foreign exchange, plummeted in the international market, throwing his country off the path of economic development. Rapidly, the nation descended in the chaos of a genocidal frenzy. Political entrepreneurs exploiting peoples’ fear about the future is not restricted to faraway lands or the pages of history. After electing an African American president twice, the United States electorate, albeit through the workings of the Electoral College system, in a total reversal chose Donald Trump. The economy was healthy. It was on a steady path of recovery since 2008, coming out of the Great Recession, the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. Although there was a smattering of incidents of terrorist

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attacks, the country was at peace. Yet, there were grievances, especially from those whose lives were not touched by the improving economy. Then on June 16, 2015, Donald Trump came down the escalator to the Trump Tower lobby and announced his bid for the presidency by taking aim at illegal immigrants in the country, especially from Mexico. Many called his bid “Quixotic.”23 In that dramatic moment, the wealthy Trump, twice divorced, fraught with moral turpitude, never elected to a public office, caught the imagination of his support base. After President Obama’s second term ended, in an extraordinary turn around, the nation elected Donald Trump. His antiimmigrant message along with a protectionist “America First” message started a populist movement. Confounding even the savviest pollsters at every turn, Trump won the presidency.

Fear: the essential ingredient Fear is a useful emotion and a rational part of our decision-making processes. To be fearful of the unknown is an important key to our survival, since without fear we are apt to act in a manner detrimental to our being. If you are designing a “rational” fish, and forget to include fear, it would lunge at the first morsel of food it would see floating by. If the drifting allure turns out to be a lure, your fish would be dead and fail to procreate. Its genetic line would disappear. Yet unbounded fear is the primary ingredient of the demise of social and political peace. Think of the Norwegian artist Edvard Munch’s famous painting, “The Scream.” It shows the distorted head of a man in the middle of a dread-filled scream, mouth agape, eyes bulging, clutching his head in utter freight. Yet, if you look carefully, you notice that he is standing against the background of a serene sunset, where boats are sailing by peacefully, and an older couple stroll behind him holding hands. While we don’t know what this man is afraid of, a worldview dominated by fear leads to pathological behavior that can grip an entire nation. I call such behavior “collective madness,” where entire nations immerse themselves in genocide or in a fratricidal frenzy.24 Madness is a uniquely non-medical term; these days, nobody would walk into the office of a psychiatrist and get a diagnosis of being “mad.” Yet, that is exactly what we find among people residing in societies that create a fear of the “other.” The Germans engaged in such behavior with the rise of the Nazi Party, as did the Hutus in Rwanda in their frenzied fratricide of the Tutsis.25 The Cambodians under Pol Pot killed their own people with no remorse for their assumed political beliefs.26 Ethnic division enabled the genocide in Bosnia.27 It is the fear that drove people. This irrational fear, like in Munch’s painting, screams at the possibility of the “others” posing an existential threat to their lives, their religion, or their culture, while those who are impervious to the message of the demagogues and hate mongers remain calm.

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Munch’s “The Scream,” therefore, serves as a perfect metaphor for all the various threats that we perceive around us. When we are sufficiently threatened, we strike at the source of what menaces us. Taken to an extreme, this utterly human emotion causes us to join groups that promote terrorism and other hate-fueled crimes. We may call these “hate groups,” but at the end of the day, it is fear that propels people to do unspeakable harm to their apparent enemies. Take away every Klan member’s menacing hood, and you are going to discover eyes filled with fear; fear of losing status, position, power, livelihood, their wives, daughters, and girlfriends, and even life itself. It is true for every participant in acts of politically motivated attack on innocent people from genocide to suicide bombing. The majority Hutus was afraid of the Tutsis. In their propaganda, broadcast over and over from their government-run radio and television stations, they described the Tutsis as “Nilotic invaders, Hamitic minorities, arrogant, with a lust for power.” They were called “rats,” “cockroaches,” “serpents,” and “anti-Christ.” The only way for the Hutus to survive in Rwanda was to exterminate the Tutsis. In another part of the world, despite being 88 percent of the population, Buddhists in Burma were afraid of the approximately 4 percent of the population who were Muslims, mostly from the Rohingya tribe in the southern part of the country.28 Worried about the global rise of militant Islam and the willingness of some of the Rohingyas to espouse Jihadi ideology, the Buddhists saw themselves under siege. An influential Buddhist monk, Ashin Wirathu, clad in a saffron robe, a symbol of Ahimsha (non-violence), told his nation, “Now is not the time for calm … Now is the time to rise up, to make our blood boil.” Because, he claimed, “Our religion is not the only thing under threat. The whole country is.”29 Instigated by such sermons, the common refrain in Burma became, “you cannot sleep next to a mad dog.” It was little wonder that the bloodthirsty mobs unleashed a genocidal pogrom against the Rohingyas, pushing many of them across the border into Bangladesh, creating a human rights catastrophe.30

Political entrepreneurs and the imagined community To anyone living in a modern society, the basis for forming groups is innumerable. We can form groups on the basis of the numerous sub-sects of a religion, race, ethnicity, economic class, language, gender, sexual orientation, culture, or common interest. Once formed, in these days of global communication, an identity can transcend geographic space. The question then is: how do we choose the most predominant identity from all others? For that we need the work of an external agent. Although the ingredients for the formation of collective identity are all around us, it takes someone special to tell a coherent story by drawing from religion, history, and mythology, which resonates with a number of people. The noted economist Joseph Schumpeter in a seminal book showed that it is not enough to understand the forces of demand and supply to analyze the market process.31 For that we need

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to recognize the role of a group of leaders’ efforts to shape the course of the economy. He called them “entrepreneurs.” The entrepreneurs are not necessarily the people who invent; rather these are the individuals who take other people’s inventions and then take the next step to innovate. These entrepreneurs act as the catalytic agents that make the market take its shape. With their innovations, they disrupt the market and find their way into the chaos. Take, for instance, the case of Bill Gates. He personally did not invent anything groundbreaking in the isolation of a laboratory, but took the existing bits of technology, created the corporate giant Microsoft, and changed the course of the entire field of computer technology and altered the course of our everyday living. In the political arena, these political entrepreneurs come in the form of George Washington, Hitler, Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and bin Laden. Through their vision, these innovators “connect the dots” for their aggrieved followers, which not only allow them to see who they are as parts of a larger entity, but also a way out of their current predicament. Thus, under the leadership of George Washington, a new nation was formed. Hitler gave a common purpose to fellow Germans. Dr. King showed the African Americans the promised land of racial equality. We cannot understand collective action without understanding the process by which a motley group of individuals is suddenly bonded together for a common purpose, good or evil.32 Our collective identities firmly establish our membership in mentally constructed communities. Since there are infinite numbers of collective identities that an individual can assume, the process of developing a compelling identity on the basis of which a large number of people would act is one of the most intriguing questions that faces us. I argue that the development of a collective identity depends upon the abilities of “political entrepreneurs” to develop the necessary collective identity by “faming” the issues that produce anxiety among people. The importance of framing, particularly by authority figures in the human decision-making process, is well recognized in the field of psychology and cognitive sciences.33 The concept of “entrepreneur” as a catalytic agent for change has been around at least since economist Joseph Schumpeter introduced it in 1912.34 In my formulation, while aspects of absolute and relative deprivation provide the necessary condition, the presence of a political innovator provides us with the sufficient condition for producing collective movements in general, and terrorism in particular. If leadership is crucial for collective action, the logical question to ask is, who are these leaders and why are they important as agents of change? Max Weber was among the first to emphasize the role of a leader.35 He described leaders in a neutral fashion: they can be good or evil, constructive or destructive. These leaders, he noted, do not come through the usual path of leadership of organizational hierarchy or dynastic connection. They seem to mesmerize their followers into blind obedience through their charisma, a certain quality of character that sets them apart from the rest of the population. Many scholars were sceptical

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about including an external agent, whose qualities cannot be defined, much less predicted.36 Even Weber could not come up with a specific set of characteristics for them. However, it is certain that at times of stress, people seek simple answers to complex social problems. These leaders provide them with extreme clarity and without any obfuscation or uncertainty. Most of us live with doubts, hesitations, or qualms; when we meet someone without any such misgivings, we feel attracted. While Weber emphasized the role of a leader, it is human psychology that answers the question of why some of follow leaders with god-like devotion. In a set of famous experiments, Stanley Milgram clearly demonstrated that even a marginally recognized authority figure can play a significant role in influencing people to do things they would normally not do.37 In these experiments, the male volunteers, drawn through newspaper advertisements, were told that they were taking part in an experiment to study memory and learning. The subjects were told that they were the “teacher” and were to ask a series of questions to a “student” in the next room. The “teachers” were to administer an electric shock to the “student” if he made any mistake. With a repeated mistake the extent of shock would increase. As the level of shock increased, the “teacher” heard the man on the other side of the wall first grunt and then scream in agony, complaining about a heart condition. If the “teacher” refused to administer a shock, he was simply told by a man in a white lab coat to go on. If he refused to go on after three such instructions, the experiment was halted. To the horror of those who have faith in human judgment, two-thirds of the subjects (the “teachers”) went all the way, administering the highest level of shock with clearly marked switches, supposedly “killing” the unseen “student” in the next room. Milgram also included women volunteers to see if they would react any differently from their male counterparts. Alas, the level of obedience among women was no different to men, although they seemed to be more conflicted about their task. The most striking feature of the Milgram experiments is that the authority figures that the subjects were obeying were not known national figures. They were simply assistants wearing white laboratory coats. Given the human proclivity to follow leaders, it is hardly surprising that people will adhere to instructions not only from the likes of Osama bin Laden, but also of village mullahs and the heads of small neighborhood cells, such as Muhammad Siddique Khan, the leader of the group responsible for the 7/7 train and bus bombings in London. Human history, in fact, is replete with examples of crimes of obedience,38 from the Holocaust to the Mai Lai massacre, where otherwise rational, highly educated people have engaged in acts that defy every norm of civilized society. This proclivity to subject oneself to a group norm can engulf an entire nation, such as in Nazi Germany, where many ordinary Germans became Hitler’s willing executioners.39 Such madness can similarly afflict a small community of people. In 1978, the world came to know of a collective suicide/murder of nearly a thousand of Reverend Jim Jones’ followers in the far-away jungle of Guyana.40

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In an episode eerily reminiscent of the grizzly scenes of Jonestown, another cult group, Heaven’s Gate, committed an act of mass suicide in 1997. When the police entered the mansion the group had rented in the most expensive part of San Diego, they discovered 39 bodies of men and women. As a testimony of the power of the leader, the autopsy revealed that several men in their twenties had had themselves surgically castrated to prepare their bodies to directly ascend to the alien spaceship, which they were told was waiting for them. When we form groups, we inevitably form a bond that often requires us to subsume our individuality to the needs of the group. This is not only true of a nation under charismatic leadership such as Hitler’s Germany, Mao’s China, or Habyarimana’s Rwanda, it also serves as the driving force of small terrorist cells. Sageman, a trained psychiatrist, after a careful study of the cell in Germany that brought about the 9/11 attacks, calls the phenomenon “a bunch of guys” hypothesis.41 These men, all from various parts of the Arab world, living in an alien culture in Hamburg, Germany, congregated in a mosque, perhaps for the most mundane of reasons: they were looking for familiar culture, language, and Halal food. Although they came from different Arab countries, the young men were also united by their animosity toward the West in general, and the US in particular. Through their many hours of animated discussions, the “bunch of guys” was looking for actions against their perceived enemies. The opportunity arrived when they made contact with the operatives of al-Qaeda. A plan was hatched, necessary funds were transferred, and the members followed through with the plan to their ultimate destruction; despite numerous chances, contrary to the predictions of rational choice theory and game theory, none of the participants defected. The human proclivity to commit crimes of obedience, brilliantly demonstrated by Milgrams’ experiment, has been repeated in many parts of the world with consistent outcomes. The latest example took place in Paris in 2010, when it was fused with a live audience as a part of a fake game show, part of a documentary on human nature.42 It had all the trappings of a real show with music, beautiful hostesses, a raucous audience, and a group of contestants whose job it was to deliver jolts of shock when the subject gave wrong answers to questions. An actor played the role of the subject sitting at an electric chair. Even when the player cried for help, 80 percent of the contestants kept on zapping the man till he “died,” topping the earlier number of 60 percent compliance. The contestants and the audience, who asked the questions, did not know that it was staged, yet only one in five refused to go along with the crowd. The show amply demonstrated what can happen when we mix the power of leaders with television. Phillip Zimbardo asked the question, how do good people turn evil?43 By extending the results of his experiments conducted on prisoners and prison guards nearly four decades ago, he answered the question by stating that there is nothing sinister or even mysterious about the way such a transformation takes place. Given the right set of circumstances that cause people to form a destructive collective identity, practically any one of us is able to become “evil.”

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In sum, groups are not established randomly. The existence of conflicting cultural, religious, or ethnic identity does not necessarily imply that a group will rise up to take violent actions. While all of the forces of identity, backed by a widespread feeling of deprivation, serve as the necessary condition, for sufficient condition we must turn to the rise of a political entrepreneur. The problem of including political entrepreneurs within an analytical framework is that a theoretical paradigm must always have predictive capabilities. Unfortunately, the rise of a charismatic leader cannot be predicted. The debate on whether environment produces a leader or a leader shapes the environment, cannot be settled with empirical testing. Since the emergence of a political entrepreneur is crucial to our framework, we have to accept the shortcoming of the predictive capabilities of social science theories in anticipating revolutions and mass movements.

Commitment To start a political movement – especially if it is against a dominant political order – a leader needs a group of true believers. This is because, at the nascent stage of a mass movement or a terrorist group, these early recruits take the most risk of being detected and punished. This risk to an individual participant goes down considerably when the group size increases. That is why we often celebrate the early joiners in any successful organization. A group’s march toward success depends on the readiness of the members to follow orders and their readiness to sacrifice everything for its stated goals. The early Christians were legendary for their willingness to endure and die from unspeakable cruelty. The story of a female slave named Blandina was repeated often among the early faithful. In 177, during the reign of Marcus Aurelius, she was tortured to death in the French city of Lyon. Blandina refused to testify that her master practiced cannibalism and incest as a part of Christian ritual. The executioners inflicted pain on her in every possible way for days in the full view of the public as a warning against those who might want to adopt the creed. The sight of her suffering, however, did not deter the future recruits; rather, the strength of her conviction only reinforced their faith in the new religion. Similarly, suicide attackers not only try to intimidate their victims through random killings, they also send a message of unyielding conviction to their constituents. Employment in a commercial organization does not demand unquestioned fealty from its employees. The relationship between an organization and its workers is simply transactional and pecuniary. Yet, the need for commitment from the employees has become deeply ingrained. At the turn of the twentieth century, management practices saw little reason to interact with the workers, as most jobs were menial and required little planning. However, with the pace of industrial production picking up speed through inventions such as assembly lines, the need to use workers to their point of most efficiency became increasingly acute. In

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1909, Frederick Taylor developed what he called the “Scientific Management Theory.” Workers were seen as motivated by only one factor: money. In exchange for money, they ought to be utilized in a way that would maximize their productivity. Techniques such as “time and motion” studies were employed to find the optimal physical way for a person move and interact within the production process. However, the limits of the physical means of increasing productivity became apparent during 1920s to 1930s, when a serendipitous finding from a Western Electric plant in Hawthorn, Illinois, shook up the study of management. The researchers were trying to find the optimal level of illumination for the factory floor. So they carefully started to dim the light in stages and measure its impact on productivity. To their bewilderment the academics discovered that as they dimmed the lights to the point of being nearly impossible to see, productivity kept on rising. This puzzling finding led an Australian sociologist Elton Mayo to investigate the results.44 He realized that as the lights were dimmed, the workers took it as a matter of pride to work harder to impress the researchers. It was their soaring team spirit that was responsible for the increase in productivity and not the physical surroundings. This led to the founding of the Humanistic School of Management. The power of commitment to the goals of an institution is so strong that corporations spend billions of dollars in hiring specialists for team building, spend money on inspirational speakers, and the CEOs give motivational speeches. Roman generals would be known not only for their valor and choice of strategies but also for their oratorical skills. The Hindu religious text, the Bhagavad Gita, starts with Lord Krishna exhorting the warrior prince, Arjuna, who is reluctant to kill his own kinfolks, by urging him to fight for righteousness. The Koran promises heaven for those who would be martyred in the battlefield for Islam. Large or small, collective actions require firm commitment to the cause, which must be inculcated by leaders. From football coaches to CEOs, the association between team spirit and victory is hardly a matter of surprise. What happens when commitment of followers slips? Max Weber noted the charisma factor of a leader might not last forever. Time would break the spell and the adherents, seeing the world from a different angle, would withdraw their unwavering commitment to the charismatic leader. Horgan, through his detailed interviews of IRA members, demonstrates that the loss of a grip on the members would lead to a group’s demise.45 Groups fracture or dissipate when there is bubbling discontent over ideology or strategy. Al-Qaeda experienced a deep ideological chasm in its early days when it struggled to identify its immediate enemy. In question was who its primary target should be. Bin Laden was emphatic in his insistence of hitting the “far enemy:” the United States and its allies should be the group’s primary objective. He argued that by weakening their masters in the West, the apostate governments in the Islamic world – from the royal houses of Saudi Arabia to the secular dictatorship of Egypt – would fall on their own, thereby bringing

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the global Jihadi movement to its fruition. However, a strong faction within alQaeda consisted of Egyptians and Palestinians. They wanted to aim first at the heart of the “near enemies.” The disagreement over strategy led to bloodshed. Abdullah Yusuf Azzam, a Palestinian known as the “Father of Global Jihad,” was a mentor to bin Laden. Together, they began their journey toward Global Jihad.46 Soon, Ayman al-Zawahiri and his devoted supporters, released from Egyptian prison, joined them, and Zawahiri was recognized as the second in command to bin Laden. A power struggle ensued.47 In November 1989, a massive bomb killed Azzam on his way to a prayer meeting in Peshawar. A former Federal Bureau of Inventifation agent, Ali Soufan, thought it was Zawahiri who ordered the assassination.48 Although Azzam’s death did not hobble al-Qaeda, in many other cases, such power struggles can spell disaster for a group. Disagreements within an organization can lead its members to join other groups or, in some cases, starting a new group.49 Ideological hold on the members can also loosen when a group carries out outrageous attacks that assault the sensibilities of its core base. Horrified and repulsed, some members cut ties with the group.

Capability The capability of an organization depends on a number of interdependent factors. These, among others, are money, management, and product. Money is a huge factor in the success of any organization, legal or illegal. It is the lifeblood that sustains an organization and provides the ability to survive and strive for success. In the case of a private organization, it is acquired through its business model, which chalks out the path toward monetization of an idea. The business plan is presented to raise money by borrowing from banks, government agencies, such as the Small Business Administration, or venture capitalists, or, failing all of these, angel investors: friends and family. Groups that are able to secure funding from a stable source, such as a sympathetic government, wealthy benefactors, or contributions from a large support base can rise to prominence. Lashkar-e-Taiba is a radical Islamic organization located in Pakistan, fighting Indian rule in Kashmir. In its most prominent acts of terrorism, it attacked the Indian Parliament in 2001, the city of Mumbai in 2008, and an Indian military base in Jammu in 2009. This group was able to raise substantial amounts of money from the Pakistani government and its military to carry out their hostile acts. Iranians heavily finance the Lebanese group, Hezbollah.50 These groups develop a symbiotic relationship with their sponsoring states. The states give them financial support and give legal immunity in the country. In return, the sponsors outsource their hostile foreign policy to these groups, thereby receiving political cover for these illegal activities. Al-Qaeda received ample financial support from bin Laden’s personal fortune and from individual supporters in Pakistan and, most importantly, from Saudi

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Arabia and some of the Gulf countries. The IRA was aided by generous contributions from the Irish Catholic diaspora in the Boston area. The Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka (LTTE) received funding from Tamils living in the UK and other parts of the world. The Khalistani movement found a steady source of income from some of the wealthy donors in the Sikh community, particularly in Canada. Those groups that are not as fortunate to have a steady source of income are left to themselves to finance their terrorist activities. ISIS, though nearly bankrupt at one point, was able to capture some of the oilfields of Iraq and sell their products, raising enormous sums of money, which partially accounts for its spectacular early military successes.51 Most terrorist organizations, however, turn to criminal activities for funding. Many, such as the Taliban, especially after their ousting from Afghanistan by the US military invasion, relied of revenues from the opium trade. FARC in Colombia and Sendero Luminoso in Peru found deep pockets in the production and transportation of coca. The main source of income for Abu Sayyaf of the Philippines was kidnapping and hostage taking. Since these groups work outside the legal system of organized societies, they attract not only the true believers but also criminals and other miscreants with scant allegiance to the group’s ideology. We will discuss the issues of mercenaries and true believers in the chapter on transformation of a terrorist organization.

Management Needless to say, good management is needed for any organization’s success. Behind all the successful terrorist organizations and mass movements are their organizational structures. The IRA, the longest surviving violent dissident group in history, was known for its strict hierarchical structure, borrowed from the British army.52 Lenin, with the help of Trotsky, developed the organizational system that saw them through the turbulent early days of the Revolution. Mao Zedong set up the Red Army and its structure. Bin Laden was known for micromanaging his group. Fortunately, he found able assistants who were behind every major move al-Qaeda made. These groups developed well thought-out structures with divisions of administrative tasks from finance to personnel. As good management is needed for a group’s success, bad or non-existent management spells doom for dissident groups. Take for example the Occupy Wall Street movement of 2011. Zuccotti Park, near Wall Street in New York, saw its birth. Drawing inspiration from the so-called “Arab Spring,” which was roiling entrenched power in the Middle East a year earlier, the founders of the movement, members of a Canadian anti-consumerist group, set up a website and began sending out emails to its members. Both movements were greatly aided by the exploding popularity of the new method of mass communication, Twitter. Although Twitter was introduced in 2006, it initially had relatively few users. However, by March 2011, it boasted 140 million daily posts.53 On September 11,

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2011, hundreds of people set up tents at Zuccotti Park. The movement, protesting against a real problem – growing inequality of income in the United States and elsewhere – promised to be a real game changer. Yet, on September 15, the protesters, already dwindled thin, were forced out of the park. What caused their quick demise? Among many factors, the most important was a lack of an organizational structure. The idealistic young men and women of the movement, similar to the anarchists, a century ago, did not believe in hierarchy. They aimed at creating a classless society. As they rejected hierarchy, they also denied the movement of a leadership structure, which stood in the way of defining a clear set of goals and strategies. The Occupy Wall Street movement died with a whimper.

Narrative A terrorist group or a startup company is about its products. If a startup company has a product that is ill defined, infeasible, poorly manufactured, or is rejected by the market, it has no chance of surviving. Similarly, a dissident organization must clearly articulate its political goals. If its target base finds them impossible to achieve or are flawed, it cannot grow. For a group to thrive, its leaders must provide a compelling narrative containing three important factors. First, they must clarify the goals and aspirations for the political base they claim to represent. Second, they must identify in no uncertain terms the enemy that is preventing the base from attaining what is rightfully theirs. Finally, the narrative must contain the strategies by which the groups will achieve their goals. A group’s success depends on the strength of its narrative. The narrative is its product. Take, for example, the case of al-Qaeda. When bin Laden began his campaign against the United States, he had already burnished his credentials as a mujahedeen who fought against the Soviet army and was able to drive it back across the borders of Afghanistan. In a region full of hypocrites, who used the name of Allah only to promote themselves, he had given up the life of a scion of an Arab billionaire to live the hard life of a religious warrior. His distinctive stature, his low scholarly tone, and his calm demeanor in the midst of chaos added to his mystique. It was easy to see why his message of certain victory against the only remaining superpower would not only resonate with those who felt helpless but also seem entirely feasible. Since the narrative defines the client community and its enemy, the spread of its acceptance depends on the boundaries of the in-group and out-group. Bin Laden delivered a narrative of demonstrated capability to inflict massive pain on the United States and its allies: the idea of a global caliphate based on a strict interpretation of Sunni Islam. While many were attracted to bin Laden, his message did not resonate with the vast majority of the billion plus Muslims worldwide. There was a problem of mass acceptability of his narrative. Although he used the word “Muslim” quite liberally, Islam, similar to all other great religions,

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is certainly not monolithic. Apart from the divide between the Sunni and the Shi’a, each group is further divided along innumerable denomination, faith, tribal, and cultural fault lines. Therefore, bin Laden’s message of a global Jihad did not enjoy the universality that he sought. Compare bin Laden’s achievements with those of Mohandas Gandhi or Dr. King. They were able to clearly articulate their political goals, with which a significant portion of the population agreed. Gandhi was a diminutive man with a weak voice. Yet he was able to mobilize millions; they followed him when he asked them to face brutal beatings by the police without resistance. The Freedom Riders, many from affluent white families living in comfort and security in the northern states, responded to the calls of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to go to the South and register African Americans to vote. The Freedom Riders journeyed across the Mason-Dixon line, knowing fully well the danger they would be facing.

Opportunity Grievances Dissidence thrives when there are widespread grievances. These grievances could be based on many factors including poverty, income inequality, discrimination based on race, religion, language, or ethnicity, etc. If a group offers a way out of the misery, it gains a loyal following. The accumulated grievances are the needs that drive the demand for a collective response, which radical groups stand ready to fill.54 Grievances can spread due to government oppression.55 When a government uses force that is seen as unjust, excessive, or capricious, people tend to overcome their fear and join forces to confront the organized state. The Indian government’s use of the military in the disputed state of Kashmir has often created conditions for further turmoil. Young men and women have joined mass movements and have participated in armed resistance. Each act of egregious repression by the Indian government has opened the door for Pakistan to exploit the anger of ordinary Kashmiris and instigate terrorist attacks. In the United States, the sight of police beatings during the Democratic Convention in 1968 provided further impetus for the already unpopular anti-Vietnam war movement, and the images of water cannons and police dogs used against the civil rights activists in the South solidified demands for change. Government repression evokes two sentiments among the target population: fear and anger. If anger overwhelms fear, opposition to the government spreads. On the other hand, if fear wins over anger, the peace of a cemetery prevails in the land. Evidence shows that democracies, with individual legal protections and free media access, are particularly vulnerable to the inefficiency of repression in quelling rebellion. Within autocratic systems, governments are often better able to suppress open rebellion by the sheer forces of brutal coercion. The example

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of China’s Tiananmen Square massacre stands as a prime example where a totalitarian power was not only able to devastate a mass movement and but also able to obliterate its memory from most of its population.

Building a network The opportunity for a group to grow rests on its ability to communicate with its political base and spread its message of active resistance. Communication, therefore, is at the heart of any movement. Throughout history, the leaders of dissident movements have tried ingenious methods to send messages to their potential supporters. The nocturnal ride of Benedict Arnold is famous in history. In 1857, when the soldiers in the British colonial army staged an insurrection, which came to be known as “Sepoy Mutiny,” the radicalized soldiers in one camp would send a chapatti (an Indian bread) to another as a symbol of solidarity. If they accepted, it would be a signal for their readiness to join the mutiny. More than a century later, as technology changed, the Iranian Revolution was fueled by messages from the exiled Ruhollah Khomeini dictated on audio tapes, which were instantly copied and distributed through the vast network of mosques. The genocidal frenzy in Rwanda was spread through the governmentrun radio station, which the Hutu insurgents listened to on their transistors. Apart from these direct methods of communication, dissident groups have had another close ally in spreading their messages: the news media. Acts of terrorism are by design a combination of macabre violence mixed with public spectacle. It is no surprise that Count Kropotkin called terrorist acts, “propaganda by deed.” No wonder, Schmid and de Graaf correctly called terrorism a form of political communication.56 Technology has changed in the past couple of decades, opening up new opportunities for the dissident groups to communicate. The rise of social media has been an incredible gift to those who would like to vent their grievances online and organize large protest groups. The world watched with fascination when during the so-called Arab Spring large-scale demonstrations began in most Arab countries, changing the course of history.

Trigger event A trigger event is an unexpected event that can amplify a message of rebellion. These events are usually externally generated by the actions of a state. When they take place, a movement takes full advantage of the ensuing chaos and confusion to organize and strike at their targets. Annals of all political movements are punctuated by trigger events. It would suffice to mention a few of famous events that changed the course of history. By the middle of the eighteenth century, the rumblings of discontent were being felt all over the British colony in America. Such anger often provoked mob

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violence.57 Yet, the colonies were far from being unified in their opposition to colonial rule. Most contemporary observers on both sides of the Atlantic believed that “colonial unity was impossible because of the great differences between provinces in manners, religion and interest.”58 It all changed with the imposition of the Stamp Act of 1765. Rapoport shows how the disparate acts of mob violence instigated by groups, such as the Sons of Liberty, coalesced around the common source of resentment and gave a definite shape to the American Revolution.59 One of the most significant trigger events took place at the heart of the Middle East when President George W. Bush invaded Iraq. The momentous action, initiated with intense bombing dubbed “sock and awe,” was designed to quickly oust Saddam Husain and bring about Western-style democracy. The dream of democracy, however, soon withered in the desert sand. Pandora’s box opened, the aspirations of Shi’a, Sunni, Kurds, and all other ethnic or religious minorities collided with each other in a hodgepodge nation that was hastily created from the ashes of the Ottoman Empire after World War I. The presence of foreign troops on Muslim soil flamed passion in the country, which began to see them as an occupying force. The anger and resentment overcame the fear of retribution. Soon, al-Qaeda morphed into a far more virulent group, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and then into ISIS. The Shi’a insurgency also targeted the allied forces. Faced with uncomfortable political situations, governments often impose punitive measures to quell rebellion. The implied assumption behind such measures is that as the demonstrated costs of participation increase, fear grips the community, stopping it in its track toward further escalation. Yet often such acts of coercion backfire as they add fuel to the fire. The prospect of punishment evokes two competing emotions: fear and anger, especially when it is viewed as unjust or excessive. When fear is greater than anger, it suppresses rebellion. The massive punitive actions undertaken by the Chinese government in response to the Tiananmen protests demanding democratic reforms, was seen all over the world as undue and extreme. Yet, the totalitarian regime was able to suppress every spark of rebellion. Such a show of force would have been impossible in a democracy, where indignation would overwhelm peoples’ reticence.60

State failure For a startup company, the most important opportunity is a keenly felt gap in the market, where nobody is supplying what is in demand. The creation of this gap is accelerated when there is a new disruptive technology, which allows other businesses to flourish. The invention of the railway as a mode of transportation not only made it easier for people to move around the continent, but it also created a huge boom is trade and commerce. The First Intercontinental railway of nearly 2,000 miles was completed during the mid-1860s. The construction of the railroad marked an important watershed in the economic and

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political history of the United States. Similarly, the arrival of the Internet changed the economic landscape forever, creating new companies serving the everyday needs of ordinary people. The over-exuberant frenzy that it created gave birth to the so-called “dot.com bust” of mid-1990s. However, the market disruption left an indelible imprint in the annals of the nation’s economic history. Extending the trend, today we see companies such as Lyft and Airbnb filling the niche needs of people. The advent of artificial intelligence is pushing the limits of our imagination as to how we are going to live even in the next decade or two. Today, across the horizon we can see self-driving cars, domestic jobs done by robots, and simulated reality that boggle our minds.61 Similarly, opportunities arise for groups that operate outside the law, from terrorist groups to crime syndicates, when governmental control weakens. At the extreme end of this lawlessness is what is commonly known as “state failure.” A terrorist group also needs opportunities to grow. While we associate rebellion with poverty, the most significant opportunity for such groups happens when a country experiences what is known as “state failure.” A number of scholarly outfits provide indexes of state failure or state fragility, of which the Foreign Policy journal has the longest track record. A state is considered to be “failed” when its government has imploded – mostly due to violent conflict or invasion – leaving its citizens without the most basic public services, such as personal security, medical treatment, education, or protection of the law. Some states experience spectacular total collapse of its institutions, such Afghanistan in the immediate aftermath of the Soviet withdrawal or Iraq after the fall of Saddam Husain. Others go into it in stages as prolonged conflicts eat into every fabric of the society, such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, or Somalia. And then there are countries such as Pakistan, which, although having a strong central government, contains pockets of absence of governmental authorities. When a nation experiences the disintegration of its political order, people form groups outside the legal bounds for protection, provision of minimal public goods, and for earning a living. Criminal gangs and terrorist organizations alike fill the power vacuum.

Geography and infrastructure Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, still an upstart fighter, battle hardened from his experience in fighting under the banner al-Qaeda, was in Iraq. He had just started his branch of AQAP when he wrote a letter to bin Laden, listing many of the obstacles he was facing in his new battleground. Among those, he listed the flat open terrain of the Arabian desert, which, unlike the forbidding terrains of Afghanistan, with high mountains, deep ravines, and the covers of tall trees, offered scant protection from the enemy.62 Indeed, geography and the presence of infrastructure play an important role in sustaining insurgencies. The North Vietnamese were able to fight off the US

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military under the cover of dense forest with few roads, where a mechanized army could comfortably launch a large offensive. The Indian military was similarly hamstrung in confronting the Naxalites, hiding in the forested tribal region of the country. A number of scholars have found geography to be a significant facilitating factor, especially in guerrilla warfare.

Summary In the previous chapter I explained the reasons for a rational individual to join a dissident organization. By using standard theories of organizational development, this chapter examined the reasons for terrorist organizations to grow and achieve their political goals. Terrorist organizations are similar to all other organizations, with organization being vital to a movement or a terrorist group. Similar to every organization, a terrorist organization thrives on commitment, capability, and opportunity. In the final analysis, a new terrorist organization is no different from a startup commercial entity, except for the fact that one works within the established legal system, while the other does not.

Notes 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

Wright (2007: 3). Warrick (2015). Thurston (2017); Kendhammer and McCain (2018). Maruf and Joseph (2018). Isaacson (2015). www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/12/30/al-qaeda-expense-reports/ 4255089/. Shapiro and Siegel (2007, 2012); Shapiro (2013). Rogers (2003). Galloway (2017). July 25, 2019. Aslan (2013). Pagels (2004). Gonzales (2010). Horner (2016). Lapidus (2014). Anderson (2017). www.theguardian.com/technology/2007/jul/25/media.newmedia. www.statista.com/statistics/264810/number-of-monthly-active-facebook-users-world wide/. Hochschild (1999). Gumede (2008). McGreal (2001). Kendhammer and McCain (2018). www.washingtonpost.com/politics/im-going-down-the-escalator-the-spectacle-intrump-tower-that-launched-a-presidency/2019/06/16/20fec336-8e1d-11e9-adf3-f7 0f78c156e8_story.html?utm_term=.38c291237d72. Gupta (2001a). Harff (1996); des Forges (1999).

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Hilton and Lifton (2004). Maas (1997). CIA World Factbook. Lehr (2019: 177–178). Fuller (2013). Schumpeter (1939[1912]). For a more structured discussion of the political entrepreneur, see Shepsle and Bonchek (1997: 241–250). See, for example, Simon et al. (2001). Frohlich and Oppenheimer (1978) introduced the concept of an entrepreneur in the context of political mobilization. Weber (1947[2009]). Tucker (1968). Milgram (1974). Kelman and Hamilton (1989). Goldhagen (1996). Gupta (2001a: 169–179); Lalich (2004). Sageman (2004). www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124838091. Zimbardo (2007). Mayo (2003). Horgan (2009b). Sageman (2004). Wright (2004). Soufan and Freedman (2011). Bjorgo (2013). Norton (2018). Warrick (2015, 2019). English (2003). Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter. Kruglanski et al. (2019). Gupta et al. (1993); Davenport (2007a, 2007b). Schmid and de Graaf (1982). Rapoport (2011). Miller (1936: 50). Rapoport (2011). Gupta et al. (1993). Harari (2017). Warrick (2015).

5 THE DYNAMICS OF DISSENT

In search of the root causes Organizations and movements are like living organisms. Once born, they do not remain static; they evolve. A living organism grows into adulthood. Some experience transformation by shedding parts of their bodies (like tadpoles), while others metamorphose, like a caterpillar turning into butterfly. At some point, they all die. Some die because of old age or disease, some are killed by predators. Living organisms also leave their DNA through procreation, unless, due to ecological changes, their line goes extinct. Dissident groups experience the same biological evolution. Some experience growth spurts, some deviate from their initial ideological positions and transform into something akin to criminal syndicates, while others face death, either because they have achieved their political goals or they have suffered a military defeat. Even for some who face demise, death only refers to their organizational structures. The ideology that gave birth to them can survive if the conditions that helped generate them remain invariant. In those cases, groups are reborn, perhaps bearing a different name, with a similar set of goals. For those, changing times make their ideology irrelevant and disappear into the dusty pages of history books. In the Chapters 2 and 3, I examined the motivations of individual participants in political groups. This chapter discusses the socio-political ecology within which a dissident organization goes through its life cycle. Biological evolution has created our brains, which imbue us with the need to cooperate with others in our community to address problems that can only be solved by working together. This ability to cooperate and engage in altruistic behavior, where our individual needs are suppressed for the good of the collective, not only sets us apart from the rest of the animal world and but it remains at the

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core of who we are. Yuval Harari presented us with a wonderful thought experiment to explain this point.1 What would happen if we have a stadium full of chimpanzees? There will be pandemonium and chaos. Chimpanzees are our closest genetic relatives. Yet, they cannot solve a problem, other than fighting against another group, that requires working collectively toward a common goal. In contrast, a gathering of a large number of humans would see a very different outcome; they would immediately form a society. The secret of our ability to work together is buried inside our brains. Our brain chemistry is designed to release pleasure hormones that make altruistic behavior immensely satisfying. With the right rewards from our brains, we find gratification in working for something greater than ourselves. Joining a terrorist organization to fight a common enemy is but a reflection of the fundamental structure of the human social brain, developed over eons of evolutionary process.

Poverty Beginning with Aristotle, for most of us, the link between poverty and terrorism seems almost self-evident. Yet Krueger and Maleckova, in a thorough study, examined the issue with a great deal of precision and found little correlation between poverty and terrorism.2 The problem of establishing a direct correlation between poverty and political violence, however, is that it is not very clear how we should define poverty. Does poverty mean individual poverty, where the poor being tired of not having their fair share of the national wealth start a violent rebellion? In that case, those who take part in violent movements should be the destitute. In psychological terms this is known as egotistical deprivation,3 where personal frustration leads to acts of violence. A number of scholars have examined the veracity of this hypothesis linking poverty to political violence. Some have gathered information from direct interviews with the participants in terrorist activities,4 while others have used secondary sources, such as arrest reports.5 Empirical evidence does not establish the case that those who take part in terrorism are from the poorest segments of the community. In 2002 the Pew Research Center conducted a survey of public opinion in the Muslim world.6 From this survey, Bueno de Mesquita came to the conclusion that a person’s perception of the economy (either from personal standpoint or in the aggregate) “is essentially uncorrelated with his or her support for terrorism.”7 The accumulated information from this and other empirical works is fairly clear. Most of the studies of individual (or egotistical) deprivation find the counterintuitive result: those from the poorest segments of the population do not typically fill the ranks of the violent revolutionaries. Rather it is the scions of the middle- and upper-middle-class families who get disproportionately involved in politically motivated violence.

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Lack of democratic freedom Immediately after the devastating attacks of 9/11 the following question was on everybody’s mind: why do these people hate us more than they love their own lives? The quick response that came from President Bush, which resonated well with the grieving US public, was that “they hate us for our freedom.” In other words, these terrorists are from freedom-deprived nations and our ability to choose our own destiny has somehow evoked a deep sense of envy among these people. Unfortunately, this line of reasoning allowed the Bush administration to embrace the cause of spreading democracy around the world with the zeal of a religious crusader.8 Democracy was seen as the perfect antidote for the citizens of the despotic nations. The result of this unquestioned understanding of the root causes of Jihadi terrorism saw the invasion of Iraq. The theory was that the transplanted seeds of democracy in the deserts of Iraq were going to sprout and eventually cover the entire Arab/Muslim world, making us safe from terrorism forever. Alas, like all other supposed causes of terrorism, this too turned out to be fool’s gold; the ousting of the Taliban from Afghanistan and Saddam Husain from Iraq did not prevent terrorist attacks from the believers of Islamic extremism. The democracies of Great Britain, Spain, Belgium, and France not only suffered the devastating effects of terrorism, but what shocked the most was that the perpetrators, unlike those who took part in the 9/11 attacks, were not foreigners, but were home grown. Even a number of US citizens were found to have strong links with al-Qaeda abroad. Even if we forget the anarchists of the late nineteenth century, the leftist groups in the 1970s, the recent experiences of India, Israel, and Sri Lanka, and the partially democratic nations of Russia, Pakistan, and many others around the world should dispel any myth about democracy as an antidote to terrorism. In fact, a careful investigation of the available empirical information shows that “attitudes toward democracy as a system of governance for the respondent’s home country, and support for terrorism are close to uncorrelated.”9 What about the hypothesis that democratic nations are the primary targets of the terrorists? Pape10 generated controversy by claiming that the democracies are the primary targets of suicide bombing.11 In the days immediately after the devastating 9/11 attacks, Pape’s findings fed the natural inclination to see ourselves as the primary victims of terrorism. Although democracy is not a binary concept and nations fall on a continuum of democratic values, many countries with questionable democratic roots are the biggest targets of terror attacks, including suicide bombings. These countries would include Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Somalia, South Sudan, Iraq, Morocco, Yemen, and Russia, among others. Despite having very low democratic values and institutions, these countries have suffered enormously from terror attacks.

Geography Does geography influence the course of an insurgency? Fearon and Laitin argue that civil wars are not explained very well by the assumed sources of political

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grievances, such as income inequality, poverty, or discrimination in the society.12 Nor is the lack of democratic freedom or the extent of ethnic or religious differences or any other form of “clash of civilizations” an excellent predictor of civil wars, insurgencies, or protracted low-intensity warfare. Rather, they demonstrated that these events are best explained by a number of physical attributes such as bad roads and rough terrain. Civil wars are also prevalent in weak nations, without a strong military or bureaucratic infrastructure. The findings of Fearon and Laitin suggest that the armies of the poor nations with crumbling or non-existent infrastructure offer a weak presence.13 Furthermore, since the population is not dependent on the government for livelihoods it has low opportunity costs for joining the forces of violent opposition, who might provide them with not only security, but also with all the rudimentary public goods that all of us grow accustomed to expect from our governments.

State failure One of the most dreaded events in a nation’s history takes place when the power of the central government weakens to being close to non-existent. The hallmark of an organized society is that the state carries the monopoly of the right to use coercion.14 In the face of a prolonged armed conflict, many countries around the world become “a mere geographic expression, a black hole into which a failed polity has landed.”15 Countries like Lebanon during its civil war, and Somalia, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, and Iraq are prime examples of failed states, at the time of writing this book.16 Although the term “state failure” may imply that an entire country has descended into anarchy, it also may happen that an otherwise functioning state with ample central control will contain parts that are lawless. For instance, the “wild west” of the western frontier provinces has only nominally been part of the political structure of Pakistan since its independence. Even the much-vaunted Pakistani army, much less the police and civilian bureaucrats, dare not venture into these areas. O’Donnell calls these the “brown areas” of state control.17 In a failed state or in a “brown area,” the calculation of costs and benefits of terrorist organizations goes through a radical shift. Since the government is unable to enforce the law, terrorists and criminal organizations that operate outside the legal structure carry on their activities with impunity; the costs of participating in illegal activities plummet and all kinds of nefarious activities flourish, including terrorism. In 2006, the journal Foreign Policy developed a cross-national index of state failure, based on 12 factors of governmental control.18 Data show a strong correlation between state failure and terrorism.19

The rebellions that were not: the sufficient cause So, now we are back to square one in our quest for the root causes of terrorism. If it is not poverty or lack of democracy, then what are the causes of terrorism?

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Surely, physical geography is a facilitating factor for insurgency, but it cannot be seen as the root cause. Rough terrain and broken-down infrastructure may promote civil wars, but they are not causally linked with terrorism. A failed state is significantly correlated with terrorism, yet the breaking down of law and order, by itself, may not generate a coherent ideology. The reason the measures of deprivation – relative or absolute, egotistical or fraternal – do not show a strong correlation with the occurrence of political violence is because of the presence of the so-called “collective action” problem.20 Communist leaders, such Lenin, Mao, and Ho Chi Minh knew this well. Trotsky pointed out that if deprivations were sufficient to cause uprisings, the peasants would always be in revolt.21 The factors of deprivation, therefore, only provide the necessary condition for mass violence. In other words, without grievances, there can be no rebellion. However, for a set of grievances to produce political violence, we need the sufficient condition, a factor that must be present to produce organized political dissidence. In other words, for causes to be converted into action, we need agency. This sufficient condition requires the presence of political entrepreneurs, who would frame the prevailing issues to produce a strong enough collective identity. The strength of collective identity, which clearly identifies the “in” and the “out” groups – the “community” and its “enemies” – prompts people to take part in violent actions in the name of their group at the direction of their leaders. Even the self-radicalized ones are inspired by the words of some leaders. Unlike an individual’s self-identity, collective identity, however, is not stable. It is contextual, malleable, and multiple. The political entrepreneurs bring about violent collective actions by “connecting the dots” for their followers by creating a consistent story by borrowing from religion, history, and mythologies. When this story resonates with a large number of people and they adopt such a collective identity over all others, a mass movement is born. There are numerous examples in history, where poverty, deprivation, and systematic discrimination, by themselves, did not bring out violent political movements.22 Take for instance, current race relations in the US. The achievement gap between the Euro-Americans and African Americans remains as wide today as it was in the days when Martin Luther King Jr. was marching, the major metropolitan cities were ablaze with widespread race riots, and black radicalism was rampant among groups such as the Black Panther and the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA).23 Yet, after the assassination of King, Malcolm X, and other radical leaders, and the dismemberment of the SLA and Black Panther movement, black political movements, both peaceful and violent, came to an end. The Los Angeles riot of 1992 was a disorganized, free-for-all expression of anomic frustration rather than a cohesive action against a racist society.24 Even the Nation of Islam, under the firebrand leadership of Louis Farrakhan, eschewed all kinds of violent collective actions. In October 1995, when a large number of African American men assembled for the Million Man March in Washington DC, Farrakhan urged them to take personal responsibility in the

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face of a long litany of economic grievances. The need for collective action, radical or otherwise, was simply forgotten. To be sure, there have been small regional issue-oriented protests against racism, often led by Reverend A1 Sharpton or Jesse Jackson, but they have been episodic and did not produce any nationwide ethnonationalist movement, typical of so many other parts of the world. I posit that the absence of radical political movements is the result of not having a strong enough notion of the “enemy” (or the “out-group”) within the African American community after the passage of civil rights legislation. This epochal legislation took away the sharpest edges of overt discrimination. There is no question about the fact that the presence of systemic discrimination is alive and well within American society. Yet, there is a new reality within US civil society. Today’s African American community is far more confident and proud of its achievements in all aspects of social, political, and economic life of the nation than any time in the past. Despite the white backlash in the election of Donald Trump,25 the victory of Barak Obama for two presidential terms amply testifies to the presence of a new era. However, there seems to be a mystery if we consider the cases across the world, from Northern Ireland to Iraq, from Pakistan to Palestine, where ethnic or religious minorities have risen up in armed conflict with the established powers. Why is the United States an outlier? We can point out several factors explaining why the United States has been fortunate not to endure the fate of violent revolts it has experienced, especially in the mid-1960s. Since the passage of the civil rights legislation, the absence of water cannons and police dogs set against peaceful demonstrators has robbed the movement of a single, identifiable enemy. Furthermore, the assassination of Dr. King robbed the movement of a coherent leadership. We may also speculate about another anomaly. While radicalism roiled the rest of the Islamic nations and their diasporas to many Western nations, Indian Muslims remain moderate in the face of a number of acts of provocation. With about 15 percent of the population or in absolute number, 180 million Muslims, India is tied for second place in the Islamic world with Pakistan. Yet, for a population of that size, only a handful have joined Jihadi groups, such as al-Qaeda or ISIS, despite numerous calls for them to rise up against Hindu dominated India. This incongruity has puzzled many of those who study terrorism. The Economist in an article, asked: “Why India’s Muslims are so moderate?”26 To be sure, being a minority there are enough reasons for them to be aggrieved. The Kashmiri Muslims are in constant control by the Indian armed forces. There have been sporadic riots and, at the time of writing, lynchings by the so-called “cow vigilantes” under the governance of the Hindu nationalist party, the BJP. Yet, they remain moderate without resorting to joining Jihadi movements abroad in any significant number.27

The trails of history While studying history, we must recognize that no mass movement can be studied as a single event. If we look into the evolution of any movement, we will

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find its links to a distant past, which will link to an even more remote precedent. Thus, we may study the American Revolution, yet this epochal set of events was simply a culmination of other rebellions, such as the Sons of Liberty, which mobilized the shopkeepers in Boston in 1765 to protest against the Stamp Act.28 By tracing its history we can go back to the Franco-British rivalry in Europe until the path is lost in the dim antiquity of unrecorded history. Therefore, any narration of the history of a mass movement must start from an arbitrary cut-off date. A quick look around the world will show that among the multitude of minority groups included in Minorities at Risk, only a handful take up arms in the name of their community to redress current or past injustices. Whatever the immediate cause that triggers an upheaval, it is incumbent upon a political leader(s) to take the historic grievances and give them a political character through the framing of the issues in a way that resonates with a sufficient number of people within the defined community. The political entrepreneurs, by attracting a core group of followers, establish an organizational structure. When there is a huge asymmetry of power a dissident movement adopts terrorist strategies and carries out propaganda by deed to attract others from a larger base of sympathizers and free riders. I have presented the process by which a movement is born in Figure 5.1.29

FIGURE 5.1

Root causes of collective action

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The group and the base The birth of a movement is characterized by the formation of a dissident group by a small band of ideologically motivated men and women. The reason behind a strong ideological bond among the initial members is because they need to go against an established order, often taking enormous risks to their person. Furthermore, since the nascent group is weak, it cannot offer its members special privileges or any other kind of special reward. In order to be viable, the group almost immediately develops a hierarchical structure with a charismatic leader at the helm. Since a dissident movement is created around a set of historical grievances, a larger base of sympathizers usually supports its core membership. These are the free riders, who share the group’s core beliefs and feel that their entire community would benefit if the group is able to achieve its political goals. Yet, because of a number of “selfish” reasons, they refuse to take activists’ roles. Most often this support base is surrounded by an even larger group, which, typically, does not share the ideological orientation and nor is it included within the perimeters of the dissident group’s perceived “in-group.” As a result, the larger society is either apathetic or hostile to the group’s political aims (see Figure 5.2). Al-Qaeda was established in the 1980s and, after the defeat of the Soviet Union in the Afghan war, transformed itself into a fighting force against the Saudi royal family and then against their principal benefactor, the US. The innovation of the idea of the near enemy (the “apostate” regimes of the Islamic nations) and the far enemy (the US and the West) was based on a long struggle, which goes back to the establishment of the young religion and its quick expansion, which brought it directly into confrontation with established Christian Europe. Yet, al-Qaeda could bring only a fraction of the world Muslim community to its core.30 The image of the pious bin Laden has enlarged its support base far and wide, yet many in the Arab/Islamic world still remain either

FIGURE 5.2

The group structure

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apathetic to his message or are hostile to it. Therefore, public support is absolutely essential in the politics of terrorism. Without public support a dissident organization cannot recruit volunteers, raise money, operate safe houses, or avoid infiltration and destruction by the target government.31

The mixed motives of individuals and groups The reliability of cross-group data on various dissident groups is always open to criticism. Yet, a researcher often needs to work with imperfect information. By using a dataset such as that collected by the Israeli group ICT, in Table 5.1 we can clearly see that most terrorist groups engage in only a few types of violent activities; they seem to specialize in no more than three activities.32 As can be seen, nearly all of the ten groups shown in the table are highly specialized in their activities. The table presents a thumbnail portrait of these groups indicating the clustered nature of activities of the terrorist groups. Each cell of the table indicates the percentage of each activity for the groups. The last row presents the sum of the three most prevalent acts of violence as a percentage of each group’s total activities. From this list we can easily discern the concentrated nature of the various groups. Thus, for instance, Basque Homeland and Freedom Party’s (ETA) and the IRA’s activities are primarily concentrated on bombings, car bombings, and shootings (96 percent and 94 percent of their total activities). The Peruvian group Sendero Luminoso prefers car bombing, shooting, and hostage taking (90 percent). The Islamic rebel group of the Philippines, Abu Sayyaf, and FARC in Colombia, by contrast, specialize in kidnapping and hostage taking. They comprise 91 percent and 82 percent of their respective activities. Similarly, only a handful of the world’s terrorist organizations engage in suicide bombings. Of the 52 major groups listed by the ICT, only nine engage in suicide bombings. Of them, the ones that are active in the Middle East (eight out of nine) committed 89 percent of all suicide bombings during the 12-year study period. From Table 5.1, it is apparent that Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad follow the path of violence by choosing to concentrate on suicide bombings, shootings, and knife attacks. Thus, we can clearly see that violent opposition groups do not choose their weapons of terror in a random fashion but are guided by their internal organizational logic. It is also interesting to note that among the major groups listed in Table 5.1, only the Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK) comes close to offering a full slate of terrorist activities. Their top three activities comprise a relatively low 62.1 percent of their total activities. Since all of these groups appear to be highly specialized as parts of a deliberate strategy, the question arises, what does their choice of activities say about the motivations of these groups? I have discussed in the previous chapter that although we can never demonstrate a group’s motivation, by following the noted economist Paul Samuelson I can assume that their choice reveals their preference and motivation.33 In order to find out how these various activities

Source: www.ict.org.il/

Bombing 6.1 27.3 Car bomb 4,3 0 Hand grenade 2.6 0 Highjacking 0 0 Hostage taking 0 18.2 Incendiary 0 9.1 devices Kidnapping 5.2 45.5 Knife attack 7.8 0 Letter bomb 0 0 Mortar attack 0 0 Rocket attack 0 0 Shooting 37.4 0 Suicide bombing 34.8 0 Vandalism 0 0 Arson 0 0 Chemical attack 0 0 Stoning 0 0 Vehicle attack 1.7 0 Lynching 0 0 Total 100 100 Top three activ- 83.6 91.0 ities as a percent of the total

Activities 37.3 35.3 2.0 0 0 0 0 0 2.0 0 0 23.5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 100 95.6

0 0 0 0 6.7 6.7 26.7 0 0 0 0 0 0 100 73.3

Basque Homeland and Freedom (ETA)

13.3 33.3 6.7 6.7 0 0

Abu Sayyaf Hamas Group al-Qaeda

65.8 0 0 5.3 2.6 2.6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 100 81.6

7.9 5.3 0 2.6 7.9 0 6.9 3.4 0 3.4 3.4 10.3 41.4 0 0 0 0 0 0 100 72.4

20.7 10.3 0 0 0 0 1.9 1.9 1.9 0 0 27.8 35.2 0 0 0 1.9 0 0 100 82.0

9.3 18.5 1.9 0 0 0

Liberation Tigers Palestinian Revolutionary of Tamil Eelam Islamic Armed Forces of Jihad (PU) Colombia (FARC) (LTTE)

TABLE 5.1 Comparison of profiles of ten terrorist groups (1980–2002) (% of total activities)

0 0 0 6.2 0 31.5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 100 94.0

25.0 37.5 0 0 0 0 20.7 0 0 0 0 13.8 13.8 3.4 3.4 0 0 0 0 100 62.1

27.6 0 3.4 3.4 0 10.3

Irish Republican Kurdistan Workers’ Army Party (PKK) (IRA)

10.0 0 0 0 0 35.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 100 90.0

5.0 45.0 0 0 5.0 0

Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path)

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are associated with each other, I ran a factor analysis. I have arranged the components according to their highest factor loading in the five categories and present them in Table 5.2. This table further bolsters the argument that dissident groups do not choose their activities randomly but do so with careful consideration; they pick those which are closest to their ideology, expertise, opportunity, and general modus operandi. Let us look at the logic of association of violent activities as identified by factor analysis. We may have a deeper understanding of the categories by focusing on the activities that load the highest within each category. Thus, suicide bombings define the first category and we can call them the choice of the “ideological” terrorists, since these are inspired by ideological fervor (Hamas), religious extremism (PIJ and al-Qaeda), and personal charisma of a leader (LTTE). I call them “ideological” because, apart from the technical know-how and complex logistics needed to carry out a successful suicide attack, the act needs supremely dedicated cadres who are willing to give their lives for the cause. This is so rare in the world of violent conflict that only a handful of the groups can have a ready supply of suitable candidates. If we examine the other activities within this factor, we see that shootings and grenade attacks require being physically close to the target, which indicates the assumption of considerable personal risk by the attacker.

TABLE 5.2 Principal component analysis of violent activities by selected terrorist groups (1991–2002)

Activities

Suicide bombings Shooting attacks Grenade attacks Bombing Car bombings Letter bombings Mortar attacks Rocket attacks Vehicle attacks Kidnapping Hostage taking Vandalism Arson attacks Incendiary devices Highjacking Stoning Lynching

Component factors I Ideological

II Professional III Anomic IV Hooligan V Vigilante

.777 .759 .678 .274 .403 .344 –.561 –.495 –.301 –.357 –.631 –.331 –.331 –.387 –.659 .267 .134

–.228 .173 .377 .631 .621 .452 .384 .364 –.012 –.06 .314 –.005 .005 –.05 .312 –.299 –.630

.05 .338 .302 –.444 –.590 –.698 .301 .292 .938 .898 .391 .074 .074 .01 .252 .100 –.100

Source: www.ict.org.il/ Note: Cumulative percentage of explained variance 89.0 percent.

.322 .05 .391 .307 –.112 –.021 –.438 –.362 .055 –.053 .247 .928 .928 .887 .344 –.320 .115

.414 –.245 –.187 .313 .105 .195 .191 .064 .071 –.008 .110 .076 .076 –.003 .105 .804 .736

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In contrast, groups with specific professional skills carry out the second category of attacks. They include bombings and car bombings that involve a number of specialized skills. Although seldom motivated by acts of religious zealotry, religion may be one of their principal reasons for conflict. These attacks are usually done with remote control devices, which accord the attackers time to escape. The IRA and ETA fall into this category. Jessica Stern, having interviewed numerous members of terrorist organizations all over the world, notes:34 Over time, however, militants have told me, terrorism can become a career as much as a passion. Leaders harness humiliation and anomie and turn them into weapons. Jihad becomes addictive, militants report, and with some individuals or groups – the “professional” terrorists – grievances can evolve into greed: for money, political power, status, or attention. I, therefore, call these groups “professional” terrorists. The third category of activities is promoted primarily by the groups who need to make a financial gain, such as FARC and Abu Sayyaf. Their preferences for monetary gains are revealed through their preponderant emphasis on hostage taking and kidnapping. Their vehicle attacks are usually related to attempts at taking hostages. Since the hostages are held for ransom, and usually for quite a large amount of money, we may conjecture that those taking part in these acts are motivated also by their personal pecuniary considerations. In other words, we may expect to find a larger proportion of what I call “mercenaries” among these groups. We may call them “anomic” terrorists because they attempt to operate within an environment of anomie or lawlessness and thrive in failed states or in nations with weakened central control. Dissident organizations thus come with various forms of motivation. For the purpose of careful analysis and subsequent policy prescription, it simply does not stand to reason to paint all groups with a broad brush. We must understand the qualitative difference that separates the original al-Qaeda, founded by Osama bin Laden, from the likes of FARC and Abu Sayyaf.

Escalation and de-escalation A dissident group becomes more powerful as its base becomes strengthened. As shown in Figure 5.3, a group gets stronger when it gains popular support. As a group gains political legitimacy, its core group increases in size taking new recruits from the pool of erstwhile free riders. I call them “easy riders” because in Olson’s exposition35 the free riders are those who would not take part in a collective action. The term implies a cut-and-dried absolute categorization.36 However, as Horgan and others have shown, participation is a seamless process, where someone might take part in a terrorist action and then not do anything in the name of the group.37 Furthermore, participation can take numerous forms, from passing on a code word to providing a safe passage or a safe house to

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FIGURE 5.3

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Escalation and de-escalation of violence

actually taking part in a violent action designed to kill or injure members of the enemy group. Through the process of escalation, those who did not pay much attention to the dissident group become increasingly attracted to its messages. As a result, a group gains strength and the forces of violent resistance increase. When a group increases in size, importance, and power, it also develops the capability to recruit another group of activists, the captive participants. In every social movement, particularly those which espouse violence, there are activists who join out of fear of retribution or simple peer pressure. Among the IRA in Ireland, there are numerous examples of young men joining the group due to explicit threats.38 Although there is no reliable information on how many join these groups out of fear, it is safe to conjecture that the proportion would depend on the strength of the group. Thus, three types of participants form the core group: the true believers, the mercenaries, and the captive participants. The opposite takes place when a group loses its political legitimacy and its core membership gets depleted through attrition, desertion, or arrest by the authorities. If the flow of new members is not enough to fill the void, the group starts losing ground. Dissident organizations fight for their political causes. Their choice of violence reflects their strategy to gain strength.

Choice of strategy When viewed from outside, a particular terrorist action may often seem foolhardy, since many attacks do not appear to have any military significance. For instance, the 9/11 attacks were of no consequence to the military imbalance between the wounded superpower and the Islamic radicals. In fact, these attacks virtually ensured a huge US armed response against al-Qaeda. With Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri on the run, the top echelon of al-Qaeda either

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killed or arrested, it is hard to imagine what instrumental rationality might have prompted the attacks against the US. As a result, there is often a pervasive assumption of irrationality on the part of the participants as well as the perpetrating terrorist groups.39 Yet, a careful examination of the terrorist strategies reveals considerable planning and forethought. By examining terrorist activities, we can divide them into two categories: those that are designed primarily as military actions and those that are symbolic actions, undertaken to produce a number of psychological, political, and, eventually, military results. Thus, those groups that are locked in a territorial struggle stage attacks, including suicide missions to gain military advantage. Thus, Hopgood, having studied the use of the elite Black Tigers by the LTTE, saw their use usually for territorial gains.40 Hopgood clearly states that “Black Tiger attacks aim primarily to win the war, not to spread terror.” Similarly, Ayman alZawahiri, the leader of the al-Qaeda movement, is clear in his assertion of the efficacy of suicide attacks: “The method of martyrdom operation, [is] the most successful way of inflicting damage against the opponent and least costly to the Mujahidin in terms of casualty.”41 In contrast, through its activities a group often attempts to send symbolic messages. In their insightful work, Schmidt and de Graaf point out that to a terrorist group participation in a violent activity is a form of communication.42 In the parlance of economics, this is known as “signalling.” As they play out a macabre mix of violence and theater, they send a message to a number of important adversary and client groups. To the adversaries, they send a message of threat, the shape of things to come, unless their demands are not met. Pape demonstrates the strategic use of suicide attacks against democracies by various terrorist organizations.43 Through their acts of public cruelty, terrorist groups also signal their commitment to the larger “cause.” In their analysis of Hamas, Mishal and Sela argue that part of the motivation of the terrorist group was to provoke the Israelis into imposing draconian measures on the larger Palestinian community.44 For instance, Bloom argues that Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad have carefully chosen their strategies to coincide with the ebb and flow of the Palestinian public opinion.45 When suicide attacks became unpopular they refrained from attacks. When opinion favored the Palestinian Authority to achieve a separate statehood through negotiations with the Israelis, the more radical groups came to a hudna, or truce. Similarly, in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, when global public sympathy was clearly in favor of the US, there were no suicide attacks. Through these acts, the dissident groups aim at increasing their political legitimacy and solidifying their support base. Based on econometric analysis, Gupta and Mundra showed that suicide attacks in Israel were also caused by inter-group rivalry among the various Palestinian dissident groups.46 When a government responds with excessive force deemed by the target community, the perpetrating group only increases in stature.47 Similar to a firm that tries to increase its market share through advertising, the various terrorist groups attempt to increase their popular support through acts of wanton violence.

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The literature on the strategies of terrorism focuses on its impact on public opinion (both of the target society and the group’s own community), the demonstration of the target government’s lack of moral standing, inconsistency of application of force, and its offensive weakness in the face of the growing strength of the dissident group. Finally, the groups aim at discrediting the moderates who might be interested in coming to a negotiated settlement with the government. A dissident group engages in strategic use of violence, which is reflected not only in its timing but also in the choice of activity. For instance, the use of stone-throwing children against the heavily armed Israeli army created worldwide sympathy for the Palestinians living under occupation.48 A dissident group may engage in violent activities to demonstrate weakness or inconsistencies of the target government. The ability of a group to expose government weakness increases when it has information on how it might react to the acts of provocation.49 Empirical findings of Lichbach50 and Moore51 corroborate such behavior. All types of governments are not equally equipped to respond to violence by non-state actors within their own borders in the same way. Gupta et al. demonstrate that though non-democratic regimes are able to quell rebellions by using brutal force, democracies are much more constrained in their response.52 As a result, democracies must rely on political accommodation rather than sheer repression in their response to violence. Extremist groups often undertake acts of violence to spoil the middle ground of compromise. Kydd and Walter show that suicide attacks increased in frequency whenever the Israeli and Palestinian authorities were close to an agreement.53 The Israeli government interpreted the campaigns of suicide attacks by Hamas and the Palestine Islamic Jihad as a weakness (or even acquiescence) of the moderate Arafat regime to curb violence by the extremist groups.54 Finally, when do terrorist groups employ their biggest weapons, suicide attacks? The smartest weapon in the arsenal of a group is its cadre of suicide attackers.55 The defining characteristic of suicide attack is that the attackers know that the mission will not be considered a success unless they die in the process. Therefore, for a group to engage in suicide attacks, it must have volunteers for whom the motivation must shift from “reason” to the “cause.”56 Evidence from around the world suggests that those groups that are imbedded in a community are typically inspired by nationalistic or irredentist sectarian aspirations, even when they profess religious or Marxist ideologies. These groups develop bases within society and are much more sensitive to the cultural mores of the base. In contrast, those groups that are filled by the “outsiders,” inspired by a millenarian vision, or are supported mostly by foreign countries, are less sensitive to the community’s wishes. Similarly, groups that are criminally oriented tend to be less constrained by the community.

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Transformation Terrorist groups are not equal in their devotion to ideological goals and over time some of these groups become more criminal in orientation than political. I distinguish between a terrorist group and a criminal organization by assuming that a terrorist group aims at achieving a set of public goods, the benefits of which will flow to all members of the community, regardless of participation. On the other hand, a criminal gang is motivated by the prospect of quasi-public goods (or common pooled resources), the fruits of which are restricted only to the core members of the group.57 These two goals are often incongruent and, despite the widespread belief to the contrary at the extreme ends of the ideological spectrum a clear division between the two is maintained. As we will see in Chapter 8, these two groups may occasionally develop some cooperative ventures, but they eye each other with unease and suspicion. As a result, their relationship becomes much more complex than is generally assumed.

Terrorism increasing and attenuating forces: the dynamics of terrorism Terrorism and the strength of a movement follow the dynamic interactions between the state and the dissident group. Facing challenges from a dissident group, the state reacts in a predictable way. Since much of what a violent protest group does falls outside the legal system of any organized society, the state portrays these as ordinary acts of criminal behavior. However, when the political nature of these acts becomes apparent, the authorities try a number of timehonored techniques for quelling a rebellion. During the course of the life of a movement it goes through a number of peaks and troughs when levels of violence escalate and subside. We can now develop a conceptual picture of this dynamic relationship by bringing together the accumulated knowledge of the vast literature. We can look at the dialectic relationship between a state and a dissident organization through the interaction between two broadly defined forces: terrorism increasing force (TIF) and terrorism attenuating force (TAF). Let us examine what would constitute these two forces. In our everyday lives we allocate our available time to the pursuit of activities that promote self-interest as well as our group interest. The forces that strengthen our collective identity or deepen our conviction that our selfish interests are best served by joining the forces of the opposition make the dissident movement stronger by attracting more activists. On the other hand, if people come to the opposite conclusion, the movement loses ground. Beside the calculations of benefits each rational actor faces a cost factor. If the cost of participation goes up, fewer people join the terrorist movement and vice versa. Beside these three factors of rational decision-making, there are a few facilitating factors. These factors help strengthen the TIF or, in their absence, make the TAF stronger. Let us examine the three factors that determine the escalation and demise of organized dissidence.

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Strengthening of collective identity The notion of “us” and “them” is predicated upon an essentially moral ideological perception, which pitches good against evil, religious against profane, rightful owners against invaders and interlopers. In the process charismatic leaders frame the issues by defining the in-group and clearly singling out the enemies. The universal message from the leaders is that their community is under attack; without active and violent resistance (“the only language that the enemy understands”) its future is doomed.

Charismatic leaders I have argued that the factors of economic political deprivation do not provide sufficient cause for the development of systematic opposition to an organized government. For that we need a dissident organization that can strategically shape the frustration that is widely felt in a community. And, for a successful organization to develop, we need the rise of a charismatic leader(s). This is the biggest unknowable in history, which ultimately makes any prediction of the rise of terrorism and mass movements problematic. Yet, if we examine the causes of the rise of the fundamentalist movement in Islam, we can see that Muslim grievance against the West has been around at least since the breakdown of the Ottoman caliphate in Turkey. However, it took a series of political entrepreneurs such as Hassan al-Banna, Sayyid Qutb, Abdul Azzam, Osama bin Laden, and Ayman al-Zawahiri to give it a shape through al-Qaeda by framing the existing grievances in the context of political Islam. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that Fair and Shepherd,58 by using the Pew Research Center survey data, would find that the largest correlate of support for terrorism comes from those who perceive a threat to Islam.59

Overreaction by the government From the earliest days of the Sicarii, the Jewish zealots who waged wars against the Roman occupiers,60 to current-day Islamic suicide attackers, terrorists have always laid a trap for the authorities to overreact and engage in such a manner that would clearly demonstrate their “true nature.” Their inhumanity would enrage those who had preferred to sit on the fence and prompt them to take up an active role in the dissident organization. The opponents – often the forces of the target government – reinforce these sentiments through acts that further alienate and provoke the members of the support base. The memories of the atrocities are kept alive through songs, plays, and literature, and the political leadership use these as tools for mass mobilization: the pictures of the tortured and killed serve as the most potent recruiting tool for years to come. In the history of many mass movements, by simply visually inspecting the casualty figures, one can pinpoint the junctures of history when a movement came to life as a response to overreaction by the authorities.

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Acts of political/religious provocation by the government In the final analysis every dissident group lays its claim to moral high ground visà-vis the target government. They do it through resorting to religious justification, evoking the images of past glories, and/or demonstrating the immorality of the prevailing economic injustices. Through their strategic moves, the dissident groups attempt to bolster their moral claims. For every movement there are areas of symbolic importance. When the government transgresses these points, public sentiment is instantly inflamed. These arousals of public ire quickly get manifested in terms of higher levels of deaths and injuries.

Loss of political legitimacy of the regime Self-interest as well as collective interest rest at the heart of perceived political legitimacy of a government. Through their actions, political authorities strive to engender belief among the citizens of the benefits of staying with the existing political system. However, when there are cracks in the political legitimacy of a regime, the forces that increase terrorism get a boost.

Demonstration of ability to provide public goods Hearts and minds are not swayed solely by the prospect of ideological reward. Almost all successful dissident groups want to demonstrate their ability to provide material goods for the welfare of their community. The mythical story of Robin Hood exemplifies how a small group of outlaws could gain political legitimacy not only through the demonstration of moral superiority to the existing social structure, but also by distributing their booty to the non-participant population in and around Sherwood Forest. Hamas in the Palestine, Hezbullah in Lebanon, and the Naxalites in India have gained loyalty within their communities by providing public goods from health care to the rule of law.

Costs of dissidence There are two aspects of costs of participation to an actor in anti-systemic violent actions. The first is the opportunity costs of time, and the second is physical costs imposed by the state in preventing terrorism. Opportunity cost is an economic concept which measures the amount of income that one must give up to engage in a time-consuming activity. To a prospective participant this is a very important consideration. That is why when an economy goes into a deep recession there is a greater propensity for political violence. For that reason, we find more young men and women joining mass movements. Yet to join the workforce on a full-time basis, and still be dependent on parents for room and board, the student population of the world has the lowest opportunity costs of participation.61 For a similar reason, we find

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that those living in extreme poverty and eking out a meager existence cannot a join dissident movement, since any time taken from their subsistence living would mean starvation. The high opportunity cost also prevents peasants, dependent on strict plant cycles, from joining dissident movements.62 Although there are little systematic data in this area, a casual perusal of the biographies of the terrorists would reveal that a vast majority of them did not hold jobs in the formal sectors of the economy or were underemployed at the time of their participation.63 Since it is generally accepted that the activists in political violence are better educated than the rest of the population, their inability to find, or in some cases unwillingness to hold, formal employment commensurate to their educational achievement may signal a low level of opportunity cost for missing work. In contrast to the opportunity cost, which is an indirect measure of forgone income, the actual costs of participation are the price one must pay for getting involved in an extra-legal activity. These costs are exacted by the government and come in the shape of loss of income (fines) or liberty (prison time), pain (torture), and even life itself. They can also spill over to the actor’s loved ones. For instance, their friends and family members can be targeted. In many cases they may lose their government jobs and, as is the case in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, the Israelis may destroy the family homes of those who take part in suicide attacks. Under the standard economic model, an increase in cost would lower the level of participation in the extra-legal activities. However, when it comes to ideological goods, such an assumption is sometime problematic. Thus, Gurr argues for a quadratic relationship between government coercion and political violence. In other words, up to a certain threshold, which Gurr calls “high violence, high coercion,” increase in government sanction only solidifies the opposition.64 However, after the threshold is crossed and a set of draconian measures has been implemented, protest movements tend to decrease. A number of studies have empirically shown the existence of this quadratic relationship and have argued that while the democratic regimes, having to work within the limits of law and a biding constitution, are rarely able to cross the threshold of high coercion, the non-democratic nations can often impose such brutal retribution on the protesting dissidents.65

Network and organizational structure Communication is at the heart of all organizations. The terrorist organizations are no exception to this rule. The way an organization communicates within itself66 and with its clients through networks has been a subject of intense scrutiny by the theorists for nearly half a century.67 Research into the process by which grassroots organizations in urban America have developed has shed important light on mobilization of the masses by overcoming the collective action problem.68 Specifically, a number of scholars have explored the way terrorist and other dissident organizations develop their networks.69

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Dissident movements require the spreading of ideas and a means to mobilize a large number of people. Contrary to the traditional approach, where organizations are seen as hierarchical, elitist, and ahistorical,70 the non-hierarchical organizations show definite cultural and historic patterns.71 In their ability to adapt to local conditions, some movements can tap into their traditional networks. Thus, the Iranian Revolution was greatly aided by the network of Shia mosques, which distributed illegally taped sermons of the exiled Ayatollah Khomeini and was able to mobilize the masses against the Shah’s regime.72 It is not only the Shiites who have been able to take advantage of the existing network through the mosques; Islamists in general have been able to get their radical message across through the mullahs and the mosques. The Islamic tradition of daily prayer at the calls of the local mullah allows the recruiters to spread their messages and to recruit activists.73 However, not every city or every country offers the same opportunity. With differing history and socio-economic, cultural, and historical backgrounds, mosques in London, Milan, Madrid, and Hamburg became hotbeds of radical politics, yet they did not in Sydney, Berlin. Chicago, or Geneva, for example.74 In the private and public sectors there is a wide variety of organizational structures. Some are strictly hierarchical, while others are franchises, with a much looser matrix of operational duties. Each type of organization has its strengths and weaknesses. While a strictly hierarchical organization can be much more coherent and have a single vision, non-hierarchical organizations have the advantage of flexibility to adapt to regional conditions. The dissident organizations in a similar fashion demonstrate a wide range of typology. Sageman provides a picture of the al-Qaeda network, where a group of like-minded people across the world is seen as a network with a cluster of nodes.75 In this framework, a mosque in London, where the volunteers to the global Salafi movement are actively recruited and plots are hatched for future attacks, is a node. The entire movement may be seen as a network connecting these nodes. This is analogous to the network of air traffic with each airport serving as a node. However, not every airport is equal in status. Some, due to their size of population or geographic location, are the hubs, where the traffic volume is much larger than in the regional airports. Thus, Chicago, New York, Boston, Minneapolis, Atlanta, and Los Angeles are the national and international hubs, while Albany, San Diego, and Pittsburgh are more regional nodes. Similarly, in a fluid and constantly evolving architecture of terrorist networks, we can clearly identify the nodes and the hubs. By plotting these links of communication, Sageman identified the Central Staff, Core Arab, Maghreb Arab, and Southeast Asia as the four clusters built around “hubs” such as Osama bin Laden, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah, and Abu Bakar Baasyir. Western journalists and policymakers, unaccustomed to this fluid and rapidly changing organizational structure, often make the mistake of assuming a strict pyramidal structure of organization.76 Thus, the respected London newspaper the Observer quotes an unnamed security official saying:

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If you look at the structure of al-Qaeda, what you basically have is a pyramid … If you see the see the two groups of bombers [who carried out the 7/7 London bombings] as two separate teams of foot soldiers on the very bottom, then there is a possibility they are linked by command structure in the level above. This is the level we are trying to identify and track down …77 Unfortunately, the Salafi movement is not a top-down system with a strict chain of command going down from bin Laden to Muhammad Sidique Khan (the ringleader of the group) to the teenager Hasin Hussain. As Robb points out, today’s radical Islamic groups are not like the old-fashioned PLO with Yasser Arafat as the undisputed head of the organization. Instead, modern Jihadi terror groups are linear, open-sourced, decentralized conglomerations of small, quasiindependent groups drawn more by inspiration from bin Laden than a direct instruction from him.78 Along the lines of Sageman’s79 understanding of the network, I present the structure of a hypothetical terrorist organization in Figure 5.4. In this diagram, a group of nodes make a cluster. I have represented “hubs” as dark nodes. In this hypothetical case, the core group is characterized by the presence of more hubs than the peripheral clusters.

FIGURE 5.4

Hypothetical representation of a terrorist network

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These nodes and hubs should not be viewed simply as points of information exchange, such as “how to make a bomb.” Rather, together they represent what is known as a “small-world” of virtual community on the web.80 Through their interactions, they develop social capital, provide ideological and emotional support, raise money, keep the fire of hatred burning, and plan for future actions. For instance, Robb points out that there are between 70 and 100 groups that make up the Iraqi insurgency, which are organized like a “bazaar,” where ideas are traded and they all learn from each other’s experience.81 Through their communications the insurgents perfect their weapons, improve surveillance system and, sometimes, coordinate attacks. This is what Stern calls “inspirational terrorism.”82 Stern contends that their malleability of mission and the ability to create a “virtual family” gives groups like al-Qaeda their strength. As a result of this non-hierarchical organizational structure, they become the true multi-headed Hydra. In the summer of 2004, the police in London discovered what was quickly dubbed by the media a “sleeper cell.” In a diabolical plan, Dhiren Barot, a converted Muslim from India, led a group of men to bomb the London Underground, among other places. The group planned to stage a huge explosion in the tube tunnel under the River Thames. If they had succeeded, thousands of commuters would have drowned in the subterranean labyrinth of the underground network. What surprised the investigating detectives was the apparent professionalism that these men exhibited; they submitted a business plan to alQaeda operatives, minutely detailing every aspect of the project along with a cost estimate for carrying it out. In contrast to this London group, which sought financial help in carrying out the proposed attacks, the Moroccan group that bombed the Atocha train station in downtown Madrid around the time Barot was arrested were more independent of bin Laden’s operation. Unlike the British group, they did not have any direct contact with al-Qaeda and nor did they seek funding from any outside sources. The Madrid cell’s only contact with al-Qaeda was through the Internet.83 They raised their own money from selling drugs and from other illicit methods. While al-Qaeda is largely decentralized, other terrorist groups are not. The difference between the two types of groups can be seen when its organizational structure is compared with the PKK (Kurdish Workers Party). The PKK was hierarchical under the leadership of Abdullah Ocalan. After he was arrested in 1999, the group went dormant for a while and changed its name to the Kurdistan Freedom and Democracy Congress in 2002, then to the Kurdistan People’s Congress in 2003, in order to distance itself both from Ocalan and from his Marxist ideology. Although there are groups that are strictly hierarchical and those that are not, within the latter, a group may have a cluster that is non-hierarchical, with another one exhibiting more of a Weberian pyramidal structure. The Southeast Asian network, for instance, exhibited much more of a hierarchical structure.84 Abdullah Sungkar and Abu Bakar Baasyir created Jemaah Islamiyah from the top down, along a much more Weberian pyramidal organizational pattern.

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Funding terror Waging a violent campaign against an established social and political order is an expensive proposition. Money is the lifeblood of any organization. To run a modern terrorist campaign a group must be economically savvy. While every group must raise money for their operations, the larger groups, such as al-Qaeda and the LTTE, have developed an incredibly intricate web of legitimate and illegitimate businesses. The very clandestine nature of terrorists makes it doubly difficult to raise enough money to sustain a group’s activities. The problem for researching this area is that much of the information on the financing of terrorism is shrouded in secrecy. However, a growing number of important books and articles are filling this need.85 Based on these published reports, Figure 5.5 presents a scheme for terrorist organizations’ avenues for raising money. The first and foremost source of funding, especially for some of the Islamic groups, is charitable contributions by their support bases. The religious duty of zakat or alms is one of the five pillars of Islam. Every faithful is obliged to give a certain portion of his wealth to charity. These contributions are often collected at the mosques. In Saudi Arabia, there is no income tax. Instead, the Saudi citizens are obliged fulfill their religious duties on a voluntary basis. Beside these personal contributions, Saudi banks also collect 2 percent of each transaction as zakat.86 Since this money, paid by Muslims all over the world, is part of the religious tradition, there is hardly a strict assessment of its volume. However, journalists Pallister and Bowcott estimate that the 6,000 strong Saudi royal

FIGURE 5.5

Sources of terrorist funding

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family alone is worth $600 billion, making their yearly zakat about $12 billion.87 Beside zakat, there are many reports of wealthy benefactors supporting terrorist organizations. In fact, bin Laden may have invested most of his fortune in the creation and expansion of al-Qaeda. The role of contributions from the diaspora has been an essential factor in the sustenance and expansion of many groups. The Irish Catholic diaspora, particularly in Boston, has long supported the IRA, the Canadian Sikhs the Khalistan movement, and the Tamils in India, Australia, and Europe have sent money to the LTTE. In the process of the development of a violent dissident movement, the crucial role that a foreign state plays in providing financial support cannot be overestimated. An organized government often supports a terrorist group operating in a different country for ideological or for political reasons. Thus, to Pakistani governments, the support for the mujahedeen infiltrating the Kashmir valley has been a moral issue from the very beginning.88 The problem for Pakistan has been that, without any history of its own, its national identity had to be artificially crafted. Hence, in order to maintain its separate identity, its political imperative required it to lay claims to the Muslim-majority state of Kashmir. Furthermore, from the point of view of military strategy, the geography of the subcontinent obviated the need for Kashmir to be part of Pakistan. The current Jihadi movement did not originate in the late 1980s, as many might presume. Rather the six decade-long conflict has been a steady low-intensity conflict, which has been amply aided by the active support of the Pakistani military and its intelligence arm, the InterService Intelligence (ISI). Similarly, supporting the anti-Castro Cubans has long been a part of US foreign policy, which led to the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961.89 Similarly, the US government has in many parts of the world covertly supported many dissident groups that can be called terrorist organizations. Beside ideological and foreign policy rationale, governments may also support terrorist groups in order to save their own societies from being their target. This is a sort of “protection money” that Palast claims prompted the Saudis and the Gulf states to secretly supply al-Qaeda with large sums of money.90 Since nearly every nation considers supporting dissident movements as part of their active foreign policy or out of some other domestic political concern, the United Nations has been unable to pass legislation defining “terrorism” – and thereby banning its support by the signatories. Dissident organizations also become involved in legitimate business ventures from banking in Riyadh to running taxicabs in Belfast. The economic system in the orthodox Islamic world attempts to straddle a delicate divide between what is acceptable in the Islamic tradition and the needs of a modern economy. Thus, the theocratic Islamic economy must operate within a system that does not allow income taxes or interest on loans, and must treat voluntary charitable donations as outside the accounting process. As a result, in the early days of alQaeda, Islamic banks from the Pakistani Bank of Credit and Commerce (BCCI)91 to Saudi Dar al-Maal al-Islami (DMI) and Dallah al-Baraka (DAB) raised suspicion and accusations of supporting all kinds of violent activities from

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financing terrorism to supporting the Pakistani nuclear proliferator A.Q. Khan’s illicit operations. Even the US State Department charged that Osama bin Laden had a controlling interest in the DMI.92 Beside these legitimate business ventures, terrorist organizations engage in every kind of illegal activity from kidnapping and hostage taking for ransom, bank robbing, human trafficking, drug trading, gun running, smuggling, and even running prostitution rings. All of these operations carry the risk of alienating the support base, if the group loses its moral message. However, not every society is the same when it comes to the cultural acceptance of the various means of getting involved in these activities. Therefore, they pose a dilemma for the terrorist groups between seeking political legitimacy and raising money for their operations. Although I have presented the case of terrorist groups engaging in legitimate and illegitimate business activities, not all of their activities can be classified along this binary classification. In the immigrant communities from the various lesser-developed nations strewn around in the Western world, sending money home is a matter of utmost priority. Since the cumbersome, expensive, and often non-existent corresponding banking system in their own countries makes it difficult to transfer money through formal channels, they send money home through a time-honored system called the Hawala, which was, perhaps, created in the dim past of the early medieval era to meet similar needs. Under this system the sender contacts a Howaladar (the one that operates the system) and gives him a certain amount of money. The Howaladar in London, Paris, or New York, in turn, contacts his counterpart, from whom the intended collects the corresponding amount in local currency. The entire system works on trust and through a network of traditional contacts, without keeping much of a paper trail. This system, which is controlled mostly by Indians and Pakistanis, helps millions of Asians and Africans to transfer funds internationally. This not only ensures safety, but it also evades detection by the authorities. A joint World Bank and International Monetary Fund study concluded that: The anonymous transfer of funds through the [Hawala] systems has also attracted concerns about their potential use as a conduit for terrorist funds. Because there is no requirement for identification documents or source of funds, a [Hawala] dealer can initiate or facilitate a multiplicity of transfers, which conceal the ultimate origin of the funds through their network in different jurisdictions. The recipient of funds can use the funds to conduct a terrorist act. Once the transaction is completed, all customer identification documents, codes, or references are most likely destroyed, except, perhaps, those required for settlement purposes.93

Dynamics of terrorist movements The interaction between a dissident group and the state authorities shapes the dynamics of their mutual destiny. We can show the process with the help of

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Figure 5.6. In this figure, the dynamic interaction is shown with the help of two forces: the TIF and the TAF. We should note that at each point in the history of a conflict the two forces exist side by side and their relative strength determines the outcome of the violent movement. In this diagram, the vertical axis measures the relative strength of the two forces. If at any point the increasing force is greater than the attenuating force, the level of violence (shown on the horizontal axis) spirals out. However, since it cannot increase indefinitely, a society generates from within the forces that reduce the level of violence. During the course of a violent campaign, the society often settles for a long-standing standoff of low-intensity conflict, where the two forces seem to achieve a point of stable equilibrium. At this point, each side knows its limits and does not want to transgress the threshold. Take, for instance, the conflict between Hezbullah in Lebanon and the Israeli Defense Force. For several years, the Israelis became used to the Hezbullah sending short-range missiles across its borders and Hezbullah became accustomed to low-level Israeli retaliation. These tit-for-tat responses can keep the two adversaries on a more or less stable level of violence. In the stylized depiction of this dynamic relationship in Figure 5.6, point “a” shows a stable equilibrium. To the left of this point, the TIFs will gain the upper hand. This may happen due to the inner politics of the dissident groups, wanting to increase pressure on the government, or the government, seeking to satisfy public’s demand to punish the members of the opposition group. If by any chance one of the parties takes a bolder action and the level of violence increases to the right of the point “a,” the desire not to escalate the violence to an unacceptable level makes the reaction muted from the aggrieved party. As a result, the society becomes bogged down in a steady cycle of conflict. Situations like these are usually characterized by low-intensity violence, since a high level of violence produces its own dynamics, which takes it up to an even

FIGURE 5.6

Dynamic interactions and growth and decline of violence

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higher level of escalation, or countervailing forces generate conditions to reduce the intensity of fighting. This situation is also one of military stalemate, with neither side having the punch to knock the other out. This equilibrium of the two forces can be severely shaken for a number of reasons. For instance, if any one party takes a move that is considered to be way outside the realms of a proportionate response, violence escalates to a new height. This sudden move, causing a shift of the curves (not shown in the diagram), can come as a deliberate action by the government of the terrorist organization, often due to a change in leadership, a gross miscalculation by either side or as a result of some historical accident. The combatants may wish to push the level of conflict to a different level with the hope of achieving a total victory over the other or it may be the outcome of a misunderstanding. Richard English quotes Tom Maguire, one of the IRA men to whom the events of the Easter Rising, following a brutal crackdown by the British forces in 1916, was a “life-transforming event.”94 The British policy of using utmost force only helped forge Irish nationalism. McGuire writes: The Easter insurrection came to me like a bolt from the blue. That is why the rise of charismatic leaders and abrupt points of escalation and dissipation punctuate the chronicles of all movements, I will never forget my exhilaration, it was a turning point in my life.95 Another IRA activist Tom Barry pointed out: through the blood sacrifices of the men of 1916, had one Irish youth of eighteen been awakened to Irish nationality. Let it be recorded that those sacrifices were equally necessary to awaken the minds of 90 percent of the Irish people.96 Such deliberate policy missteps by the authorities are always exploited by rebel leaders and others in society to keep the flames of hatred glowing for generations to come. A radical shift in the stable equilibrium point can also be the result of a miscalculation by the leadership. The crisis across the Israel–Lebanon border, which escalated into a full-scale war in the summer of 2006, is widely seen as an outcome of miscalculation on both sides.97 Thus, The Economist reports: In launching his raid Nasrallah [the leader of Hezbullah] was in fact doing nothing new. In recent years, Hezbullah has mounted several similar raids into Israel. It got away with them, even when Israel was led by Ehud Barak and Ariel Sharon, tough prime ministers, who had been war heroes too. Their reactions were astonishingly mild.98 However, when the Hezbullah fighters sneaked across the border and, in a raid, killed several Israeli soldiers and abducted two others, the response was swift and

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overwhelming. From all indications, The Economist is right in stating that this time Nasrallah had miscalculated. In fact, after the war, which many Israelis saw as a humiliating defeat for Israel, Nasrallah admitted the miscalculation. In terms of our diagram, this brazen act by the Hezbullah pushed the dynamic relationship to a point where violence spiralled out of control. At this point the overwhelming forces of TIF would escalate violence to a very high level, resulting in many deaths and billions of dollars of damage to the economies of Israel and Lebanon. During the course of a conflict, there are moments when the future hangs in the balance. In my stylized rendering, this is the unstable equilibrium “b,” where a small push can send the society to the path of a peaceful resolution of hostilities or can set it up for huge escalation of violence. For instance, in the waning days of the Clinton administration, as a last-ditch effort, Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak were brought to Camp David. As the world waited for a solution to the most intractable problem of all, all hopes were dashed when it ended without any agreement. This officially brought the Oslo peace process to an end. Within days, the entire region experienced the most violent spates of suicide attacks by the Palestinians and the Israeli retaliated with matching ferocity. Historical accidents, outside the realm of the leaders of the dissident group and its adversary, the target government, can also throw a society experiencing prolonged low-intensity conflict into the path of radical escalation of violence. In 1994, an American-born Jewish extremist Baruch Goldstein opened fire on a group of Muslims praying at the Cave of the Patriarchs in the city of Hebron, killing 29 Arabs and wounding nearly 150. This act of violence inflamed passion among the Palestinians and the violence escalated to a new high. The history of every mass movement provides examples of events causing huge escalations of violence. The impacts of TIF and TAF over time are shown in Figure 5.7, where a continuation of a low-intensity conflict is suddenly shaken up by rapid escalation of violence. This quickly takes the society to an extremely high level of violence. Since this level of violence is unsustainable over a long period of time, the terrorism attenuating forces swell up to force a return to the old status quo, a negotiated compromise, or a victory of one side over the other.

Death of a movement The death of a movement comes from three different, often interconnected, reasons. First, a movement dies when its political goals become no longer relevant in the face of a changed political reality, or the support base becomes disillusioned or gets tired of violence. It can be argued that the growing affluence of the Republic of Ireland and the general apathy of the British public to the cause of the Protestants in Northern Ireland laid the foundation to a peaceful outcome of the longest-standing conflict, where the oldest organized dissident group in the world, the IRA, was forced to accept the reality of a divided Ireland.

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FIGURE 5.7

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Hypothetical impact of TIF and TAF over time

Second, a dissident group, particularly one that is organized in a strict hierarchical structure around a charismatic leader, can suffer military defeat in the hands of far superior government forces. With the leaders killed or behind bars, the group disintegrates and disappears from the pages of history. This fate is particularly applicable to relatively small groups, with little or no connection to the larger community. Many groups, such as the Greek Revolutionary Organization 17 November99 and the Symbionese Liberation Army100 in America, have suffered such a fate. A radical movement ends when the leadership accepts an offer to join the democratic processes of a nation. With the leadership eschewing violence and deciding to contest the elections, violence subsides. The decision by Daniel Ortega of the Sandinista movement to contest the Salvadoran election in 1990 essentially brought the violent conflict to an end.101 This is usually the outcome of a negotiated agreement. Finally, a group can achieve its military and political goals. Once these goals are reached, the need to fight on also disappears. Thus, the recent communist rebellion in Nepal is on its way toward establishing a constitutional monarchy and joining hands with other political parties to form a democratic regime.102 Figure 5.8 sums up my arguments offered in this chapter. The top part of the figure shows the factors of individual motivations for joining a dissident group to achieve a set of public goods for the entire community. Rational individuals overcome the free-rider problems through a combination of incentives that

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FIGURE 5.8

Individual and group: a static view of the evolution of terrorist organizations

appeal to their selfish interest as well as ascriptive or adoptive group welfare. A dissident group is composed of the ideologues, the mercenaries, and the captive participants. A group gains or loses strength through its support bases (the easy riders and the sympathizers). The policies of the governments and the strategies adopted by the group leadership create the relative strength of the terrorism increasing force and terrorism attenuating force. When the terrorism increasing forces overwhelm the attenuating forces, violence increases. The level of violence reduces when the reverse takes place. These two forces are influenced by the trigger events and other external factors.

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With time, a group evolves. A few become victorious and become part of the legitimate government in the newly formed government, such as in Israel, Algeria, and Kenya. Some groups turn toward the economically lucrative side of the movement, and resemble more of an organized crime syndicate than a political movement. As we have noted, most groups die out. Their death comes when they suffer a military defeat. Their leaders are captured or killed, most group members scatter, leaving the organization voluntarily or are imprisoned. The Italian Red Brigade, the Black Panther movement, the Naxalites in West Bengal in the early 1970s, and the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka in 2009 provide good examples of military defeat. A violent dissident group may also disappear from the pages of history when their ideology becomes increasingly irrelevant in a changing world. As a result, they begin to lose vital public support among their bases. Perhaps the Basque separatist group ETA makes a good example of this. Finally, a terrorist group may become mainstream as a result of a negotiated settlement. If the current peace process is maintained in Northern Ireland, the IRA as an organization may indeed be relegated to the pages of history. Terrorism does not happen in a vacuum. This chapter has discussed its origin through the interaction between a dissident group, the target state authorities, and the trigger events and other exogenous factors. This dynamic interaction shapes the ebb and flow of socio-political violence, including terrorism. In the process, apart from escalation and deceleration, there can also be prolonged periods of low-level tit-for-tat conflict.

Summary This chapter integrates the forces that create, escalates, transforms, and ends a dissident group into a formal structure. I examined the life cycle of groups in the context of this dynamical system. From the earliest days of recorded scholarship, eminent thinkers have speculated on the causes of political violence, identifying economic and political grievances as the root causes. Empirical evidence points to the fact that on a cross-country basis, measures of poverty, income inequality, and lack of democratic freedom have a weak correlation with terrorism. Since without grievances, there cannot be a movement, I argue that their presence (necessary conditions), by themselves, does not cause politically motivated actions. For that to happen, the rise of charismatic leaders and an effective organizational structure must be present (sufficient cause). There are examples where grievances alone failed to ignite the fires of violent revolt. The African Americans and the Muslim minority in India are cases in point, where feelings of deprivation did not lead to widespread terrorism. Among the factors that cause terrorism, lawlessness and lack of government control (state failure) have the strongest explanatory power. I have presented a model, where interactions between terrorism increasing forces and terrorism attenuating forces determine the life cycle of a movement. Dissident movements gain strength when TIF overwhelms TAF. They wane when the

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opposite takes place. If they are stuck at an equilibrium, countries experience titfor-tat cycle of violence, placing the state and its adversaries at a standoff. Analyses of the components of the two forces provide us with policies toward minimizing the risks of terrorism.

Notes 1 2 3 4 5 6

7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

Harari (2017) Krueger and Maleckova (2003). Runciman (1966). Horgan (2003); Post (2003). Sageman (2004). Pew Research Center (2002), www.pewresearch.org/global/2002/12/04/what-theworld-thinks-in-2002/. The survey was conducted in Bangladesh, Ghana, Indonesia, Ivory Coast, Jordan, Lebanon, Mali, Nigeria, Pakistan, Senegal, Tanzania, Turkey, Uganda, and Uzbekistan. Although part of the larger survey, Egypt did not allow this question to be asked. This survey was not conducted in Syria, Iran, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia. Bueno de Mesquita (2007: 12). It is important to note that President Bush embraced the idea of spreading democracy as a justification for invading Iraq after a failed search for weapons of mass destruction. Bueno de Mesquita (2007); see also Li (2005). Pape (2005). See Crenshaw (2007). Fearon and Laitin (2003). Ibid. Rotberg (2004); Debiel and Klein (2002). Rotberg (2002: 90). For one of the best sources of state failure, see the State Failure Taskforce, http:// globalpolicy.gmu.edu/pitf/. O’Donnell (1993). www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=3098&src2=PJA05. These 12 factors include: 1) 2) 3) 4) 5) 6) 7) 8) 9) 10) 11) 12)

Mounting demographic pressures Massive movement of refugees and IDPs (internally displaced persons) Legacy of vengeance – seeking group grievance Chronic and sustained human flight Uneven economic development along group lines Sharp and/or severe economic decline Criminalization or delegitimization of the state Progressive deterioration of public services Widespread violation of human rights Security apparatus as “state within a state” Rise of factionalized elites Intervention of other states or external actors

19 The variable state failure index alone explains a highly significant 22 percent of the variance. Ln (fatalities and injuries) t-ratio R-squared F-statistic

=.73 + .051 State Failure Index (.73) (5.3)* .22 27.7 (1,98)

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20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32

33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57

58 59 60 61 62

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Olson (1968). Also, see Gupta (1990, 2001a, 2005b). Olson (1968) Gupta (1999, 2001a). McLellan and Avery (1977). Lee (2002). Jones (2020). The Economist (2014) “Why India’s Muslims Are So Moderate?” www.economist. com/the-economist-explains/2014/09/07/why-indias-muslims-are-so-moderate. Ahmed (2019). For an excellent discussion of the Sons of Liberty movement and its link to the American Revolution, see Rapoport (2006). Gupta (2006a). Sageman (2004). Bueno de Mesquita (2007); English (2003); Bloom (2005). The ICT dataset is by no means perfect. Unfortunately, as I have argued in an article (Gupta, 2007), due to the lack of reliable information, we are often held hostage to available data. Currently, we have no other dataset that provides such breakdown of activities of the various terrorist groups. Samuelson (1938). Stern (2003b: 112). Olson (1968). Gupta (2001a). Horgan (2005b). Horgan and Taylor (2003). Elster (2005). Hopgood (2005). Benjamin and Simon (2002: 28–29). Schmid and de Graaf (1982). Pape (2005). Mishal and Sela (2000). Bloom (2005). Gupta and Mundra (2005). de Figueirdo and Weingast (2001). Freedman (1991). Ginkel and Smith (1999). Lichbach (1987). Moore (1998). Gupta et al. (1993). Kydd and Walter (2002). Bueno de Mesquita (2005). For an excellent review article, see Crenshaw (2007). Elster (2005). Some economists (Berman and Leitin, 2007) have defined the objective function of a terrorist organization with the help of “club theory,” where the group attempts to maximize the private benefits of their own members. Although such a formulation makes it easy to use standard economic models, the problem with this approach is that it fails to distinguish between a primarily ideology-driven terrorist group and a profit-driven criminal organization. Fair and Shepherd (2006). Pew Research Center (2002) www.pewresearch.org/global/2002/12/04/what-theworld-thinks-in-2002/. Rapoport (1984); Gupta (2006a, 2006b). Gupta (1990). Popkin (1979).

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63 The importance of holding formal employment is widely recognized in the scholarly literature. Amartya K. Sen (Dreze and Sen, 1989) has shown that providing employment during droughts is the best way of preventing mass death. Similarly, Sen argued that the biggest deterrent for female infanticide is women holding jobs in the formal sector of the economy. Although holding formal employment may be a strong deterrent, it is certainly no guarantee against participation in acts of terrorism. The recent plot to bomb various locations in the UK, hatched by a group of doctors, is ample testimony to this precautionary note. 64 Gurr (1970). 65 Venieris and Gupta (1983); Gupta (1990), Gupta et al. (1993). 66 Guetzkow (1965); Perucci and Pilisuk (1970); Tichy (1981). 67 Redding (1972); Farace et al. (1977). 68 Laupmann and Pappi (1976); Lipnack and Stamps (2008). 69 Sageman (2004); Stohl and Stohl (2007); Robb (2007). 70 Dye and Ziegler (1981). 71 Fulk (2001); Buchanan (2002) 72 Hiro (1989). 73 Napoleoni (2005: 128–139). 74 For an explanation of the historical and cultural impact on communication, see Oberschall (2004). 75 Sageman (2004: 138). 76 Stohl and Stohl (2007). 77 Thompson et al. (2005). 78 Robb (2007). 79 Sageman (2004). 80 Coll and Glasser (2005). 81 Robb (2007). 82 Stern (2003b). 83 Wright (2004). 84 Sageman (2004: 140). 85 Gunaratna (2002). 86 Napoleoni (2005: 120). 87 Pallister and Bowcott (2002). We should be quick to note here that there is no reason to believe that the entire fund was devoted to supporting terrorism. The bulk of the money was used for various religious and social service work. 88 Swami (2007). 89 Schlesinger Jr. (1965). 90 Palast (2002). 91 For a detailed history of BCCI, see Beaty and Gwynne (1993). 92 Napoleoni (2003: 120). 93 Quorchi et al. (2003: 24). 94 English (2003: 3). 95 Ibid. 96 Ibid.: 4. 97 See The Economist (2006) “Madness Reincarnate: The Accidental War.” July 20. www.pierretristam.com/Bobst/library/wf-290.htm. 98 Ibid. 99 Kassimeris (1999). 100 McLellan and Avery (1977). 101 Walker (2003). 102 Sengupta (2005).

6 FAITH, NATIONALISM, AND CLASS WARFARE Birth of a movement

What can my enemies possibly do to me? My paradise is in my heart; wherever I go it goes with me, inseparable from me. For me, prison is a place of [religious] retreat; execution is my opportunity for martyrdom; and exile from my town is but a chance to travel. Ibn Taymiyya (c. 1300)1

Fear and cooperation: why do we “believe?” “He never had a chance,” writes Robert Sapolsky.2 The Stanford cognitive scientist and primatologist describes the fatal mistake of a young male who, looking for food, ventured alone into another group’s territory. The transgression cost him his life; his lifeless body lay torn apart, mutilated by the rival band. The protagonists in Sapolsky’s story are not humans. They are chimpanzees, with which we share over 98 percent of our DNA. Their behavior opens windows into understanding our primal urge to form groups and wage wars against others. Primatologist Jane Goodall began observing chimpanzees in the wild in Tanzania’s Gombe National forest in the 1960s. Her early writings painted the picture of a “noble savage” living in harmony within its own surroundings – caring, compassionate, and with deep emotional ties.3 However, soon Goodall4 and other eminent scientists5 began contradicting this pretty portrait of the primate. These scholars noted with horror that chimps engage in what we might consider genocide, gang rape, infanticide, and other forms of extreme cruelty. More evidence of the dark side of chimpanzee behavior started flowing in. In the journal Nature, Wilson et al. published the result of a comprehensive study of 18 chimpanzee and four bonobo communities.6 Their sample consisted of 152 killings observed or inferred over five decades of the study. It revealed that 15 chimpanzees and one bonobo community engaged in killing as a group

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(average of eight attackers per killing). The victims were overwhelmingly male (95 percent) and most killings (66 percent) were parts of intergroup conflict. Most astoundingly, these slaughters did not happen due to human interventions, loss of habitat, or food shortages. They reflected natural proclivity toward group killings of perceived “enemies.” In a remarkable essay, Sapolski draws a direct line between what happens among chimpanzees and international politics.7 He argues that the formation of “us” versus “them” mentality among humans reflects the evolution of our brains over millions of years. For self-preservation, our brains are trained to distinguish in a split second between those who are from our own community and those who are outsiders. The advances in brain imaging technology have provided us with new tools to peer into the functioning of our most powerful organ. Numerous tests have shown that looking at the picture of a person of our same ethnicity activates a specialized part of the brain called fusiform cortex. Seeing the face of a person from a different race also activates it, but at a lower rate. Brain scans reveal that our empathy for a person in pain is less for those of a different race from us. While some of these reactions can be the products of social construction, learned over time from our family and friends, others are in-born. Children from a very early age begin preferring people of their own race and gender. It is not that we are born racists, but from our need for survival, nature imbues us with primal fear of the unknown. Sapolsky points out that oxytocin, a brain hormone often called the “cuddle hormone” because it is released when people cuddle or bond socially, promotes cooperative behavior. When we bond socially, our brains reward us with its secretion, producing a feeling of happiness or euphoria. Oxytocin also causes us to favor our “own kind” over others.8 The other side of bonding within a community is the feeling of alienation and hostility in the presence of strangers or those whom we consider to be our enemies. For humans, fear and need for social bonding go hand in hand. In search of security, our evolutionary brains treat us with pleasure hormones when we form groups. While in the animal world groups are formed on the basis of genetic kinship, for humans, it happens deep inside our complex brain cells. Since all our groupings are imagined, the basis for their construction is often based on counterintuitive, counterfactual assumptions of identity. In our pursuit of social cohesion, makes us susceptible to hyperactive agency detection, which we find among our leaders. MRI scans map the pathway to social cognition that is baked into our neural network.9 When faced with fear and uncertainty, leaders allow us to see a pattern that we otherwise might not recognize. Known as the Gestalt law of the whole, it is the process of simplifying a complex distribution of matters, discovering a pattern among their random scattering. This is truly an act of “connecting the dots.” By selectively borrowing from history, mythology, and religion, leaders frame a coherent picture that explains what the followers never saw before. The emergent picture depicts a constant struggle between good and evil, the oppressed and the oppressor, between God and Satan. In our proclivity to join,

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we tend to accept storylines that promote division. In order to reinforce a stated faith, symbols of who we are are designed and rituals are performed. Since nobody can tell what is in another person’s mind, we carry a symbol or take part in a joint exercise of rituals to demonstrate who we truly are. This process is at the heart of all “isms” – the cross for the Christians, the crescent moon for the Muslims, the hammer and sickle for the communists. Evolutionary psychology, neurobiology, endocrinology may point to a rather unpleasant outcome for human beings living in a world of constant battles. However, Sapolsky assures us that turning into bloodthirsty bigots is not an inevitable outcome for the vast majority of us: In most cases, the prefrontal cortex, a region crucial for impulse control and emotional regulation, springs into action a second or two later and silences the amygdala: “Don’t think that way, that’s not who I am.” Still, the initial reaction is usually one of fear, even among those who know better.10 There is another important aspect to this understanding of our enemy-making process. As we know, the creation of in-group or out-group is not etched in stone. All our group formations, whether based on religious faith, nationalism, ethnicity, or economic class, are imaginary, transient, and contextual. Suppose you are on a late-night train, sitting in an empty compartment. A group of boisterous young men with strange haircuts and attires enters. They have been drinking. Your amygdala would be screaming bloody murder and would immediately send danger signals, making you eager to get off at the next stop. However, if you were in a pub watching a game on TV and the same boys were there rooting for your team, you would develop a sense of camaraderie and a brain scan (if it was available at the bar) would fail to detect signs of fear response, with your amygdala remaining calm. Laboratory tests verify that under different circumstance, we spontaneously cooperate with our supposed enemy.11 This variability and situational dependence are uniquely human. In other animal species, friend and foe distinctions reflect degrees of biological relatedness, or what evolutionary biologists call “kin selection.” Wolves, for instance, distinguish between a pack member and a stranger by smell – a fixed and genetically determined pheromonal signature – and react accordingly. Chimps visually recognize their brethren who grew up together and primarily target outsiders. Humans are at a disadvantage compared to the wolves and chimpanzees. Our olfactory senses are inadequate to smell out our genetic kinfolks. Also, living in much larger groups, defined by nation or religion, unlike the marauding chimps, we cannot know every member of our in-group. Therefore, we must depend on imagination and visual cues. When we think of being a citizen of a country and feel patriotic, our inability to know everyone in the country leads us to use our minds. We imagine all others within our political boundaries; we conceive of a continuous history of

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the same people – just like us today in looks, ethnicity, and beliefs – going back thousands of years. We imagine a common mindset, common interest, and a shared identity that separates us from all others, as it has been throughout history. We call our country motherland or fatherland that establishes a genetic kinship covering hundreds of millions of people. If it comes under attack from a different country or one part of the nation seeks independence, we are horrified, imagining the dismemberment of the body of our parents. Fear and loathing permeate the nation; impassioned speeches implore us to sacrifice everything to protect our country. The problem, however, is that we only know a miniscule part of the populace personally. When bands of hunter-gatherers settled down into villages and towns, they recognized their inability to recognize every member of their community. Human beings can recognize about 150 faces, yet a small town may have several thousand inhabitants. Therefore, we need other cues to bind us together. Similar to putting on war paints in ancient times, carrying standards by the Roman legions, we sing patriotic songs, salute our flag, and tell each other consistent stories of our common heritage. From the jumbled facts of history, our leaders show us the pattern and frame a coherent picture, through which we see a continuous trend. We believe “we” have been deprived of our rightful place in history by the machinations of our implacable “enemy.” Through this framing, the followers experience an “aha” moment, when the confusing world begins to make sense. This is true for all movements. As a result, there is a striking similarity of language and images in the way we characterize and depict the members of our community vis-à-vis our adversaries.12 I should be quick to add that all of these movements are based partly on facts and partly on fiction. Many are based on based on historical truth, while others are products of fabricated fear or products of mythology. National or religious identity or class consciousness, therefore, is socially constructed. It is part of a continuous process of defining “friend” and “enemy.”13 Thus, the way people might have defined what it meant to be an American in the colonial and the immediate post-independence periods is strikingly different from the way we might define it today.14 There were a great deal of differences in manners, religion, and interest among the states. The establishment of a confederacy left those differences intact, only to be assimilated into a single national consciousness over a long period of time.15 When we examine their historic evolution, we realize that the ideals of nationalism do not depend on the existence of any objective linguistic or cultural differentiation but on subjective experience of the putative differences, which evolve over time, but are accepted as invariant by their standard bearers.16 What is true about nationalism is also true about religious beliefs. History, geography, and cultural tradition shape the way we understand and practice religion yet assume their constancy.

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In this chapter, I will discuss the birth of a political movement with three examples: the IRA, al-Qaeda, and the Naxalites. The IRA (Irish Republican Army) was formed as a part of an Irish Catholic revolt against the Protestant British occupation of Ireland. In the mid-1960s, it attempted to shed the religious aspect of its movement to become a left-leaning group. Al-Qaeda began as a primary Sunni Islamic group aspiring to start a global Jihad. Later, it splintered into many small groups in Arab/African countries with each pursuing its own ethnic, religious, or nationalistic aspirations. The Naxalite movement began as a peasant revolt led by the Marxist ideologues in a small village in the state of West Bengal. The movement came to Calcutta around 1967, from which it spread to many other parts of West Bengal and other Indian states. After being eradicated through intense police and military action, some of its diehard leaders slipped away deep inside the forested areas of south-central India and established a stronghold among the marginalized tribal people of several states.17 My central thesis of this chapter is that while we categorize political groups and movements into the three groups, in reality, in the final analysis, it is not about religion, nationalism, or classism, per se. All of these movements are the products of some real grievances faced by certain communities, while the leaders develop a narrative based on their social, political, and cultural environment where faith, nationality, and ideology become fluid and overlap.

The birth of a movement Every movement starts with a core idea: an idea of a group of people being wrongfully treated by another. Sometimes the offending group consists of “those” who have deviated from the “true path” of a common religious faith; sometimes “they” are accused of being interlopers with no claim to the land; and sometimes the “others” are seen as the source of economic exploitation. The narratives for these ideas are framed along a long history of enmity between the victims (“us”) and the odious others (“them”). No mass movement can be studied as a single event starting and ending at a certain date and time.18 Its narration, therefore, must begin from an arbitrary cut-off date. When we carefully examine the history, we recognize the presence of a set of long-standing grievances based on separate group identities, punctuated by the rise of important political entrepreneurs who shape these movements over time. Movements evolve, where the contours of the groups and their enemies wax and wane, include and exclude different sets of people. The ideologies of the collective – religious, nationalistic, or Marxist – mix freely with people’s selfish interest and, in the process, produce violent movements, sometimes locally and at other times, conditions permitting, worldwide. Through my narratives of the three movements, I would like to demonstrate that, in the final analysis, religion, nationalism, and socialism only serve as the basis of shared identity. Although religious zealotry, hypernationalism, and godless communism may appear to be distinct ideologies, at their root all three of

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these speak to the fundamental human need to belong to a larger community.19 As a result, religious and national identities often follow the shapes of the dividing lines of economic class. The aim of the Islamists is often to uproot the current highly unequal economic structure and replace it with an egalitarian vision that would evoke the image of Lenin and Mao. Similarly, the ultranationalists nearly always embrace a certain religion and promise an equitable society. In a revealing statement, Ayman al-Zawahiri even characterized Osama bin Laden as the “new Che Guevara.”20 At the core, therefore, the neat divisions often become indistinguishable and group ideologies fall on a continuum along threedimensional axes.

Islam: from theology to arms Religion is perhaps the oldest invention of the human mind. In their inability to comprehend the forces of nature, the earliest humans sought divine providence. To appease the angry gods, they sacrificed animals or each other, prayed in unison, carried symbolic images as amulets, and pledged allegiance to one single unseen entity. Over millennia, the disparate belief systems evolved as organized religions, relegating the faith of the past to the ignominious status of “mythology.”21 Unquestioned fealty to a god or a number of gods, is the source of peace and solace to many. However, most importantly, faith provides its followers with a ready identity, complete with the images of good and evil, heroes and villains, “us” and “them.” With powerful representations, it defines in no uncertain terms the boundaries of its binary worldview. The taciturn God’s words are open to interpretation by the religious leaders. In blind religious obedience, faith trumps the need to question and to reason. In their interpretation, the priests, the rabbis, the monks, and the mullahs demand unquestioned adherence from their followers. As a result, every religion is, at once, a source of spiritual comfort and an instrument of indiscriminate carnage.22 Among the great religious faiths in the world, the history of Islam is no different. However, what is perhaps unique about Islam is that Prophet Muhammad, unlike Jesus or Buddha, was also a king. He led his troops to battlefields, had a worldly family life, and left behind an established penal code (Sha’ria), which prescribed in great detail the punishment for every transgression. Furthermore, his life and his instructions were recorded in the Hadith. Islam, therefore, perhaps more than any other religion, encompasses every aspect of life: spiritual, social, economic, and political. In Islam, every human action is judged with reference to the Koran, the Hadith, and the Sha’ria.23 Since the holy books were written well before lives became complicated with the advent of myriad technologies, the proper path for a modern Muslim requires their interpretation. Apart from the Koran, the Sha’ria, and the Hadith, Islamic tradition also recognizes the analogies to the Prophet’s life and his words to judge situations not encountered in his time. Also, the mainstream Islamic tradition also recognizes

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the consensus by the leading religious scholars, especially in the Sunni faith, and the hierarchy of mullahs for the Shia faith. The attraction of Islam through the ages has been its powerful message of equality among its believers. However, perhaps the most significant message of Islam is the concept of Ummah, or the community. Anyone who accepts Allah as the one and only true God and Muhammad as His messenger is included in the global Islamic family of Ummah. Once included, even the lowliest of the low is accorded equal status during religious observances. Since nationhood divides the Ummah, Islam does not recognize national identity, which might lead to inter-state warfare. The Koran forbids the spilling of the blood of fellow Muslims. Because of the existence of the Sha’ria, Islam not only specifies the rewards and punishments of the afterlife, it also clearly establishes the path to righteous living and the penalties for secular transgressions, often in minute detail.24 Fanaticism and literalism are certainly not the sole domain of Islam. Christians, Hindus, and Buddhists have engaged in mass murder with alacrity throughout history. However, Islam’s extreme specificity, which makes it a way of life, has been a source of its strength as well the fountainhead of conflict among its numerous factions. The unequivocal message of right and wrong has attracted many seeking sureties in an otherwise uncertain world. At the same time, it has lent itself to the forces of utmost literalism to the words of the scripture. Consequently, Islamic revivals have trodden an all-too-familiar path: a religious scholar, being dismayed by the failings of the extant social order, preaches its violent overthrow in the name of God. His radical messages attract the attention of the authorities, which put him in prison, torture him, and in many cases put him to death. The path of political Islam has thus been paved by the torn bodies of the martyrs, their sacrifices inspiring the multitude to the path of radicalism for ages to come. Division within Islam started immediately after the death of Muhammad in the year 632. The nascent community was divided into those who supported the direct bloodline of the Prophet to succeed him and those who supported his trusted friend and father-in-law Abu Bakr. The Sunnis supported the claims of Abu Bakr, but the Shias favored keeping the leadership of the caliphate within the House of the Prophet (ahl al bayt) by supporting his cousin and son-in-law Ali. This struggle for succession erupted in a brutal civil war, where Muslims were shedding the blood of fellow Muslims and, in the process, created the deep chasm between the two branches of Islam, causing the continuing horrors of fratricidal frenzy. Mass violence followed Islam almost from its inception for another reason. Islam has a strong ascetic core, whose simplicity in living has clashed with the more materialistic parts of its adherents throughout its history. The first such uprising occurred within a short time after Muhammad’s death. A group of Islamic fanatics called the Kharijites, which literally means the “rejectionists,” took up arms against the Caliph. Arguing that Islam’s ruler was insufficient in

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his fealty to the teachings of the Koran, the Kharijites preached Jihad against fellow Muslims, breeding violence in their path. One of them assassinated Imam Ali as he was leading a prayer in 661. Although the Kharijites disappeared as a group from the pages of history after nearly 200 years, their literalist version of Islam has resonated with a large number of people and created violence and upheaval all through its history. In 1257, after a relentless expansion of the Islamic Empire lasting over 600 years, which saw nearly two-thirds of the known world under its domination, Islam faced the first real challenge to its existence: Hulagu Khan the Mongol ruler sacked Baghdad, the primary seat of Muslim civilization, with a cruelty that paled even the legendary ruthlessness of Attila the Hun. The sight of impotency in the face of such unimaginable atrocities shocked an ascetic Islamic scholar, Ibn Taymiyya (1263–1328). Taymiyya fled the devastated Baghdad and took refuge in Cairo, then the second most important base of the Islamic Empire under the Mamluk regime. His radical messages upset the seats of power. Taymiyya was imprisoned and was brutally tortured. Undeterred, Taymiyya called for Jihad against the non-believers.25 The ascetic ideology of Islam received a significant boost when in the mideighteenth century a village sheik, Ibn Abdul al-Wahhab, began preaching in the Arabian Peninsula. Wahhab’s ideological orientation was along the lines of Taymiyya’s. Similar to Taymiyya, Wahhab intended to purify Islam to its old glory days by cleansing its practices of what he called innovation and idolatry. Wahhab considered the spread of Sufism, a mystical form of Islam that permeated Arabian society at that time, as a threat to the true faith. He also rejected the personal worship of Prophet Muhammad.26 Some of his followers even destroyed Muhammad’s grave in order to prevent it from becoming an idol-worshipping shrine. In his teachings Wahhab rejected the analogies and consensus by the scholars and based his faith solely on the literal understanding of the Koran and the Hadith. As he drew an ever-larger flock of followers, he struck a deal with Muhammad Ibn Saud, a local chieftain. Their joint enterprise – mithaq, a binding agreement to be honored for eternity by their successors – suited both men well. It allowed the radical preacher to preach his version of Islam without the fate of his hero, Ibn Taymiyya. A grateful Wahhab declared the rulers of Mecca and Medina as apostate, which allowed Ibn Saud to conquer the holiest shrines from fellow Muslim rulers and become the primary guardian of Islamic faith, the keeper of the key. As Tariq Ali points out: Ibn Wahhab provided theological justification for almost anything Ibn Saud wanted to achieve: a permanent jihad that involved looting other Muslim settlements and cities, ignoring the Caliph, imposing the tough discipline on his own people and, ultimately, asserting his own rule over neigbouring tribes in an attempt to unite the Peninsula.27 Their agreement recognized Ibn Saud and his house as the chief of political administration, and Ibn Abdul al-Wahhab and his house as the sole authority on

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Islamic interpretation.28 Together, the two men laid the foundation of Saudi Arabia, the only nation on earth today that bears the name of a family. With Wahhabism being the state religion, it became inseparable from Saudi political life.

Jihad and its justification Jihad, by which a Muslim feels justified in joining a battle, has been a complicated concept in Islam. The literal translation of the term is not “holy war” but “struggle.” Jihad to a Muslim implies struggle for the path of righteousness. Jihad is also divided into greater Jihad and lesser Jihad. The greater Jihad is fought in hearts and minds, where an individual strives to live by the code of Islam: faith in Allah (shahada), five times of prayer (three times for the Shias), fasting during the month of Ramadan, charitable contributions to the poor and to Islamic causes (zakat), and pilgrimage to Mecca (hajj). Together they constitute the five pillars of Islam. Against the constant struggle of worldly temptations, pious Muslims wage their Jihad. The lesser Jihad is directed against a threat to the Dar-al-Islam, or the land of Islam from the Dar-al-kufr, the land of non-believers. When Dar-al-Islam is attacked, as Taymiyya insisted, it is the religious duty of every Muslim to join the forces of Jihad. This is the defensive Jihad. Islam, being a proselytizing religion, requires each believer to strive to spread the words of God through religious conversion. It is explicitly forbidden to convert people by force, as the Koran states, “There is no compulsion in religion.” However, as a part of offensive Jihad, it is the obligation of each Muslim to propagate Islam through voluntary contributions, prayer, and by defeating the forces of “falsehood” in the battlefields. The need to call for Jihad in defense of the religion is widely recognized in Islam. What is not clear, however, is who has the authority to issue a fatwa (religious edict) to declare war, particularly under Sunni Islam where, similar to Protestantism in Christianity, there is no central hierarchy of authority. This lack of a religious chain of command has caused confusion among the faithful and has given rise to heated debates among religious scholars. Among many authorities of Islamic jurisprudence,29 the authority to declare Jihad comes from the Koranic verse: “O ye who believe! Obey Allah, and obey the Messenger, and those charged with authority among you” (4:59). Under normal circumstances, only the head (the caliph) of the Islamic state has the authority to call for a Jihad, because the laws of Islam were designed with the idea of a unified Ummah, one collective nation with a caliph at its head speaking with moral authority to call to arms. If the caliph delegates the duty to a head of military operations, it could in theory, be issued by him, as long as the express consent is there, in which case he would be speaking in the name of the caliph. There has never been a difference of opinion on this. The Koran tells Muslims to obey the prophet and to obey those in charge of their affairs. The situation is slightly different for the more hierarchical Shia clergy. In Shiite Iran, under Khomeini’s “authority of the jurist” rule, the head of the

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Islamic state can call for Jihad. In that case, for instance, if the majlis (council) passes a fatwa, the president can declare it, with, of course, the acquiescence of the Ayatollah. In a formal set-up, the procedure to call for Jihad is analogous to the functioning of the British parliamentary system. After Islamic leaders started fighting amongst themselves, they each declared themselves the head of state, resulting in confusion. In today’s nation-states, the largely secular type leadership has seen the rise of respected people of religion who have arrogated to themselves this right. As a result, the contrarian clerics in many Sunni countries have issued fatwas urging the faithful to join the Jihad.

From frustration to fatwa: the spread of global Jihad The Islamic Empire spread at lightning speed soon after the Prophet’s death and, for nearly a thousand years, remained the predominant force in the “known world.” They not only conquered a vast territory but achieved a level of science, literature, and arts unseen in human history at that time. Inheriting the great traditions of Persia and Arabia, Muslim scholars translated the works of Aristotle, Ptolemy, Euclid, and Galen, which at that time had been lost to the Europeans, mired in the prejudice and conflict of the “Dark Ages.” To this, the Arabs brought two of the biggest innovations of the ancient world: paper technology from China and the concept of zero from India. It is indeed impossible to imagine the world today without the contributions of the Arab/Muslim world. Yet, like all other empires of the past, the Islamic Empire began its deep path to decline. In 1492, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella routed the Moors from the plains of Andalusia. For the first time, being free of fighting, the coffers of the Spanish king were full enough to take a chance on an eccentric Italian man with a business plan that was rejected by the Spanish Academy of Sciences several times for severely underestimating the circumference of the earth. The risks taken by the Spanish monarch on Christopher Columbus paid off as unimaginable riches from the new world started flowing in, transforming Spain and the rest of Western Europe into colonial powers. For the next 500 years the Islamic Empire saw a steady stream of defeats. The most significant of these reversals took place in the waning years of the seventeenth century. In the late summer of 1697, a combined Christian force decisively defeated Ottoman Sultan Mustafa II at the Battle of Zenta. For the first time a Muslim ruler had to enter into a treaty with a Christian prince, addressing him as an equal partner.30 The signing of the Treaty of Carlowitz (January 26, 1699) was a source of utter humiliation for the sultan, since even a language for addressing a fellow monarch did not exist for the Ottomans. Since then, defeats of the Islamic nations cascaded down, until in 1918 the last standing empire in Istanbul was vanquished by the victorious Allied Forces during World War I. Historian Bernard Lewis gives a number of reasons for the steady decline of the Ottoman Empire vis-à-vis the European forces.31 He argues that the primary reason for its demise was its shutting out and losing

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interest in the non-Muslim world, particularly Western Europe. Lewis points out that since Europe did not have any Islamic shrine and nor was it particularly wealthy compared with the territories of the East, the Ottomans had little knowledge of the Europeans. They did not know, and nor did they care, about the inventions of Leonardo da Vinci, Copernicus, Galileo, or Newton. The discovery of the Americas held little interest for the Ottomans. Yet, with the discoveries of the far-away continents, two important events took place. The need to travel by sea gave birth to improved technologies in naval warfare, from sturdier ships, sails, and canons to navigational instruments. As a result, all the subsequent colonization – from Francisco Pizarro to Commodore Perry – came on the back of superior European naval power. Furthermore, the opening up of the sea routes to the Orient cut out the Arab middlemen for overland trade, causing economic hardship in many parts of the Arab/Muslim world. Second, the colonies in the new and the old world quickly made many Western European nations wealthy. With wealth came leisure time to devote to science and technology. In the meantime, the Reformation had unshackled the pursuit of science, which manifested in every area of human endeavor from medicine to military. The Islamic world, deeply turned inward, could not compete with the West. Starting with the late 1800s, as the demise of the glory days was becoming evident to everyone in the Islamic world, a series of nationalistic uprisings started taking shape, inspired by the prospect of a religious revival. The strain of literalism that was imbedded from the inception slowly emerged as a precursor to global Jihadism. Although most of these movements failed to achieve their goals, the life and work of those who willingly gave up their lives became enshrined in Islamic history and mythology to inspire others to rise up against perceived injustice and follow their examples. First, armed resistance against the colonial Europeans and their collaborators came from Muhammad al-Mahdi.32 Mahdi declared war against an “apostate” Egyptian regime, which, in collaboration with the Ottoman Turks, was ruling the Sudan. His rag tag army – empowered by religious zeal and the promise of paradise – routed a much larger joint force in a series of battles. Mahdi’s claim of a direct lineage from the Prophet added to his charismatic appeal. Being emboldened by his early successes, Mahdi began promoting pan-Islamism with himself at the head.33 In 1885, a triumphant Mahdi entered the gates of Khartoum. Within a matter of a few months, he was dead. Soon the Egyptians struck back, this time in partnership with the British, and reconquered the Sudan from Khalifa Abdullah Muhammad.34 Although Mahdi did not live long enough to enjoy the fruits of his military success, his legacy is still shaping the history of Sudan and has left an indelible influence in the development of panIslamic radicalism. Through Islam, Mahdi gave expression to northern Sudanese nationalism, which sees itself as a part of the Arab Middle East that extends from the Gulf nations to North Africa, instead of being part of the continent of Africa. This identity lies at the core of the crisis of the Darfur region.35

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Furthermore, the mystique of another warrior prophet helped develop Islamic revivalism in neighboring Egypt, through the establishment of the Muslim Brotherhood. The stirrings of Islamic identity in the aftermath of the destruction of the Islamic Empire came in the Indian subcontinent among some of the besteducated intellectuals. Among them, the most significant contribution was made by the poet Muhammad Iqbal (1877–1934). A Cambridge-educated scholar and a barrister at Lincoln’s Inn, Iqbal wrote in Farsi and in Urdu. Although he was more prolific in Farsi, his revolutionary poem Shikwa (“Complaint”), first recited in Lahore in 1908, created an immediate sensation among Muslim intellectuals. In a most eloquent way, Iqbal, after apologizing for the audacity of addressing Allah, passionately protested that it was the Muslims who recognized His greatness and spread His words at the cost of their blood. Yet at the end it was them who were at the bottom. Iqbal pointed out that Muslims have fought the enemies of God without any selfish desire and had even stopped in the middle of the fiercest battles to pray. It was through their true and single-minded devotion they were able to establish the kingdom of the true God on earth. Then why were the non-believing Christians and even the idolatrous Hindus dominating the Muslims? Iqbal’s passionate plea did not end there. Five years later, he wrote another poem, Jawab-i-Shikhwa, “The Answer to the Plaint.” The answer from God reflected the mainstream ideas, known as Salafism (the “righteous” or “pious” ancestors), professed by the radicals throughout the history of the religion: the Muslims were at the bottom of the social ladder because they strayed from the glorious path that was shown by the Prophet and his companions. Islam could regain its glory days only by going back to the ideals set by the first three generations of Muslims.36 The poet’s laments did not fall on deaf ears. On the political front, his writings are considered to be the inspiration for the eventual establishment of the Islamic state of Pakistan. However, around 1900, Iqbal was not the only one seeking answers to the causes of the retreat of the Islamic world. A strong movement of Salafism was afoot in several parts of the Islamic world. Although the adherents of Salafism would claim that it began with Muhammad, as a modern movement it started in Egypt in the mid-nineteenth century among intellectuals at al-Azhar University, the preeminent center of Islamic learning, located in Cairo. Islamic scholars, such as Muhammad Abduh (1849–1905), Jamal al-Din al-Afghani (1839–1897), and Rashid Rida (1865–1935), began what some call the second Ijtihad, or the period of intense questioning.37 Their conclusions by and large followed the well-trodden path of Salafism. The wave of Islamic revivalism, which preached political Islam, reached the shores of the Indian subcontinent in 1866. When Darul Ulooum a Muslim seminary founded in a small town called Deoband, India became the focal point of a conservative stream of thought. The Deobandis, along with the piety of Salafism also preached active Jihad against all evils. The teachings of Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia found a kindred soul in the Deobandi movement. Together, they

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gave birth to a short-lived movement in India called the Khilafat, which aimed to help the ailing caliphate in Turkey. One of the early followers of this religious fundamentalist movement was an Indian Islamic scholar of great reputation, Sayyid Abul A’la Maududi. In Islamic terminology, the world was mired in ignorance, jahiliyyah, which was lifted only when Muhammad showed the true path. In his powerful denunciation of the prevailing state of the Islamic world, Maududi called his contemporary society Jahiliyyah or ignorant of the true path. His contributions became enshrined in the constitution of the newly founded Pakistan, which was “Islamic in both letter and in spirit.”38 Maududi’s writings were to serve as the cornerstone of much of revolutionary Islamic thought today, including the Taliban, who claim their philosophical mooring to his teachings along with those from the Deobandi school. The winds of Salafism turned more political. In Egypt it produced another significant step toward latter-day global Jihadism when Hasan-al-Banna (1906–1949) established the Muslim Brotherhood (Ikhwan al-Muslimun). Al-Banna preached that the powerlessness of the Egyptian government was a direct result of its emulating Western ways. In 1924, when Kemal Pasha replaced the last vestige of the Islamic caliphate in Istanbul with a regime that was openly hostile to traditional Islam, al-Banna, similar to the Khilafat movement in India, started Islamic revivalism in Egypt. His blistering criticisms were aimed at the Egyptian authorities as well as the spineless al-Azhar University for failing to give much-needed moral leadership against Nasser’s secular sacrilege.39 He argued that the only way Egypt, and all other Islamic nations, could return to their days of glory was by the strict adherence to Islam.40 His Muslim Brotherhood boldly declared: “God is our purpose, the Prophet our leader, the Koran our constitution, Jihad our way and dying for God’s cause our supreme objective.”41 Although al-Banna failed in his attempt to violently overthrow the authoritarian regime in Egypt and was assassinated in 1949 by the agents of the state, he cast a towering shadow of influence over the global Jihadi movement that was to come half a century later. In the evolution of the concept of modern-day Jihad, which sees violent politics as a means of achieving religious objectives, no one is more important than another Egyptian, a disciple of al-Banna, Sayyid Qutb. However, before we delve into Qutb’s contributions to the Jihadi movement, it is important to take a moment and understand him in the context of his time. The history of post-World War II Egypt was entangled in conflict with the newly founded state of Israel, and the Cold War that pitted the capitalist West against the communist regimes to the East. During this time, the division between the nationalists and the pan-Islamists, which started with the establishment of a secular regime in Turkey and subsequently spread to Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and the Shah’s Iran, became sharpened. To the strict Islamists, it presented a Hobson’s choice, where the decadence of the Western lifestyle was an affront to the traditional culture and faith and, while the “godless” communists were even more abominable. In this struggle, the Egyptian nationalist Gamal Abdel Nasser rejected the forces of the former

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colonialists, Britain, France, the US, and their lackeys, the Israelis. A secular Nasser embraced nationalism, fueling the wrath of the Muslim fundamentalists. From the beginning the Muslim Brotherhood was much more hostile to the enemies inside, whom they declared traitors and apostate, than to those outside of the religion. To the followers of al-Banna and Qutb in Egypt, Nasser was enemy number one. After graduating from a teacher training college, Sayyid Qutb (1906–1966) worked for the Egyptian Ministry of Education. In 1948, he was sent to the US for higher education. Although Qutb was impressed by the technological advances he saw in the country, he was deeply affected by the racism of the time. However, what alienated him even more was the moral degradation of the West that he perceived.42 The prevalence of free mixing between men and women deeply offended him. From his first-hand experience, Qutb penned his book Milestones, which is regarded as the manifesto of the modern Jihadi movement. We cannot possibly understand the movement without carefully examining Qutb’s arguments. Similar to all other “political entrepreneurs” in history, Qutb alleged the West had a millennium-long “enmity toward Islam” and had followed a “wellthought-out scheme … to demolish the structure of Muslim society.”43 Qutb married the ideas of Jahilia offered by Maududi to characterize current Islamic society with Ibn Taymiyya’s call for a duty of all Muslims to wage Jihad against apostates and, thereby, extended Ibn al-Wahhab’s ideas of a just society to its fullest extent. He asserted: the Muslim community has long ago vanished from existence … we can say that the Muslim community has been extinct for a few centuries, for this Muslim community does not denote the name of a land in which Islam resides, nor is it a people whose forefathers lived under the Islamic system at some earlier time. It is the name of a group of people whose manners, ideas and concepts, rules and regulations, values and criteria, are all derived from the Islamic source. The Muslim community with these characteristics vanished at the moment the laws of God became suspended on earth.44 Apostasy is a serious crime in Islam, punishable by death. Through such a radical claim, Qutb at once declared the entire Muslim society takfir (declaring a Muslim to be an infidel) and opened up the gates of an uncompromising struggle. Qutb firmly rejected the idea of a peaceful coexistence by stating: “Islam cannot accept or agree to a situation which is half-Islam and half-Jahiliyyah … The mixing and co-existence of the truth and falsehood is impossible.”45 Qutb’s arguments can be summarized as follows: first, the only Muslims that are worthy of emulation are the followers of the Prophet, since they alone followed the true teachings of the Koran. The rest of the world has always been mired in Jahiliyyah or ignorance. This is the cornerstone of the Salafism. Second, Qutb steadfastly

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rejects nationalism. He points out that if Muhammad wanted to only unite the tribes of Arabia, he could have done it. Instead, he established his rule in the name of Allah. Therefore, nationalism has no place in Islam and anyone from any corner of the world can be part of the Ummah. Third, in his lifetime, Muhammad did not start a social movement simply to redistribute wealth from the rich to the poor. He could have done this to bring the poor on his side during the trying days of fighting with the other tribes of Arabia. Thus, by denouncing the central premises of nationalism and socialism, he claimed that true social justice could come only after a society had been established on the principles of the Koran.46 Finally, Qutb argued that given the fact that Islam is being threatened by the Takfiri (apostate) regimes of the Islamic world, it is the duty of every Muslim to join the Jihad. It is interesting to note that after he denounced the Muslim rulers, the Egyptian government arrested him on charges of conspiring with the Western agents against the Nasser government. He was imprisoned, brutally tortured, and, after going through a secret trial by a military court, was executed in 1966. His death only added to his aura as a Shahid or a martyr and his writings have formed the foundation on which modern Islamic extremism has built its global edifice. In the following chapter, I will discuss the course by which the Salafi movement gained strength and rose to challenge the West through the formation of al-Qaeda and other nationalistic Islamic groups, such as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

The IRA and the “troubles” of Northern Ireland If you are not confused about the Irish issue, then you just don’t understand. A common aphorism in Northern Ireland

Hate and the baby’s bib: keeping alive the fire of hatred July 12 is a day of celebration in Northern Ireland. A most strange kind of celebration this is. The Orange Order parades mark the victory of the Protestant Prince William of Orange over the Catholic King James II at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. To the revelers and those who revile them, it makes little difference knowing the facts of murky seventeenth-century politics that brought a Dutch mercenary prince into combat with an English king with a questionable claim to the throne.47 To the enthusiasts, historical facts are minor annoyances to be conveniently ignored. For weeks (and perhaps months), the Protestants plan for this day. Homes get fresh coats of paint, the street sides are festooned with decorative items that loudly proclaim their allegiance to various groups, each neighborhood tries to outdo the others in its naked demonstration of hate and macho jingoism. Elaborate floats get ready to display various battle scenes, muscular men brandish swords and puncture the air, enacting the stabbing to death of their enemies. In the parade the sublime

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mixes freely with the macabre. Men and women don their finest, the children wave flags, and huge posters depicting of the virtues of temperance carried by inebriated men draw loud hoots of cheer from the assembled crowd. In anticipation of that day the Catholics also plan ahead: the meek leave town on vacation, while the brave prepare for restoring the honor of their faith. The night before the parades, every Protestant neighborhood constructs elaborate structures so high that some place beacons to ward off low-flying aircrafts. They are made of piles of wood, cardboard, old furniture or anything that is flammable, and are decorated with all the symbols that are dear to the Catholics. The tri-colored flags of the Republic to the south flutter nervously in the air atop the strange structures in anticipation of being set on fire at midnight. In the age-old battle, symbols of division are restricted not only to the Republican flag, they spill over every kind of political beliefs and affiliations. The IRA defines itself as a progressive civil rights movement. Therefore, it claims its ideological affiliation to other “oppressed” people from many parts of the world. Since the Catholics sympathize with the Palestinians and the civil rights movement in the US, the sides of the streets leading to the bonfire proudly display the Israeli and the Confederate flags. In the mean streets of Belfast and Londonderry, everything is seen through the prism of the religious divides. The high fence that separates the two working-class neighborhoods transcends into the hearts and minds of many. In this binary world, children from a very early age are taught to differentiate between a “Catholic look” and a “Protestant look.” Most businesses close down for the July 12 revelries. The fear of renewed mayhem hangs heavily over the entire town. Bed and breakfasts stop booking for the week; even large hotels, in a fashion reminiscent of the Battle of Britain, switch off all lights, as if anticipating air raids. Like clockwork, the streets of Belfast and other cities of Northern Ireland erupt in violence. Young men (and women) get shot, beaten up with serious injuries, and some get killed. In the midst of the mayhem, while seeking the heart of the “Troubles” on Shankill Road, which meanders westward from central Belfast through a working-class “loyalist” enclave, I came upon a shop selling festive articles, knickknacks, and small mementos. From the shop display I picked up an infant’s bib showing a clenched fist with inscriptions boldly claiming, “Ulster, We Shall Never Surrender!” I saw a cherubic face adorned with the fighting words; the baby chortled and gave me a broad smile as our eyes met. In this part of the world, as in many others, hatred comes with mother’s milk; it is bred in the bone. In these parts, loathing is a learned behavior, passed on from one generation to the next. Around the world, where ancient conflicts flourish, innocence is inextricably intertwined with the vile.

A brief history of continuing enmity Depending on the motivation of the researcher, the history of sectarian violence in Ireland can begin in the late twelfth century when the forces of the English

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Crown invaded the island, or in 1690,48 when the Protestant king laid the foundation of English domination, or in 1916 when the watershed events of the Easter Rising took place,49 or in 1972 when the events of Bloody Sunday reenergized the moribund IRA and the “Troubles” started anew.50 Since the IRA is the longest living dissident organization and it involves the United Kingdom, Ireland, and the US, perhaps more has been written on this conflict by academics, journalists, security experts, and fiction writers than all other conflicts in the world put together. Therefore, in this narrative, I will briefly discuss the sources of mutual fear of the Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland, which has kept this conflict alive for centuries. The struggle for the control of the Emerald Isle began around 1155 when a papal bull allowed King Henry II of England to invade a divided land consisting of feuding warlords. As the winds of the Reformation swept Europe in the fifteenth century, Ireland remained staunchly Catholic. Facing a threat from the occupied indigenous population, the Protestant English king actively encouraged settlement of coreligionists from Britain, particularly in the northern part of Ireland. The battle for control of the island came to a head when the Protestant William of Orange vanquished Catholic James II and unified Ireland under English rule. The migration of the Scots and the English and their economic and political dominance over a vast population of natives speaking Gaelic and practicing Catholicism paved the way for a conflict based on a mixture of ethnonationalism, religious identity, and even economic class struggle. The history of Irish resistance to British colonial rule can be safely narrated from the mid-nineteenth century, when James Stephens established a secret society dedicated to changing the servile attitude of his fellow countrymen. The Fenian Society, as it came to be known, also aimed at creating “Home Rule” for Ireland, whereby the British would grant them the autonomy to establish a democratic republic, albeit under the British Crown. Such a change in the political arrangement would have enhanced the political and economic power of the Catholics. Fearing their loss of privileged status, the Protestant minority in the northern region organized and armed its own secret organization, the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) in 1912. Their goal was to scuttle the Home Rule Bill that was being debated in the British parliament at that time. The Bill was passed in 1914 but was delayed in its implementation because of British involvement in World War I. It is interesting to note that the history of the IRA deeply intertwines with the formation and development of the UVF. Over time the two protagonists have not only fought each other, but also when it appeared that a compromised solution could be reached, the fear and apprehension of one would rekindle violence and, in the process, re-energize its protagonist. This is because, in this world drawn only by the broadest strokes and Catholic–Protestant rivalry, the game was always seen as zero-sum – one party’s gain was necessarily viewed as the other’s loss. In Ireland, bullets and ballots have often been used interchangeably. The formation of the

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militant and illegal IRA coincided with the establishment of its political twin, Sinn Fein (meaning “ourselves” or “self-help”). The Protestant opposition sunk the possibilities of Home Rule and, in 1916, the violent uprising and the consequent savage retaliation by the British forces marked the beginning of the struggle for Irish independence. To the impatient Catholics, the Rising was seen as a strategic move to compel their colonial rulers to concede when it was most vulnerable due to its engagement in World War I. To the loyal Protestants, such timing seemed as if it were the ultimate treachery. As the conflict deepened, by 1919 the war of Irish independence began in earnest. By 1921 the British recognized the war was in a stalemate, which neither could win outright. As a result, London recognized the need to reach some kind of deal. For the British, the dilemma was that they recognized the practical needs of granting sovereignty to Ireland but feared its profound implications for the Empire. Public opinion in Great Britain had been, to some degree, turned against the Irish war because of some of the highly publicized violence by British soldiers in the Easter Rising. But the main impetus for a deal came from a widespread perception of the futility of ongoing conflict since neither side was nearing victory. In that sense, it is a precursor to the events that took place in the north of Ireland a couple of generations later – although in the latter case, this recognition took several decades.51 And, in both cases, a weary British public was far more willing to accede to the demands of the Catholic south than they were the Protestants in the Ulster region. After nearly three years of bloody conflict, a compromise on the conflicting demands was reached. Ireland achieved some measure of independence, while six counties of Northern Ireland, where the Protestants were in majority, succeeded in remaining within the political boundaries of the United Kingdom. This “halfempty” arrangement may have satisfied the majority on all sides, but only reinforced the resolve of the extremists on either side of the divide for a complete victory. This new arrangement created a confusing situation. The Catholics were in an absolute majority in the Irish Republic, whereas they were in a minority in Northern Ireland. To the Irish nationalists, the presence of the British Crown in any part of the island smacked of colonialism. In contrast, the Protestants in the North remained in constant fear of drowning in the sea of Irish Catholics. As a psychological defense mechanism, the Protestants became much more loyal to the government in London and the Catholics embraced their Gaelic and religious identities with gusto. With a long history going back nearly 700 years, each side had plenty of opportunity to spin their own version of history and create images of good and evil, allies and enemies, heroes and villains.

The Naxalites and the communist movements in India The transformation of India, widely acclaimed as one of the most remarkable events in the history of the past couple of decades, is often likened to teaching

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an elephant to dance. The lumbering beast long languishing in the near-stagnant “Hindu rate of growth” of annual gross domestic product per capita during much of her post-Independence era suddenly reached a breakneck speed of 8 percent rate of growth, among the highest sustained rates in the world. As the world focuses on this astonishing achievement,52 a new menace to the country’s security is emerging largely outside the public’s gaze. This is coming from a resurgent Maoist group operating within the country. Although the attacks on the urban centers and the areas of symbolic importance, such as the train bombings in Mumbai or the attack on the parliament, get most of the media attention, the new Marxist movement poses a significant danger to India’s long-term future. By some estimates, nearly 20 percent of the land is currently under the dominating influence of Maoist rebels, loosely known as the “Naxalites.”53 The affected areas extend from the border with Nepal to the north to Andhra Pradesh in the south. According to a recent report by the Ministry of Home Affairs, the Naxalites are active in more than 100 districts, some of which are so inaccessible and remote that they form the only parts of India that are yet to be properly surveyed.54 The number of deaths from Naxalite violence is also on a steep rise.55 The fact that these well-armed cadres have been able to carve out “compact revolutionary zones” in 13 states is a cause for deep concern. To be sure, India faces a plethora of insurgencies from a wide variety of groups, spread all over the vast country. However, until lately while the groups fighting in Kashmir and those in the north-east received most of the attention, the insurgency from the Maoists remained largely unnoticed even within India. As the seriousness of the situation becomes apparent, Manmohan Singh, the prime minister of India, in 2006 called it the “biggest internal security threat.”56 In this chapter, let us examine the history of its birth until 1967, when rebellion spread widely throughout the north-eastern state of West Bengal and particularly affected the metropolitan city of Kolkata.

The peasant uprising The Naxalite movement began with a relatively insignificant attack by the largely landless peasants in Bengal, in the foothills of the Himalayas, known as the “Terai region.” It happened in a village called Naxalbari. In March 1967, police came to investigate reports of looting of food grains and guns from the homes of the village landlords. As the former police commissioner narrates the story, a large number of police were sent there, primarily as a show of force. They marched into the village of Naxalbari and saw a group of surly “tribals.”57 When the police inspector who was leading the posse approached the villagers, they shot arrows, killing him. When reinforcements arrived, the police demanded the surrender of those guilty of the shooting. The reply came with more volleys of arrows. Thus began what Peking Radio would later call the “Spring thunder in Terai.”

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I have argued that no mass movement can be studied as a single event. The story of the Naxalite movement is no exception. The movement by the Maoists in the north-eastern Indian state of West Bengal that started in the late 1960s carried the seeds planted by the endless peasant rebellions in colonial India. In fact, no less than 110 violent peasant uprisings were recorded between 1783 and 1900. Similarly, in nearly half a century of further colonial rule in the twentieth century, there were numerous peasant uprisings. The colonial exploitation of the Indian peasantry was of epic proportions. The first rebellion started a hundred years before the Naxalite movement. With the high price for indigo as a dye for fabric manufactured in Europe, the British colonialists started forcing the peasantry in Bengal to plant the inedible cash crop instead of traditional food grains.58 This inevitably brought widespread hunger in the rural areas and led to the first rebellion in the 1860s.59 The dreadful stories of their exploitation inspired the publication of a number of important novels and plays, which helped create the first stirrings of nationalism in India.60 Although the exploitation of peasants in India was exceptionally brutal, despite this shameful past, none of these uprisings could be considered spontaneous.61 They were all parts of some other larger movements or were orchestrated by the village leadership. In these rebellions, Bengal always took the lead. So much so that around 1915 an exasperated King George V asked a new governor of the province, “What is wrong with Bengal?”62 The tradition of rebellion continued in Bengal. India gained her independence at the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947, with a promise from Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to keep its “tryst with destiny.” Yet almost exactly two decades later, in the middle of 1967, trouble started among the tribal people in North Bengal. Under the leadership of a faction of the Communist Party, particularly from an urban romantic named Kanu Sanyal, and a long-time Party activist and theoretician, Charu Mazumdar, groups of landless peasants, drawn mostly from the ranks of the tribal people of India, started looting food grains and firearms from the homes of landlords. At the heart of this rebellion, as had been the case in the past, was the question of the ownership and distribution of land. Land tenancy in India draws its tradition from the colonial needs of the British East India Company. This early privatized version of imperialism conducted its business on the backs of the peasants, supported by a group of indigenous landlords. In the late seventeenth century, the British Corporation granted these landlords, known as Zamindars, the ownership of land in return for their collection of tax revenue.63 The landlords, in turn, subleased their holding among landless peasantry, typically for half their yield.64 In the case of North Bengal, these sharecroppers were mostly drawn from the tribal people of the neighboring states to the east, many of whom had lived in the area for generations.65 The legacy of the colonial land tenancy system continued to spawn extreme inequity in the distribution of arable land. For instance, based on the 1971 census, in Naxalbari, a minuscule portion (4 percent of the population) of rich

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landlords owned the bulk of the land.66 Nearly 60 percent of the population was without any landholding. Most of these rural poor ended up becoming sharecroppers, working for the landlords without any tenancy rights. The situation was typical of other neighboring areas where the Maoist movement found its firm footing.

The communist movement in India: the historical context The history of the communist-led peasant uprising in India started in a district called Telengana in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh and in several northern and central districts of Bengal. Around the time of Independence, under the active leadership of the Communist Party cadres, a group of peasants attacked and killed a number of landlords in Telengana.67 In Bengal, a new movement, Tebhaga, challenged the established rules of land tenancy. Traditionally, the landlords used to get 50 percent of the crops, which the tenants would produce with their own investment of seeds, fertilizer, water, and, of course, labor. The term “tebhaga,” which roughly means “one third,” was what the peasants offered the landlords. The communist movement in India has always kept its umbilical chord firmly attached to the leadership of foreign countries. As a result, the fortunes of the movement often waxed and waned with the paths taken in Moscow or Beijing. Bengal had an intimate relationship with the early Bolshevik movement. A Bengali nationalist named M.N. Roy, fighting the British colonial rulers with a number of terrorist organizations, went into exile in around 1915, first to the US and then to Mexico. In Mexico City, he met Mikhail Borodin, an exiled Russian Bolshevik, and was converted to Marxism. With Borodin’s help, Roy attended the Third Congress of the Third International in Moscow.68 The Communist Party of India (CPI) soon after its birth suffered a great setback in prestige and credibility when, having opposed the Nazi regime in Germany and forcefully denounced Hitler,69 the supplicant communists in India suddenly opposed the British war effort in 1939 after Stalin signed a Non-aggression Pact with Hitler. The second blow to the prestige of the CPI came shortly after Independence. In 1951, a delegation from India went to Moscow and met Stalin. Although there is no written report of the exact conversation, the delegates were taken aback when Stalin, perhaps eager to establish a relationship with the newly independent nation to the south, instructed them to abandon violent revolution and to take advantage of the wonderful system of parliamentary democracy.70 Suddenly, to the chagrin of a small number of more extremist supporters, to whom it appeared to be a betrayal of the rural poor, the CPI left the peasants to their own devices and called off the movement.71 The frustration of the aborted movement in Telengana spawned another rebellion in the northern part of the restive state of Andhra Pradesh, the Srikakulam district. A small group of disgruntled revolutionaries of the Communist

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Party started working among the hill tribes by forming Girijan Sangham (hill people’s associations). The intense exploitation of these tribal people proved to be yet another fertile ground for peasant uprising. Mehra points out the major causes for this uprising.72 First, the tribal people started feeling the demographic and economic pressure from the rest of the nation as they started getting pushed out of their traditional holdings. The better-educated plains people began moving in, sensing their vulnerability. Quite often they were offered a minimal price for their land or were offered easy credit at exorbitant rates, which, when they defaulted, caused them not only to lose their meager possessions, but also relegated them and their families to de facto enslavement. In response to this growing discontent, in 1956 the Andhra government set up a state-run credit finance department specifically for the tribal people. Unfortunately, greed and extreme corruption by state officials only made the situation worse.73 Finally, under the leadership of the communist activists, the hill tribes in Srikakulam were mobilized to go on the warpath. In these remote forested areas, the rebels declared their “liberated zones,” began an annihilation policy of the local landlords and moneylenders, started collecting “taxes,” and set up “revolutionary courts” to mete out brutal justice against “class enemies” and the “enemies of the revolution.” With matching brutality by the state police and military forces, the Srikakulam movement was broken in the mid-1970s.

Marxism and violent rebellion: an ideological perspective In order to place the discussion of the communist movement in India in context, we must take a brief detour into the ideological confusion within Marxism and the global Marxist movement, which has repeatedly caused its splintering. The origin of this fundamental conundrum can be traced to the writings of Karl Marx and other early writers. Although Marx himself had little doubt about the ending of the capitalist era, the later practitioners were less certain about it. From the earliest Marxist literature, there has always been some confusion whether the transition from capitalism to socialism would come as part of an inevitable manifest destiny of the intrinsically flawed system, just the same way as feudalism gave way to capitalism in Europe and elsewhere, or as a result of deliberate activities of a revolutionary party. Marx argued that the capitalists’ insatiable acquisitiveness would lead to concentration of income in the hands of an ever smaller group of people. Being overloaded with goods and services that cannot find their price, there would be an inevitable process where profits would fall, causing a spiraling effect of increased unemployment and even lower rates of profit.74 In order to save themselves from their fate, the capitalist nations must always seek out new markets. For them, it would come in the form of colonial expansion. However, this too would be temporary, as the inevitable limits to market expansion would start creating havoc within the capitalist system. The ensuing economic crisis would ultimately implode the capitalist system, as the alienated

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working class, being aware of their true class interest, would bring about an end to the existing socio-economic and political structure. This would introduce a new era of the dictatorship of the proletariat headed by the Communist Party. In fact, Marx even predicted this end game as follows: “when the class struggle nears the decisive hour … a small section of the ruling class cuts itself adrift, and joins the revolutionary class.”75 However, the question still remained as to the role of the Communist Party in ushering in this revolutionary change. Reflecting this confusion, Lenin, in his seminal work What Is To Be Done?, praised another important Marxist writer, Karl Kautsky, for his insight, but took him to task for being a revisionist; Kautsky assumed that the revolution would come about through spontaneous outbursts of rebellion by the working class without the leadership of the Communist Party.76 This confusion regarding the role of Communist Party became much more acute when the democratic nations allowed communist parties to participate in the political processes after the end of World War II.77 In this debate, Stalin and the Soviet Communist Party, perhaps being secured within their own borders, opted to play along with the rules of the game in the democratic nations. This emphasis on the electoral system to bring about social change was stressed at the 19th Party Congress, when Gregory Malenkov, the secretary of the Soviet Communist Party, proclaimed that We have not the least intention of forcing our ideology or our economic system upon anybody. The export of revolution is nonsense. Every country will make it if it wants to and if it does not, there will be no revolution, says Comrade Stalin.78 The eschewing of revolutionary movements, the replacement of bullets with ballots, of course, did not sit well with the more radical factions. This contradiction was not simply in rhetoric but also reflected a deep chasm within the global communist movement, which quickly reached the shores of India. The question was simply whether the transition to the next stage of Marxist evolution was going to take place peacefully, through the Communist Party working within the law and gathering power gradually through constitutional means, or whether the existing socio-political and economic system could be uprooted through a violent revolution.

Propaganda by deed At this point, it is important to note the third point of disagreement among the revolutionaries. Collective movements require the presence of collective identity, which defines the group and the community and, at the same time, identifies the enemy.79 For most of us, identities based on race, religion, or language come naturally, often from birth. How about the Marxist class identity? Identity is a psychological construct. While the other forms of irredentist identities may

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come with mother’s milk,80 Lenin,81 Mao,82 and Ho Chi Minh83 were emphatic in their assertion that class identity must be painstakingly taught to the peasants and the workers. However, while Lenin, Mao, and Ho Chi Minh, realizing the difficulty in inculcating the notion of a collective identity based on economic class, advocated a long process of indoctrination of the proletariat, by contrast, other revolutionaries, particularly in Latin America, such as Che Guevara84 and Carlos Marighela,85 assumed that class identity was present in the minds of the exploited workers and peasants. It was bubbling just under the surface and could be quickly ignited through propaganda by deed. Thanks to the countless generations of egregious exploitation, the ground was already fertile for revolutionary fervor. All that was required for its deliverance was a fitting action. The appropriate metaphor was the single spark that would start a prairie fire. After working with the landless peasants for years, Charu Mazumdar and Kanu Sanyal were convinced that the “objective condition” in India was ripe for a massive uprising against an oppressive social and political system.86 The spark that was to ignite the “class hatred” was going to be the grisly killings of the jotdars or the village landlords and the rapacious moneylenders. The argument was that as soon as the peasants were shown that they could redress their grievances by killing the sources of their oppression, their natural “class hatred” would well up in cascades and flood the plains of Bengal. Mazumdar and his youthful followers took the connection between the killings and the revolutionary fervor as an act of faith. Mazumdar, therefore, despite his professed allegiance to Mao and Lenin, was, in fact, following the lines of Guevara. He argued that in their attempt to seize political power under the prevailing conditions: 1) 2) 3)

building of a mass organization was unnecessary, since the country was ready for a revolution.87 All that was needed was a spark;88 the class enemy can and should be annihilated through terrorist tactics, rather than be overwhelmed through electoral politics; any economic agenda for the rural poor must wait until the revolutionary seizure of power.89

At Mazumdars urging, violent actions started and soon engulfed the entire state of West Bengal and parts of the neighboring state of Bihar. Although nearly every city and small town was affected, Kolkata suffered the most. We will examine the implications of these ideas on the development and demise of the Naxalite movement in India in the following chapters.

Summary This chapter traced the birth of violent political movements by comparing the history of three disparate groups, the Catholic rebellion in Ireland, the religious

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movement in the Islamic world, and the communist uprising in India. It shows a number of similarities that should be considered universal for any political movement. All three movements are rooted in the past history of getting independence from British colonial rule in the case with the IRA, seeking religious reform within Islam, and peasant revolts of the past for the Naxalites. While the contours of the group identities have evolved over time, the enmity among the combatants has been kept alive by a long list of political entrepreneurs framing the issues of grievance, thereby shaping the collective identity of the community. For survival, the ideological orientation of the groups underwent changes. The IRA turned away from asserting the rights of the Catholics to becoming a civil rights movement. The Islamic movement broadened its scope from fighting Israel to achieving a global caliphate. The Naxalites severed their ideological ties to Moscow and switched allegiance to Beijing. In the final analysis religion, nationalism, or communist ideology are simply the vehicles through which a group’s identity is channeled. A closer examination reveals that all three overlap in their messages: the religious identity of Islam is often defined along the lines of certain ethnicity accompanied by a strong message of economic equality. Similarly, nationalism is frequently combined with a specific religion. Communist movements, despite their professed ideology, are centered around a nation or certain ethnic groups.

Notes 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_Taymiya#_note-5. Sapolsky (2019). Goodall (1986). Goodall (1992). De Waal (1982); Alcock (1984); Diamond (1992); Keely (1996); Wrangham and Peterson (1996). Wilson et al. (2014). For an earlier argument along the same line, see Gupta (2001a). Carsten et al. (2011). Kapogiannis et al. (2009). Sapolsky (2019: 2). Pietraszewski et al. (2014). Keen (1986). Shalins (1989). Rapoport (2011). Miller (1936). Kramer (1997). Sundar (2016). For an excellent discussion of the “Sons of Liberty” movement and its link to the American Revolution, see Rapoport (2006). Post (2005). Jacquard (2002). I am extremely grateful to Jeffrey Kaplan for his comments, especially on this chapter and on Islamic theory. The errors are all mine. Kaplan (2017). Esposito (2003).

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24 For instance, Berman (2003) points out that Islam specifies: dietary regulations, the proper direction to pray, the rules of divorce, the question of when a man may propose marriage to a widow (four months and ten days after the death of her husband, unless she is pregnant, in which case after delivery), the rules concerning a Muslim man who wishes to marry a Christian or a Jew (very complicated), the obligations of charity, the punishment for crimes and for breaking your word, the prohibition on liquor and intoxicants, the proper clothing to wear, the rules on usury, moneylending, and a thousand other themes. 25 Although Taymiyya gave the fatwa to wage Jihad against the infidel Mongols, there is no evidence that he actually called for Jihad against the Mamluks, whom he did not consider to be the ideals of Islamic piety. 26 Berkey (2003). 27 Ali (2002: 75). 28 Holden and Jones (1981). 29 Shah (2007). 30 Lewis (2002: 18–34). 31 Ibid. 32 Mahdi is a figure promised in Hadith to come every hundred years to renew Islam until the Final Judgment. It was re-enacted with less success 100 years later in 1979 with the Mecca Mosque takeover. The reappearance of the Mahdi is an integral part of Jihadi rhetoric. 33 Husain (2003: 71). 34 Deng (1989: 348, 1995). 35 Flint (2005); Prunier (2005). 36 Singh (1981). 37 Qasim (2002). 38 Husain (2003: 75). 39 Mitchell (1969). 40 Husain (2003: 71–74). 41 Ali (2002: 97). 42 Moussalli (1992); Berman (2003a, 2003b). 43 Qutb (1993: 116). 44 Sageman (2004: 9). 45 Qutb (1993: 130). 46 Ali (2002: 109). 47 Lenihan (2003). 48 Rose (1990). 49 See English (2003). 50 See Silke (2005). 51 I am grateful to Richard English for clarifying this point. 52 For instance, Time magazine’s issue of June 6, 2006 had the cover story “India, Inc.” Almost concurrently, Foreign Affairs had a special issue on “The Rise of India,” July/ August, 2006. 53 This 20 percent figure is widely quoted in many circles in India. For instance, journalist Inder Malhotra mentions this figure in his foreword to Ranjit Gupta’s The Crimson Agenda: Maoist Protest and Terror (2004). The nature of this domination varies from the “highly affected” areas where the Maoists have set up a virtual parallel government to those areas where state administration is still prevailing, but is under attack from the violent Marxist groups. 54 See Guha (2006). 55 By using open-source information, the Institute for Conflict Management estimates the number of casualties at nearly double the amount admitted by the government. See www.satp.org/satporgtp/countries/india/database/fatalitiesnaxal.htm. 56 Sengupta (2005).

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57 The upper-caste Hindus claim their origin goes back to the fair-skinned Aryans, who, according to one theory, settled in India in prehistoric times and took over the land from the indigenous people, many of whom, much like the native Americans in the US, were pushed to the remote forests and other badlands. They are often the poorest of the poor and are collectively called the “tribals” or the Adivashis, which literally translates as the “original inhabitants.” According to a report (Worldwatch Institute, 1993), in absolute numbers, India has the largest indigenous tribal population in the world, although they constitute only 7 percent of the population. 58 For an excellent discussion of the nature of British colonial exploitation, see Rao and Rao (1992). This volume also contains an English translation of the famous play by Dinabandhu Mitra, Neel Darpan (The Blue Mirror), which tells the story of these peasants with such graphic details that it quickly spawned nationalistic violence in Bengal. 59 See Bagai (1953). 60 Chatterjee (1998). 61 Guha (1983). 62 Gordon (1990: 196, emphasis in original). 63 The Zamindari system goes back at least to the Mughal period in the late sixteenth century. In Persian, the official language of the Mughal Court, zamin means “land” and dar means “holder” or “owner.” However, land tenure under the Mughals was not systematic or permanent. The innovation of the British was to make land ownership permanent and inheritable in return for fixed revenues to the government. 64 French (1997: 6). 65 Gupta (2004: 81). 66 Mehra (2000). 67 Pavier (1981). 68 Like Emma Goldman, Roy traveled through many countries and went back to his home country disillusioned with both Marxism and capitalism. See Ray (2002). 69 It is interesting to note that prior to 1939, while the communists in India forcefully denounced Hitler, a large segment of the population, abiding by the rule “my enemy’s enemy is my friend,” remained much more ambivalent about Hitler. Also, his message of Aryan identity falsely created a sense of affinity in the minds of many. 70 For a detailed discussion of the meeting of the Indian Communist Party delegates with Stalin and its consequent impact on the policies of the CPI, see Banerjee (1980: 86–88). 71 Gupta (2004: 25). 72 Mehra (2000). 73 Caiman (1985). 74 Sweezy (1981). 75 Fernbach (1974: 77). 76 Lenin (1969 [1902]: 40). 77 Although there is no written record of their conversation, Gupta (2004: 62), quoting some of those who met Stalin in 1951, reconstructed Stalin’s direct instruction as follows: “You [in India] have a very good Constitution. You are not an illegal party any more. You fight the election to parliamentary bodies, and so doing this you can carry the Communist message to people’s homes. After capturing parliamentary democracy and after capturing all the fronts of society, you can then promote people’s democracy with political power. You will then have taken over power without violence” (emphasis mine). 78 Quoted in Gupta (2004: 62). 79 See Gupta (2001a). 80 See Post (2005). 81 Lenin (1969[1902]. 82 Mao Tse-Tung (1961).

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Ho Chi Minh (1961). Loveman and Davies (1985). Marighela (1985). For a comparison between Latin American guerrilla movements and the Naxalite movement, see Singh (2006: 195–197). 87 See Caiman (1985: 72–73). 88 See Dasgupta (1975: 9). 89 See Mehra (2000).

7 GROWTH AND LONGEVITY

Adaptation: the key The key to evolutionary success in biology rests with an organism’s ability to adapt to the changing ecosystem within which it lives. Those that are best able to adapt, multiply and thrive. So it is, for an organization. Whether in business or in war, the ability to react quickly and adapt is critical, and it becoming even more so as technology and disruptive forces increase the pace of change. That requires new ways to communicate and work together. In today’s world, creativity is a collaborative endeavor. Innovation is a team effort.1 So writes Walter Isaacson in his foreword of General Stanley MacChrystal’s book, Team of Teams. The general arrived in the war-torn Iraq, heading up the Joint Special Operations Taskforce. Soon, he realized that al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQAP), under the leadership of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was getting the better of the US military. Searching for the answer, MacChrystal realized that the secret to the success of the Islamic militants rests with the leadership’s ability to adapt on the fly and quickly regroup to operationalize their strategic goals. What was important in his insight is the universality of the secret sauce of success for all organizations, from al-Qaeda to Amazon, from the Naxalites to Netflix. He emphasizes the cohesion of purpose and shared consciousness among the followers as well as the leader’s ability to promote trust and empower teams within teams to execute strategic decisions. Being part of the US government, the general did not have to deal with another important factor. To his list, therefore, I would add the group’s ability to raise money. Some of the most successful groups, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon2 and Lashkar-e-Tayiba were

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sponsored by their benefactors from their inception,3 in this case Iran and Pakistan, respectively. Also relevant for political organizations are the external factors of national and international politics, state failure, and even geographic location.

Sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland: the IRA In 1968, the IRA was a moribund, shrivelled up and an increasingly irrelevant organization. Its membership was dwindling, its meager resources diminishing with each year, and its political front, Sinn Fein, was in an electoral wilderness, boasting little electoral mandate.4 In face of increased hostility from the Protestant gangs, the IRA was being outmanned and out-maneuvered. In its feeble state it was unable to protect its people and, in the minds of many, the IRA meant “I Ran Away.” Andrew Silke, reflecting the common wisdom, saw the IRA in its most weakened position before it suddenly exploded with a renewed burst of energy.5 The decades-long history of the IRA, 50 years after the Easter Rising offer an object lesson in the rapid growth of a mass movement. Therefore, in this section, I will discuss the process of escalation of violence and the establishment of the much more violent and politically active Provisional IRA, spanning the period from 1962 to 1981. In the 1960s the Catholics in Northern Ireland lived a decidedly restricted life. The Protestant majority kept them out of the civil service, the judiciary, and even managerial positions in the flourishing private sector. Schools were segregated along the lines of religious affiliation. The more prestigious institutions of higher education’s student body did not reflect the percentage of the Catholics in the population. Another big source of frustration for the Catholics living in the large northern cities was housing. The Protestants were clearly favored in the allocation of council housing. The democratic process was of little help, since the Protestant politicians would successfully gerrymander and draw up the boundaries of the voting districts in a way that would minimize the influence of the Catholic votes.6 By looking at the plot of the number of people killed due to sectarian bloodshed in Northern Ireland (Figure 7.1), we see that violence escalated from 1969. From this plot we can visually distinguish four segments. The first segment between 1968 and 1976 shows a huge increase in violence with about 92 people killed per year. The next 11 years show an almost steady level of violence, with the number of average yearly fatalities cut nearly by half to 57. The third segment, 1988 and thereafter, shows a steady decline to the level of near zero killings. The average number of deaths attributed to the IRA was about 20 per year, while in the last five years (2000–2004) the average has declined to about two. Let us now draw a thumbnail picture of the “Troubles” of Northern Ireland and examine the reasons for the rapid growth of the IRA and the group’s ability to maintain a strong violent presence. Therefore, my narrative will cover the 20-year period from 1968 through 1987.

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FIGURE 7.1

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Number of people killed by the IRA

For more than 200 years, the marching season in the summer months has been a focal point of conflict between the Protestant and Catholic communities in Northern Ireland. The Protestants of the Orange Order who arrange most of the parades claim that they are part of their cultural heritage, commemorating key historical events. The Catholics, on the other hand, take these triumphalist marches as an affront to them since they all celebrate the Protestant victory over Catholic forces. Trouble inevitably begins when the parade goes through the Catholic neighborhoods. August 1969 was no different. The Apprentice Boys Parade travels through the city streets in a yearly ritual marking the relief of the siege of Derry in 1689, after the city gates were locked against King James’ forces by apprentice boys vowing “No Surrender.” However, this time, the riots became more intense. They began in Derry and quickly spread to Belfast. As the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) sprang into action against the primarily stone-throwing Catholics, pitched battles erupted. The broadcast pictures of police beatings and gun battles drew worldwide condemnation. What irritated the Protestants in Northern Ireland and their protector, the British government, was a veiled threat from the Irish Republic of an armed invasion of the north to protect the interests of the Catholic minority.7 This provocation prompted Protestant mobs to engage in operations akin to “ethnic cleansing,” where 3,000 Catholic families were driven out of their homes and neighborhoods. In retaliation, nearly 500 Protestant families were also uprooted from heavily Catholic areas of the two cities.8 Since the minority Catholics suffered disproportionately in the tit-for-tat atrocities, a new and much more aggressive group emerged out of the old IRA: the Provisional IRA (PIRA). As the government failed to meet the security needs of the Catholics in Northern Ireland, the immediate task of this new militant group was to protect the Catholic areas against attacks from the Protestant gangs.

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Fearing for the safety of the Catholic population, 10,000 British troops were sent to Northern Ireland, despite loud protests from the Protestants. The soldiers quickly brought the explosive situation under control. The British government imposed substantial reforms on the recalcitrant majority. These reforms met nearly all the demands put forward by a growing civil rights movement, which shortly disbanded having achieved its goals. Unfortunately, it is impossible to secure peace and implement democratic reform at the barrel of a gun. Similar to the experience of other foreign troops sent to keep peace in the middle of a civil war, the British troops soon found themselves fighting the very population they were sent to protect.9 The PIRA was growing in strength and actively acquiring more funds, guns, and volunteers. The emerging power of such a violent group caused concern and British troops stepped up their search and seizure operation, which brought them into direct confrontation with the much more self-assertive Catholic groups. These operations were carried out with brutality. Lee reports that in 1971 more than 17,000 Catholic homes were searched.10 As the troops rummaged through homes for weapons or fugitives, they would leave them nearly totally destroyed and occupants thoroughly humiliated. Yet most often these searches yielded very few weapons or incriminating evidence to suggest an active involvement in the PIRA.11 The growing indignation of the Catholics only helped the PIRA. Taking full advantage of the situation the PIRA stepped up its acts of provoking the troops into further alienating the Catholics. If the defining moment in the nationalist struggle came during the Easter Rising when the picture of the British soldiers firing at unarmed Dubliners in April 1916 galvanized the Irish resistance movement, nearly half a century later on Sunday January 30, 1972, another such atrocity proved to be a watershed event in the violent history of Northern Ireland. Known as “Bloody Sunday,” British paratroopers in Derry opened fire on a crowd of Catholics and killed 13 people. The powerful tales of the abuses of the security forces further increased the influence of the PIRA. Thus, Silke notes, “Strong local support, ample manpower, and newly acquired funds and weapons allowed the PIRA to conduct an unprecedented campaign of violence against the RUC, judiciary and army.”12 The level of violence in Northern Ireland continued to spiral out of control. Exhausted and demoralized, within eight weeks of Bloody Sunday the British government dissolved the Protestant-dominated Stormont regime, deposing unionist Prime Minister Brian Faukner. The power to rule was taken away from the elected Northern Ireland parliament and was transferred to a British cabinet minister. The next two decades marked desperate attempts by the British government to walk the fine line between Protestant fear and Catholic aspirations.13 However, in the meantime, the suspension of the Stormont government added to the anxiety of the Loyalists. This added to the tension as sectarian violence continued to claim many lives.

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Fearing a power vacuum created by the suspension of democracy, London tried forced power sharing between the two groups in January 1974. Unfortunately, this forced effort at conflict resolution satisfied neither side. PIRA violence continued unabated and in May, the Ulster Workers Council, a Protestant group with strong ties to the paramilitary groups, called a general strike to force a new election. Given the Protestant majority, the outcome of the election was a foregone conclusion and the British government refused to give in. At the same time, fearing a Protestant backlash, the army was unwilling to break the crippling strike. In the end, Westminster gave in and declared its willingness to reinstall democracy by calling a new constitutional convention.14 The Catholics summarily rejected the call for democracy. With the battle lines clearly drawn and very well understood, neither side wanted to give in. Killings continued to escalate. Having failed a top-down solution, the British for a while tried the tactic of “chatting up the gunmen.” The purpose was to win the goodwill of the fighting men through direct conversation. In order to appease the extremists on both sides, the authorities in London in 1974, despite vocal opposition from the moderates, recognized the legal status of the Protestant paramilitary group, the Ulster Volunteer Force, and the political arm of the IRA, Sinn Fein. The appeasement worked for a while as a ceasefire was called. However, soon the truce broke, and the number of killings started rising again in 1975. The following year, a constitutional convention became hopelessly deadlocked, and the British became resigned to the long-term prospect of a non-democratic direct rule of Northern Ireland. Violence subsided in the second phase in 1977. One of the primary reasons for this decline in violence was due to the return of dominance of the police instead of the soldiers. Oleary points out that “The return to ‘police primacy’ in 1977 was associated with a reduced level of killings. Armed police are more restrained than soldiers trained to kill in combat.”15 Soon the region settled down to a lower level of killings by the rival groups. Direct rule was acceptable to the Protestants since it reaffirmed the British ties to the province. The Catholics rejected it. In 1981 in a change of tactic, the IRA organized a hunger strike of its prisoners. The strategic self-immolation of Bobby Sands and nine others galvanized support for the IRA to an unprecedented level.16 Over time, the politics of polarization continued, where talking and killing went on simultaneously. Each time there was a ray of hope, it was dashed by the inevitable logic of a zero-sum game of sectarian violence. In 1986, a bomb exploded in a Berlin nightclub frequented by off-duty US soldiers. Intelligence reports indicated the culpability of Libya and its revolutionary leader Muammar Qaddafi. In a retaliatory move, the Reagan administration bombed Tripoli and the port city Benghazi. Libya claimed that the raids killed 37 people, including an infant adopted daughter of the Libyan strongman. Two of his sons were seriously injured. This strong-armed response to terrorism was extremely popular in the US, and this bold retaliatory move is

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often cited as an example of a successful counter-terrorism effort.17 However, later analyses showed that the long-term effect of this bombing only helped solidify Libyan resolve to support anti-Western forces all over the world, including in Northern Ireland.18 The supply of a huge cache of weapons by Libya in 1989 once again boosted the level of violence in Northern Ireland for years to come.19 With this thumbnail sketch of the history of violence in Northern Ireland, let us discuss the reasons for the success of the IRA in gaining strength and remaining a viable military and political power against one of the strongest security forces in the world. O’Leary correctly observes that [o]perating mostly within a territory with just over a million and a half people, and for most of that time within a support base of a minority of the minority cultural Catholic population of approximately 650,000, the IRA’s organizational endurance was impressive. It survived the efforts of five UK prime ministers to crush it – Harold Wilson, Edward Heath, James Callaghan, Margaret Thatcher, and John Major.20 I argue that during the 20-year period beginning 1968, for a number of different reasons, the ideology propagated by the IRA remained strong within a significant segment of the Catholic population in Northern Ireland and in the Republic of Ireland. The dissident group’s effort was further facilitated by its ability to raise sufficient funds21 through various illegal means, as well as receiving financial help from the Catholic diaspora, particularly in the US.22 Also, having a sympathetic regime – the Republic of Ireland – as a neighbor, the IRA benefited from having moral and political support across the border. They also used the Republic as a sanctuary. Furthermore, the IRA has been innovative in its tactics as well as its organizational structure. When one tactic failed (e.g. “proxy bombing”), it quickly abandoned it and moved on to other more effective methods. Along with attacks on its adversaries, the IRA also kept a strict hold on its political base through recrimination and vigilantism, where defections and other acts of disloyalty were punished severely. The need for keeping followers in line increased as the ideological struggle weakened over time.23 The IRA was also quick to adapt to changing situations in its organizational structure. After 1977, when the British placed a greater emphasis on policing instead of trying to crush the movement with the use of troops, the IRA responded by changing the way it was organized. Until then the IRA was organized along a strict hierarchy mirroring the British army, “complete with officers, staff and line, and territorial brigades, battalions, and companies.”24 However, it reorganized into smaller cells of “active service units” (ASUs). By strict division of labor, each ASU was given specialized tasks, such as bombing, sniping, execution, vigilante attacks, and robberies.25 This change in the organizational structure minimized the risks of both detection by the police and defection from its political base.

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The collective identity of a community can be kept alive indefinitely in the face of evident injustice. The Protestant majority, by imposing a system based on discrimination of the Catholic minority, made sure that the enmity would prevail. The jingoistic marches, observed with ritualistic fervor, kept the mutual hatred alive.26 Under these circumstances it is not difficult to see why the IRA would have a sympathetic base on both sides of the Irish border. However, the question is why did violence flare up in 1969? As English points out, in 1962, Cathal Goulding took over as the IRA’s chief of staff. “Goulding in 1962 inherited an IRA that was in a weak condition. Funding had dried up, they were short of weapons and there were not enough volunteers coming through to replace those who had been imprisoned or killed.”27 Goulding introduced new thinking in the strategic approach of the IRA. First, he developed a preliminary plan for another military campaign. However, more importantly, Goulding changed the ideological orientation and embraced Marxist new-left ideology that was sweeping Europe at that time. English makes this important ideological transition crystal clear: There was less emphasis during the 1960s on military training, and more on a leftist definition of republic struggle: 1967 saw the IRA Army Council alter Sinn Fein’s constitution in favour of a socialist republican objective, and, in Cathal Goulding’s own words, “Republicanism stands for the liberation of people. We have been accused of being to the left, but if that means seeking an end to the partition, to the exploitation of our people and placing them in the position of masters of their destiny rather than slaves of a capitalist economy, then we are to the left.”28 With rhetoric like this, Goulding and his fellow radicals, through intense ideological discourse in the discussion groups, the Wolfe Tone Societies, carried out a complete makeover of the movement.29 This was a profound change for the IRA, since the original IRA drew its membership mostly from the Catholic population of Ireland30 and the leadership of the original IRA was profoundly steeped in Catholic ideology and religion.31 Another important innovation took place when the tired retrogressive movement was given the shape of a civil rights movement. By making it into a struggle for justice and equality for the minority in Northern Ireland, the IRA elevated its struggle from a narrow nationalistic aspiration to seeking justice for oppressed people all over the world. The possibility of a renewed military campaign along with a civil rights movement wrapped in Marxist rhetoric was sure to unsettle the Protestant leaders in Northern Ireland. The success of Martin Luther King Jr. in forcing entrenched white power in the American South to end discrimination must have created a deep impression in the minds of the Protestants. Given their profound apprehension, it is not surprising that the civil rights movement would meet with extreme violence from the Loyalist groups. Their overreaction, which culminated in the Bloody Sunday massacre, made sure of the IRA’s viability as a formidable force for the next two decades. In fact,

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Silke observes: “The IRA themselves worked to provoke harsh measures from the unfortunate security forces, knowing fully well the benefits it would reap in terms of support and recruits.”32 The large flow of volunteers after the 1969 confrontation was known as “the sixty-niners.”33 The IRA has also been remarkably nimble in its strategic adjustment. They changed their targets as well as modes of attack to suit the changing needs of the time. In its struggle, the IRA had clearly identifiable enemies: the British soldiers, the Protestant paramilitaries, and the RUC, which was nearly 100 percent Protestant.34 Finally, in solving the puzzle of the IRA’s long life, we cannot overstate the importance of the Catholic diaspora, particularly in the US, in providing the necessary funds to continue its struggle.35

Nationalism versus religious fundamentalism: al Qaeda The war in Afghanistan against the Soviet invaders was one of those watershed events that have shaped the history of the Islamic violent movement that is still plaguing the world today. The Afghan War drew volunteer mujahedeen from all over the Arab/Islamic world. The process was reminiscent of another war and another call to action for a very different time, place, and cause: the way idealistic volunteers from many Western nations, including the US, joined the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939).36 Unlike regular military fighting with government support, the young men combating the Soviet forces in a far-away land had no support system. There was no way the families back home could get news about their loved ones and nor could they send care packages to them. In order to fill this pressing need, a young Saudi businessman from one of the wealthiest families in the world, Osama bin Laden, started an organization called al-Qaeda (the base). During the war, al-Qaeda won widespread admiration and support for its work in allowing the fighters to keep in touch with their families. One of the first mujahedeen to join the fight in Afghanistan was the Palestinian Islamic scholar, Sheikh Abdullah Azzam. Azzam, a desciple of Sayyid Qutb and his student Muhammad Abd al-Salam Fara, is credited with being one the founders of the modern Jihadi movement.37 Like his intellectual predecessors, Azzam believed in the violent resistance against all non-believers.38 Azzam worked tirelessly to combine all the Islamic forces to fight against the Soviets. Soon, he was joined by Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri. In their combined effort, al-Qaeda transformed itself from a charitable organization to an active fighting force.39 Problems, however, soon erupted within the Jihadi family. Azzam was particularly ecumenical and rejected the internecine fights among Muslims as fitna, or chaos, that followed soon after the Prophet’s death, which split asunder the Ummah into Shia and Sunni. He supported strikes against the non-Muslim countries, but firmly rejected the notion of the unfriendly rulers of the Islamic world, takfir (apostate), and called for a Jihad against the “near enemy.” The aftermath of the expulsion of the Soviet military from Afghanistan brought

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about a fierce debate within the group, much like the followers of Stalin and Trotsky in the post-war Soviet Union, regarding the future direction of the Jihadi movement.40 Hardened by his treatment at the hands of the Egyptian government, al-Zawahiri was not willing to lose sight of the Muslim authorities who would collaborate with the West. In his Knights Under the Prophet’s Banner, al-Zawahiri defined the goals of the global war against the Western powers and Russia by clearly identifying the enemies: 1) the United Nations, a rubberstamp organization for the US; 2) the rulers of the Muslim world friendly to the US and the Western nations; 3) multinational corporations; 4) the international communications and data-exchange system; 5) international media, newspapers, television, etc.; 6) international relief agencies that are in reality fronts for Western interests. In this debate, bin Laden at first sided with Azzam and rejected the idea of takfir. However, in 1989, Azzam and his two sons were assassinated in the Pakistani city of Peshawar.41 Although nobody claimed responsibility for it, suspicion fell on the faction of the al-Zawahiri group.42 The global Jihadi movement and al-Qaeda might have been relegated to the dusty pages of history had it not been for the start of yet another Western invasion in the Arab/Muslim world, the Gulf War of 1990–1991. The invasion against Saddam Hussain’s Iraq demonstrated clearly to the adherents of the movement the continuing incursion of the Western (and Christian) world in Arab land and the control of its oil wealth. To add salt to the open wound, the holy lands of the Saudi Arabia were, for the first time, opened up for use by the military forces of the infidel nations, where none were allowed to set foot before. Fearing the worst for Islam and his homeland, Osama bin Laden pleaded with the Saudi king not to allow the coalition forces to establish bases within Saudi Arabia. To many fundamentalist Muslims, Saddam Hussain was a takfir, whose secular Baath Party was a thorn in their side. Bin Laden wanted to fight the invaders in Kuwait with his army of mujahedeen. However, facing an imminent danger from a much more powerful neighbor amassing troops across the border, the king rejected bin Laden’s proposal and instead invited UN forces into the heart of the Arab land. In the meantime, another set of events in the al-Qaeda movement was playing out. Every prolonged violent conflict creates its own dynamics. Often at the end of the hostilities this involves the large number of young men who got involved finding themselves without a job, necessary education, or even a real purpose in life. The only training they would have received was in fighting and areas such as guns, ammunitions, and explosives. The same was true for the mujahedeen. Known as the “Afghan Arabs,” the core fighting group of alQaeda was restless and ready for action. Nearly every country in the region was apprehensive of these battle-hardened men returning home and stirring up trouble. Many of these men became involved in the chaos of the Afghan Civil War that followed the Soviet withdrawal, particularly on the side of the tribal warlords, such as Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. Later, they would develop a strong

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alliance with the Taliban, who would be victorious with the covert and overt help of Pakistan and its intelligence agency, the ISI. The leaders of al-Qaeda decided to move to Sudan. Sudan proved to be an ideal place for them since its reign of power had just been taken over by a sympathetic Islamist government, so around October 1990, the headquarters of al-Qaeda moved to Khartoum. Soon after the Gulf War began, tired of lobbying the Saudi royal family against the deployment of foreign troops on its soil (and with the Saudis becoming increasingly irritated by this upstart zealot), bin Laden cut his final ties to his homeland and went into exile in Sudan. With time, new provocations and opportunities arrived when the wars in Bosnia and Chechnya started. The tales of atrocities against Muslims swelled the ranks of the volunteers. A series of spectacularly successful attacks against the US military (in Somalia in 1993 and in Yemen against the USS Cole in 1999), its embassies (in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam in 1998), and the 9/11 attacks in 2001 added to the mystique of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda. Finally, there was a possibility that in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks when world opinion was squarely against al-Qaeda and its Afghan protectors, the Taliban, the radical Islamic group could have suffered a huge military defeat. However, the focus of the US and its allies became distracted by the war in Iraq. Once again, as has happened many times in history, an unwise policy in the pursuit of the so-called “Global War on Terror” gave life to the retreating radical group. The war in Iraq not only exposed the weakness of a conventional force in asymmetric and unconventional warfare, it also provided a fertile ground for future terrorism. This is because of three primary factors. First, another war against another Islamic country, particularly where the raison d’être for the invasion, the claims of the existence of weapons of mass destruction, turned out to be false, deepened the worst doubts about the “true motives” of the US and Western powers. Second, the pictures of tortured prisoners in Abu Ghraib and stories of mistreatment and indefinite incarceration of a large number of Muslims in Guantanamo prison not only damaged the US image around the world, they also inspired many to seek revenge through terrorist attacks. Many young men started to flock to Iraq to join the Jihad in much the same way as their predecessors had gone to Afghanistan. Finally, the widespread sectarian violence and the civil war that broke out in the aftermath of the destruction of a fragile nation, cobbled together in haste after World War I, turned Iraq into a failed state.43 Like all other failed states it quickly become a breeding ground for all sorts of illegal activities, including terrorism. Having discussed the evolution of al-Qaeda – not only as a group, but also as a movement – the question can now be asked: why did it become such a force so quickly? There are several reasons for it. First and foremost, the innovation of the global Salafi movement that gave it quick success was due largely to its ability to define its goals clearly and with the language and imageries of the Islamic tradition. After generations of shared humiliation, intellectual leaders from Hassan al-Banna to Sayyid Qutb to Osama bin Laden articulated the

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feelings that were deep inside many in the Muslim world. Together, they were able to frame the battle in individual terms. As Sageman puts it: This was a battle that every Muslim must face to defend his creed, society, values, honor, dignity, wealth, and power. To mobilize, the masses needed a leadership that they could trust, understand and follow; a clear enemy to strike at; and removal of the shackles of fear and weakness in their soul.44 The world events played an important role in the spread of the Islamic movement. On the one hand, they created a situation of increasing frustration as well as creating hope for an Islamic revolution. The creation of Israel with the claim of half of Jerusalem was like a bolt of thunder to the Muslim world, where generations had grown up learning about glories in the distant past and humiliating defeats since then. The wounded pride created a condition of fraternal deprivation, where some turned to nationalism and some to their Islamic identity. A number of political and religious leaders gave shape to this generalized condition of hopelessness and anger. A long litany of grievances, along with disappointing economic performance, particularly in the Arab countries, added fuel to the fire. The final blow to Arab/Muslim pride came with the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. These attacks only made it possible for the radicals to spread their message. Revolutionary fervor is not only the product of frustration but also of hope. The cause of the revolutionary optimism was aided by number of important world events. The success of Indian Muslims in carving out a separate nation for the Muslims in Pakistan created widespread elation in the Islamic world. However, the first real cause for celebration for many in the Islamic world came in 1979 when the Shah of Iran was ousted in a successful revolution led by the theocratic forces of Ayatollah Khomeini. The articulation of a clear message identifying the enemy and proposing a utopian society based on the timehonored tradition of Islam was evident to the adherents. The extremist groups were able to attract many to their cause. When the mighty Soviet military withdrew from Afghanistan under relentless attacks by the various Afghan and mujahedeen groups, they took all the credit for defeating the superpower, ignoring the role played by the other Arab/Muslim regimes, most notably Saudi Arabia. The final round of “victory” for the Jihadis came with the sight of the most incredible attack at the heart of the US on 9/11. Together the militant leaders were able to portray an image of strength of al-Qaeda and the Jihadis far beyond what could be attributed to these groups. The failed state of Afghanistan, after the withdrawal of the Soviet forces and in the middle of a vicious civil war, provided an ideal sanctuary for the radicals. These men were also greatly aided by Pakistan and its ISI. Having a strong base of operation, they could develop a resolute chain of command linking groups committed to violence in many parts of the world.

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Finally, the economic power of oil-rich Saudi Arabia and some of the Gulf countries in pursuit of religious hegemony allowed their radical messages to be heard. Through an existing network of mosques and mullahs the groups were able to become a formidable adversary to the Western powers.

Class conflict: the urban fighters of the Naxalite movement The confrontation between the two mainstream communist ideologies became obvious to the rest of the world as the decade of the 1960s progressed. The ideological rift that had grown between the Soviet Union and China in the post-war period affected the communist parties in India. The problem for them deepened even further in 1962 when India and China became embroiled in a border dispute, which escalated into a military conflict between the two Asian giants.45 The Soviet Union, a natural ideological ally of China, remained largely neutral in the dispute. The direct confrontation with a communist country put the communists in India in a quandary. Those who would not take the patriotic position of defending India would be quickly labeled as traitors. Once again, the international situation, as in 1939, sowed confusion and dissent among the Indian communists. Furthermore, the Communist movement in India was badly shaken up in the early 1960s, when it was discovered that one of the most respected members of the Communist Party India (CPI), S.A. Dange, had made secret deals with the government to cooperate in exchange for his release from jail. The situation was exacerbated even further when the simmering conflict between China and the Soviet Union broke out into an open military confrontation along their Siberian border in 1964. This was the straw that broke the camel’s back in party unity within the Indian communist movement. The older members of the CPI remained loyal to the Soviet Union and the brasher, younger members formed a new party, the Communist Party India (Marxist) or the CPI-M. A group of the CPI-M cadres continued to work with the landless peasants in North Bengal. This split, however, did not please everybody within the more radical proChinese party, the CPI-M. Although we can look at this split and hypothesize about cynical power grabs and personality conflicts among the top leadership, it would be a mistake to understate the importance of moral, ideological issues that caused this rupture.46 The issue of violent revolution, one of the most vexing ideological problems within Marxism, reared its head once again. To those who believed in the violent uprising of the working classes, the older members of the CPI were nothing short of betrayers to the cause, particularly since they had already sold out the peasants in 1951 during the Telengana uprising.47 Therefore, when the CPI-M decided to join electoral politics, it alienated a number of its cadres, particularly those who were already involved in organizing peasants in West Bengal. The mid-1960s was a time of great change, both internally and externally, that was affecting the nascent nation in a profound way. The early promises of

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comprehensive land reform, which would allow the Fanon-esque wretched of the earth living wages, remained exactly that, promises. In the meantime, the so-called “Green Revolution” founded on the cultivation of hybrid, high-yielding Mexican rice and corn, which would transform a perennially hungry nation into a net exporter of food, was taking root, causing a steadily rising level of income disparity in the rural areas.48 In the midst of those rising expectations, the local newspapers started carrying inconspicuous reports of desperate peasants, unable to feed their families, committing suicide.49 In the state of West Bengal, where the tradition of revolutionary fervor dates back at least a century, a new leader emerged named Charu Mazumdar. If all mass movements start with the birth of an idea, the Naxalite movement came into being with a set of nine essays that Mazumdar penned while serving time in jail around 1965.50 Born in 1911 to the family of a small landlord, Mazumdar had risen to be a middle-level party official in the CPI-M. In his essays, he asked the question: why did the communist movement not succeed in India? To him, the answer was simple. The Chinese Communist Party under the leadership of Mao Zedong had shown the correct path to a proletarian revolution. However, Mazumdar argued that along the way the followers of the revisionists in Moscow and their followers in India betrayed the Indian movement. The second important thesis for Mazumdar was that revolution in India must come not from the urban centers, but from its heartland, from the peasants in the villages. In the previous chapter I mentioned the fundamental disagreement that has split the global communist movement from its inception – whether revolution was to come spontaneously or as a part of a deliberate military action by the communist parties. Soon another tactical question emerged among the revolutionaries: should the movement start from the villages or be based at the urban centers? While the origins of the Russian Revolution had a distinct urban/industrial workers flavor,51 the Chinese communist movement, in contrast, was primarily rural based.52 This distinction fueled excited debate, in which Charu Mazmumdar and Kanu Sanyal came down on the side of a rural movement. They argued that India was primarily a “semi-feudal, semi-colonial” society and, mimicking Mao, raised the slogan “encircle the cities from the villages.”53 1965 proved to be a tumultuous year in the history of India. On 1 September, a full-scale war broke out between India and Pakistan that lasted over two weeks. With the nation convulsed with patriotic fervor, the Chinese government, by calling itself an “all-weather friend” to Pakistan, sided with India’s arch enemy. Once again, the loyalty of Communist Party members to the nation was put to test. However, by now, the pro-Chinese CPI-M, already seriously considering being a part of the Indian political system, was quick to condemn China for its alliance with Pakistan. Once again, for the likes of Charu Mazumdar, such an admonition of Chinese policies proved to be too much. The path was being paved for a further split in the CPI-M.

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The ideological rift between the CPI-M and its more radical members became wider when the former decided to join the democratic process and compete in the elections. The opportunity came quite unexpectedly. The Indian National Congress, the party credited with the independence of India, had become unpopular in West Bengal. 1966–1967 also brought acute food shortages along with high inflation. The lack of monsoon rain caused India to turn to the US for assistance for wheat and rice. In the midst of this growing discontent and fears of yet another famine, the opposition parties to the ruling Congress formed an alliance, United Front, and won the state election. The National Congress Party, which had ruled India since its independence as a practically undisputed leader, faced its first electoral defeat in West Bengal.54 As a part of the winning coalition, the CPI-M was given two of the most important cabinet positions. The party leader, Jyoti Basu, was given the Home Ministry, responsible for internal security, and H.P. Konar the Ministry of Land Revenue, which was in charge of, among others, the thorny issue of land reform.55 The electoral victory brought out the division within the party even more sharply. Now in power, the CPI-M, the ultimate outsider, suddenly became “part of the establishment.” As the Home Minister, the party boss was in charge of maintaining law and order in the state, while the other stalwart was entrusted with the task of redistributing land. Being faithful to the Indian Constitution and yet remaining faithful to revolutionary goals was an impossible balance that CPI-M was unable to perform. The younger members had grave doubts about the democratic system to deliver the revolutionary goals and were ready to form their own party.56 Piazza studied 27 Indian states and the Delhi municipality.57 His empirical investigation showed that terrorism thrived where there were weak governments, resulting from a single party’s inability to form a stable government and being forced to enter into a coalition. His findings fully support what happened with the Naxalites in West Bengal.58 However, I might add that besides having a weak government in charge, in the rough and tumble of Indian politics, political parties often use various groups as pawns to gain power, which may also create favorable conditions where terrorism can flourish. Although firm statistics on unemployment and underemployment among the urban youth were notoriously unreliable or simply, non-existent, a pervasive feeling of despair regarding lack of opportunities dominated the state. This problem was especially acute among the droves of college-educated young men and women, seeking jobs in an economy mired in red tape and choked in an inescapable bureaucratic stranglehold. The evidence of capital flight from Kolkata, as a result of an increasingly militant labor movement was all around. Soon, Kolkata and much of West Bengal were plunged into chaos due to widespread violence. The police and military operations made everyday life nearly impossible. The Naxalites had quickly secured their place in history. If we closely examine the reasons for the rapid rise of the movement, we will see the following factors. First, Bengal had a long history of violent resistance. Even when the rest of the nation heeded to the call of non-violence by

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Mahatma Gandhi against the British Raj, the Bengalis were always skeptical. In fact, the real opposition to Gandhi came from one of his Bengali followers, Subhash Chandra Bose, who fled India and, with the help of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, formed an exiled army from the captured Indian soldiers in occupied Southeast Asia.59 Along this line, Bengal was no stranger to peasant rebellion and had a rich tradition of violent resistance going far back in history. The tales from the Telengana movement from faraway Andhra Pradesh inspired many in West Bengal. However, they also had the memory of their own peasant rebellion, the Tebhaga movement. Second, the plight of the poor was a factor, particularly in the rural areas, where the much-touted land reform had but little impact. Periodic droughts and lack of opportunities made the situation untenable for a large number of peasants relegated to subsistence living. Under these dire circumstances, the peasants in Bengal were receptive to the revolutionary way out of their misery. Third, the decades of socialist planning, which emphasized capital-intensive heavy industries at the expense of job creation in the more labor-intensive service and consumer-goods sector, created unemployment, especially among college-educated youth. These young men, uncertain about their economic future, supplied the primary impetus for the revolution. The wave of the newleft movement that was sweeping the Western nations had created conditions where Marxist rhetoric was an easy sell to urban intellectuals. Fourth, the prevalence of Cultural Revolution in China provided ideological justification as well as a blueprint for starting a Maoist rebellion in Kolkata. The translation of Mao’s ideas to suit the conditions in India was made by Mazumdar, which quickly found a receptive audience among the college students and other dedicated members of the CPI-M. Finally, the birth of the Naxalite movement in Kolkata coincided with the formation of the first leftist government in Bengal. The CPI-M, being part of the government, was unsure about moving against its ideological brethren. This initial hesitancy, which included sparingly using the police force against the insurgents, added to the power of the group.60 The death of a movement is impossible to predict, especially when the root causes of its birth remain unaddressed.61

Life and death of dissident groups Most terrorist organizations – similar to small businesses – die on the vine. According to one study conducted in the early 1990s, 90 percent of these organizations ceased their operation or were totally defeated within the first year of the conflict.62 Of the remainder, only a few survive for decades. In the previous chapter, I discussed the birth of a movement by tracing the path of the ideas that helped create an organization. This chapter aims at analyzing reasons for a group’s ability to grow and remain relevant for a long period of time. For

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that, I will continue with my discussion of the IRA, Islamic militancy, and the Naxalite movement. First, it seems reasonable to argue that a group that enjoys a wide base of popular support for its ideological goals has a much better chance of survival than those that are relatively insulated from the general public. How does a newly formed group develop a mass base of support? History shows that for some groups, the prevailing political condition provides a ready platform from which to launch their actions. The colonies of the European powers were prime examples of this. It is no surprise that a vast population, being ruled by a small number of ethnically, linguistically, culturally, and even religiously different people from a distant land, would provide a fertile ground for groups intent on gaining sovereignty through violent actions. However, the notion of a single nation and nationalism does not appear automatically even under these ideal circumstances. It evolves slowly through the work of political entrepreneurs as well as leaders in the field of art and literature to portray the unifying image of a single community spanning a geographic space. However, when the concept of nationalism sweeps across the land with the interlopers clearly identified, a group is likely to find widespread support for its activities. Many of the successful groups do not arrive on the scene as political organizations. They first appear as charitable association of dedicated volunteers intent on providing much-needed public services that the government is unable or unwilling to offer. The involvement in providing public goods accords these groups with much-needed political legitimacy and public acceptance. Another way a group can ensure its survival is by tying it ideologically to a prevailing global movement. This area of a group’s evolution has not been sufficiently explored in the scholarly literature. For instance, by hitching itself to a larger ideology, a group can suddenly re-energize itself to carry out a local fight. Thus, the Abu Sayyaf group in the Philippines was essentially made up of loosely organized Muslim gangs of bandits entrenched in the jungles of the isolated southern islands of Basilian and Jolo. The history of this conflict goes back to 1566, when Spanish forces descended on these islands with a long memory of fighting Muslims in their own country. When they encountered the local Muslim population, they were bent on continuing their European war with equal ferocity.63 The resulting cruelty and violence left an indelible mark on the archipelagos when it was passed on to the Christian Filipinos. The ethno-religious tension mounted in the 1970s when the government sponsored Christian migration into these islands. The Cold War and the newly acquired oil wealth by Muslim nations such as Libya and Saudi Arabia forced Ferdinand Marcos to negotiate a truce with the then newly formed Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) in 1976. As Rogers reports, the truce only made the situation worse, as the national government’s attention shifted away from the southern provinces, creating a power vacuum, which was quickly filled by various local warlords.64 The rebel group took on more of a religious character when, in 1978, a cleric named Hashim Salamat formed the Moro Islamic

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Liberation Front (MILF). The group, still composed of a local rag-tag bunch of brigands, took a step toward global prominence in 1990 when a MILF militant Abdurajak Janjalani established contact with Osama bin Laden’s brother-in-law, Muhammad al-Khalifa. Their meeting led to the formation of yet another Jihadi organization, the Abu Sayyaf group. Rogers points out: The new group proclaimed a radical Islamic ideology and gained early notoriety with grenade attacks on Christian targets. Before long, however, it had diverted its energies to ransom-driven kidnapping. Soon, members of the criminal underground had emerged in key leadership positions, and the group’s Islamic identity was subordinated to the quest for profit. After Janjalani’s death the Abu Sayyaf deteriorated into a loose federation of bandit chiefs bound mainly by convenience.65 Maintaining ideological reputation within its political base is a very important factor behind a group’s longevity.66 Realizing its true nature, al-Qaeda disavowed its link with the Abu Sayyaf organization.67 Jessica Stern argues that a successful group must be protean in its ideology and be able to change with altered political realities.68 This adaptability, according to Stern, allowed the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) to have a longer life than expected. After the demise of the Soviet Union a number of former Soviet high-level officials took over the reins of power in the central Asian republics. Among them, the regime of Islam Karimov was one of the most corrupt and repressive. The IMU was originally established as an opposition to Karimov. However, it allied itself with Mullah Omar and the Taliban in Afghanistan, which increased its power and position. Running a charitable organization, much less a rebel force, requires monetary resources. Groups that do not have a well-thought-out plan for raising money will inevitably be wiped out.69 The groups that begin by offering services are usually supported externally. For radical Islamic groups support came from the oil-rich Arab nations and Iran. The formal creation of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in 1965 accorded huge economic power to the cartel. By holding tough on the prices of its product, the cartel was instrumental in making its members hugely rich. Although its unity and politics will have always been open to question, there is no doubt about the fact that the 1973 oil embargo and the resulting price hike added to the vast coffers of OPEC member nations. The second significant event took place in 1979 when the ousting of the Shah of Iran created a global shortage of petroleum products. As the Saudis boosted their oil production to make up for the temporary loss of Iranian oil, the sky-high prices – still the highest in inflationadjusted dollars – significantly enhanced their economic might. Having the world’s largest reserves of crude oil, Saudi Arabia, which accounts for over a third of the total OPEC production, was flush with money.

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With their newfound wealth, both Saudi Arabia and Iran pursued their own politics, which were inextricably intertwined with their goals of establishing religious hegemony. It is not only that the governments of the oil-rich Islamic nations sponsored groups of their own liking, but huge sums of money began flowing through various charitable organizations. Napoleoni points out: In Saudi Arabia, for example, there is no tax system or internal revenue service, consequently no one is able to audit the accounts and keep track of monetary inflows and outflows. Although companies regularly pay zakat,70 the donation is not an official tax, but a voluntary payment for which no records are required. The structure of Islamic banking system is of no help either. Most transactions are in cash … Although oil has brought immense wealth to countries like Saudi Arabia, the kingdom is still a tribal society, with a strong cash culture.71 Islamic banks also apply zakat to every transaction or contract.72 They deduct the equivalent of 2 percent of personal wealth and transfer them to charitable organizations. With the 6,000-member Saudi royal family alone, it was estimated that the yearly zakat was around $12 billion in 2002.73 Financial power of such magnitude played a crucial role in spreading radical Islam in many parts of the world. Islam being an aggressively proselytizing religion, and by trying to spread the Koran to non-believers being part of every Muslim’s religious duty, supporting these radical groups posed little moral dilemma in the Arab world. In many countries around the world – wherever there were sizeable Muslim populations – money flowed in. As the first visible sign, the local mosques might be repainted and/or rebuilt or new mosques would be constructed. Soon these mosques would be staffed by preachers with the strictest interpretation of the Koran along Wahhabi lines. Many of these firebrand preachers, particularly in the poorer countries, would find sympathetic audiences. The religious schools – the madrassas – funded by the Arab/Muslim nations, attracted large numbers of children from poor families. In these madrassas the children are taught to read and write and, most importantly, are given food. Both of these are attractive to parents desiring to help their children escape the vicious cycle of poverty. Unfortunately, the curriculum in these madrassas had little relevance to worldly scholarship. They seldom taught students math or science. Neither did they provide any training for a job of any kind. The outcome of this religious indoctrination – often involving long hours of rote learning of verses in an unfamiliar language with biased interpretation by the teachers – was the radicalization of disaffected young men and women into political Islam, which help spread the influence of the Jihadi groups such as al-Qaeda and others fighting in many parts of the world.74 Compared with the Arab nations, Iranian support was much more specific during this period. They provided funds and arranged training for Hezbullah in Lebanon.

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And, despite Hamas being a Sunni group, the Iranians helped them with training in explosives and provided other material support. Apart from help in developing their ideology, the longevity of many dissident groups was helped by a number of external factors, which included the counter-terrorism policies of government.

Summary The narratives of the evolution of groups that have experienced rapid growth show a similar pattern. All of these successful groups are formed around a set of longstanding historical grievances. In all cases there is a sense of overall failure of the existing government and the prevailing socio-economic system to redress these grievances. The history of a long-surviving movement or a group is punctuated by the rise of charismatic leaders who give a political shape to the grievances by putting them in a larger theoretical context of religious vision, nationalism, or class struggle. The leaders’ explanations not only contain a conceptual explanation of the prevailing conditions, they also identify in the clearest of terms the enemies of the putative community. Since the socio-political and security conditions within which a dissident group operates change with time, the political entrepreneurs need to be adaptable in their strategic use of theory as well as tactics. Since the strength of a group is directly linked to the support of the base, many successful groups in history start out as charitable organizations working to make available the basic needs of life that the government is unable or unwilling to provide. Once established, a group requires ways to communicate with the masses. Those with a ready supply network, either through mosques or other means of communication, can experience a rapid growth. However, the biggest help in promoting a radical group comes directly from the target government. When the authorities engage in activities that are seen as grossly unjust, disproportionate, or immoral, they only provoke further violence by the groups. These are the trigger events in history or acts of political provocation that only help propel a group to a higher level of visibility and acceptance by its support base. Finally, waging war against an organized government requires a lot of resources. A group gets a huge boost when it can develop a steady source of money and weapons. This support can come through a number of legal and illegal means, including support from another government.

Notes 1 2 3 4 5

McChrystal (2015: vii). Fanusie and Entz (2017). Hussain (2019). Feeney (2003); Silke (2005: 242). Richard English (2003: 81–186), however, somewhat disputes this accepted version of history and finds seeds of discontent beginning in the early 1960s that would later explode in open violence claiming many lives. 6 Silke (2005: 242–243).

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7 Ibid. 8 Lee (1989: 429). 9 It is interesting to note that the history of military intervention to secure peace has resulted in similar outcomes in many parts of the world. The Indian Peacekeeping Forces were sent to Sri Lanka in 1987 to protect the beleaguered Tamil minority population in the north of the island. Soon, the Indian troops began fighting with the Tamils and, ultimately, in retaliation, in 1991 Indian Prime Minister (then out of office) Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated by a LTTE suicide attacker. Although troops are often sent on “peacekeeping missions,” their deployment is often the outcome of a larger geopolitical game played by the rulers of the nation. See Hagerty (1991). For the result of the Indian intervention, see Narayan Swami (1994). 10 Lee (1989: 433). 11 Lee’s data show a minuscule 0.27 percent of the ransacked homes had any kind of weapon. 12 Silke (2005: 244). 13 Rose (1990). 14 Fisk (1975). 15 O’Leary (2007: 216). 16 For an excellent discussion of the strategies of self-immolation, see Biggs (2005). 17 Kosnik (2000). 18 See Stohl (1987); Enders et al. (1990); Hoffman (1998); Enders and Sandler (1993). See also Silke (2005). 19 Coogan (2002); Moloney (2002). 20 O’Leary (2007: 201). 21 See Horgan and Taylor (2003). 22 Holland (1989). 23 Silke (1999). 24 O’Leary (2007: 203). 25 For instance, recognizing that the former IRA prisoners carried the risk of being easily marked by police or that their loyalty might have been compromised while in prison, they were given jobs in the vigilante units. See Horgan (2005a). 26 For a discussion of the Orange Men’s claims of cultural tradition to carry out these marches, see Dingley (2002). 27 English (2003: 83). 28 Ibid.: 84–85. 29 The Wolfe Tone Societies were formed to commemorate the bicentenary of the birth of Theobald Wolfe Tone (1763–1798). Wolfe Tone was a leading figure as well as a primary theoretician in the Irish uprising. He is commonly viewed as the father of Irish republicanism. 30 Gallagher (1928: 35–36). 31 Brennan (1980: 81). 32 Silke (2005: 244). 33 Bishop and Mallie (1987). 34 I have argued (Gupta, 2001a: 184–197) that one of the reasons the revolt of the African Americans in the 1960s and early 1970s was effectively quelled by the American authorities was due to the fact that following the recommendations of the Kerner Commission in 1968, the local police forces were quickly integrated. Having African Americans in police departments meant that they did not appear to be an invading force within the community. In Northern Ireland, however, one of the reasons the RUC was not integrated was because of the opposition of the IRA and the Catholic community. 35 Cowell (2018). 36 It is indeed interesting to compare the two wars. For an excellent history of the Spanish Civil War, see Beevor (2006).

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37 Hagghammer (2020) 38 Much of the religious justification of violence against nonbelievers (Dar ul Kufr) by the promoters of Jihad is based on the Koranic “sword verses.” For instance, the Koran (9:5) says that “When the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them, and confine them, and lie in wait for them at every place.” However, opponents point out that these verses are said in the context of a desperate defensive war that the forces of Prophet Muhammad were waging at the time. According to this view, in the context of today’s world, such a call for violent Jihad is inappropriate. 39 Burke (2003). 40 Associated with this debate was the question of whether to use the funds raised for the Jihadi operation against the Egyptian government. See Gunaratna (2002). 41 Once again, it is impossible not to compare the assassination of Azzam to that of Leon Trotsky. Although there is no hard proof that those favoring Zawahiri carried out the killing, if it is true, it was similar to Stalin’s ordering the death of his political and ideological rival. 42 Sageman (2004: 41). 43 For an excellent discussion of the creation of Iraq, see Tripp (2002). 44 Sageman (2004: 23–24). 45 The border region between Tibet and British India was never marked with any kind of precision. Through the snow-covered mountain peaks and valleys, the British Survey of India mapped the boundaries and put up the border markers along what is known as the McMahon line. However, much of the remote and sparsely populated border region fell outside the administrative areas of independent India. The British had claimed that the border drawn up during a joint conference in 1914 was agreed upon by both the Tibetans and the British government. However, Tibet being a vassal state to the Qing Dynasty in China refused to accept the McMahon line. After China annexed Tibet the issue became parmount in the mutual relationship between the two Asian giants. For a discussion of the political significance of the border to the two nations, see Guang (2005). 46 See Franda (1971: 19). See also Ray (2002: 125). 47 Pavier (1981). 48 In the middle of the decade, the former Indian Ambassador Chester Bowles (1969: 83), in an act of unique prescience, warned: Landless labourers may accept their wages of two or three rupees a day as long as they know that everyone in their village is poor. However, when they see the landowners’ incomes rising rapidly, while their own rising much more slowly, if at all, they become restless and resentful. In other words, the dramatic increases in food output which are occurring – and which should continue to grow in the years ahead – may lead to sharp disparities in income, which in turn, may create an expanding sense of economic and social injustice. 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58

Banerjee (1980: 1). For a reproduction of these essays, see Singh (2006). Trotsky (1959). Swarup (1966). Mukherjee (1979). It should be mentioned that although the Indian National Congress Party enjoyed a monopoly of power in Indian politics, as Lijphart (1996) points out, its policies reflected a diverse coalition of interests. See Mehra (2000). Roy (1975). Piazza (2012) Piazza (2012).

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59 Gordon (1990). 60 Gupta (2004). 61 www.indiaspend.com/53-maoist-attacks-107-dead-in-2019-yet-numbers-lower-thanduring-upa/. 62 Rapoport (1992). 63 Rogers (2006). 64 Ibid. 65 Rogers (2003: 17). 66 Hausken et al. (2015). 67 Sageman (2004: 151). 68 Stern (2003a). 69 See Adams (1986); Anderson (1994). 70 Zakat is the charitable contribution that each Muslim must contribute for the betterment of the poor or for the spreading of Islam. It is one of the five pillars of Islam. 71 Napoleoni (2003: 123). 72 Ibid.: 120. 73 Pallister and Bowcott (2002). 74 Swami (2007).

8 A MARRIAGE MADE IN HELL? Terrorism and organized crime

The nefarious nuptial In the duality of our motivation, which sets up a tug-of-war between altruism and selfishness, it is hard to underestimate the allure of money, power, and personal enrichment. History is unequivocal in showing us that, at least among the leaders, the commitment to bring about a collective wellbeing for an entire community – whether the goal is religious, political, or economic – almost always gets sacrificed at the altar of self-interest. Lord Acton, is famous for his assertion, “power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Yet, most forget his much instructive second line: “Great men are almost always bad men.” In other words, even the most highminded, when given position of absolute authority, falls into the temptation of personal aggrandizing, where revolutionaries turn into rogues, saints into sinners, ideological warriors into thugs. While pages of history are littered with tales of deviation from the path of righteousness, the story Constantine’s Donation stands out as one of the most glaring. The legend of this historic gift began to circulate in the medieval Europe around the middle of the eighth century; on March 315, the Roman emperor had signed an official decree granting Pope Sylvester I, and all the subsequent popes in perpetuity, control of the western part of the Empire.1 The Dogma of the Holy See’s infallibility along with the authority of the revered emperor, this document became the most potent weapon of power for the popes. Whenever it suited a pope’s purpose, he would wave this document to extract acquiescence from the most obdurate of the medieval potentates. The most vociferous of the popes was Leo IX (served 1049–1054), who, by the authority of this document claimed his right on all matters of states, temporal and civil. The document was proven to be a forgery in the fifteenth century,

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but it still retained its aura for more than a hundred years, until it became a focal point of Martin Luther’s reformation. Despite having crooked leaders at the helm of the Catholic Church, plenty of self-sacrificing men and women filled the priestly ranks and the laity. They obeyed the church laws as they understood, suffered poverty and deprivation, endured torture for their beliefs, and even willingly gave up their lives for their faith. The both sides lived side by side. If greed can overcome grace to a religious movement, born with the chronicles of unspeakable suffering and persecution, it should be of little surprise to learn that terrorist organizations would often become indistinguishable from criminal syndicates. Despite widespread recognition of the problem criminality mixing freely with zeal of the true believers, the transformation of a dissident group is the hardest one to conceptualize.

The shape of confusion There are several reasons for conflating terrorism with activities of criminal syndicates. First, any dissident political movement, by definition, does not operate within the laws of established societies; their very existence is extra-legal. Therefore, every state authority attempts to classify these groups as criminal. Second, since it is impossible to know anyone’s true motivation, we cannot be certain if the actions are being taken in the interest of the group’s political community or for personal enrichment of its members. Therefore, the question of a politically inspired rebel group morphing into a criminal gang often remains beyond definitive proof. Third, large terrorist organizations, such as al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, or ISIS are far flung. Through their furtive ways, the leadership of these organizations are unable exert total control over all their members and the various factions that organically grow in a climate of fear and apprehension. As a result, there is always the possibility of some individual members or factions would go rogue even in a most ideologically structured movement. Fourth, the definition of criminality often depends on the acceptance of a group’s ideological base. For instance, the freedom fighters in Bengal, during British colonial rule, would regularly turn to bank robbery to sustain their efforts. Since the banks were seen as the agents of an occupying British colonial power, the heroic tales of the robbers became fodder for much adulation and one of the central themes of the itinerant village minstrels. On the other hand, in a sovereign nation, a group’s constituents might view robbing banks in a different way. Therefore, while one kind of activity would be greeted as revolutionary, others would be shunned. For an outside analyst, especially conducting aggregate analyses, the problem of knowing (and quantifying) each community’s sensitivity would pose an insurmountable problem. It makes ready sense, therefore, when the two secretive organizations, terrorist groups and organized crime, are seen as the conjoint twins of our modern-day scourge.2 In fact, a quick search of “terrorism” and “organized crime” in newspaper databases would convince anyone of the close link between the two. A Google

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search using the two terms (“terrorism” and “organized crime”) shows millions of entries. Yet the distinction is important. As threats posed by new developments in terrorism have grown in recent years, many intelligence and national security agencies became concerned about the prospect of a convergence of terrorism and organized crime. Such concerns found their expression in 2001, merely two weeks after the attacks of 9/11, when the Security Council of the United Nations adopted a resolution noting “with concern the close connection between international terrorism and transnational organized crime, illicit drugs, money-laundering, illegal arms trafficking, and illegal movement of nuclear, chemical, biological and other potentially deadly materials.”3 A US News and World Report story states that the Drug Enforcement Agency (US DEA) claims that nearly half of the 41 groups on the US government’s list of terrorist organizations are tied to drug trafficking.4 Although there is speculation aplenty regarding the nefarious nuptial, several painstaking studies paint quite a complex connection between the two.5

Separating terrorism from organized crime At first blush, terrorism and organized crime seem to be cut from the same cloth. Both operate outside the legal framework of society, both are secretive, and both use violence to intimidate others. Therefore, if we need to make a distinction between the two, it will not be on the basis of their acts but their motivations. Hoffman, thus, correctly argues: the terrorist is fundamentally an altruist: he believes he is serving a “good” cause designed to achieve a greater good for a wider constituency … The criminal, by comparison, serves no cause at all, just his own personal aggrandizement and material satiation.6 The salience of Hoffman’s argument is evident when we place the US State Department’s definition of terrorism side by side with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) definition of organized crime. The US State Department defines terrorism as: “politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by sub-national groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience”.7 In contrast, the FBI succinctly defines organized crime as “continuing and self-perpetuating criminal conspiracy, having an organized structure, fed by fear and corruption, and motivated by greed”.8 Given an apparent fundamental difference in motivation between altruism and greed, Jamieson notes that: Organized crime and terrorism are correctly viewed as quite distinct phenomena. Essentially, the terrorist is a revolutionary, with clear political objectives involving the overthrow of a government or status quo, and a set of articulated strategies to achieve them. Organized crime actors are

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inherently conservative: they tend to resist political upheaval and seek conditions of order and stability, those more conducive to their business activities.9 From a behavioral standpoint, a terrorist group attempts to achieve public goods, the benefits of which must be shared with the entire community that the group claims to represent irrespective of an individual’s participation in the endeavor to procure it. In contrast, a criminal gang does not operate out of any apparent “higher calling.” Their predominant motivation is the provision of private and/ or quasi-public “club” goods,10 which are shared only among the immediate members of that group.11 The importance of this fundamental distinction between the two becomes even clearer when we consider their respective strategies of action. A terrorist group undertakes violent activities to communicate with its base, its adversaries, and ultimately, its “client sponsors.”12 As a result, many of these acts mix violence with drama. Through “propaganda by deed,” politically motivated dissident groups claim responsibility for activities that are designed to shock a community and thereby gain political prominence. Since an effective terrorist group must retain support from its political base, it has to be ever mindful of the potential damage from being too closely associated with a criminal organization or being perceived as becoming one. In contrast, a criminal organization is necessarily secretive and will typically aspire to function completely under the radar of the state apparatus; to gain public attention is not part of its operational goals. As a result, while a terrorist group would normally strive to upset the political status quo, inviting anarchy and chaos in the process, a sophisticated organized crime group would only want to work within the political system through bribery, with violence directed selectively against certain segments of the society. Therefore, criminal organizations, like any other commercial venture, are conservative and would want to preserve the status quo. The reason organized crime groups are loathe to be too closely associated with a politically minded dissident group is, as Dishman notes, “not because of higher moral values – but because it [is] bad for business.”13 In sum, from their very nature, each group develops strategic reasons not to cooperate with the other in a prolonged manner and maintain a strict separation between them.

Defining separation Based on memoires and internal communications, Shapiro and Siegel demonstrate the difficulties of maintaining ideological cohesion as a group recruits more members with questionable commitments to the group’s ideology. They observe: “Substantial evidence indicates that members of terrorist groups are not uniformly motivated by the cause, are not equally willing to sacrifice for the cause.”14

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In order to understand the essence of their relationship it is important to distinguish between collaboration and transformation: 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

A terrorist group collaborates episodically with organized crime groups in order to purchase or transport weapons (including weapons of mass destruction) and/or other resources (e.g., false passports and other documentation) as well as operatives. A terrorist group collaborates on a sustained basis with an organized crime group in order to engage in criminal activities to raise money to carry out its political agenda. A terrorist group develops “in-house capabilities” to engage in non-political criminal activities, such as bank robbery, gun running, human trafficking, drug dealing, money laundering, for the purpose of sustaining its political goals. They continue to have a political wing that pursues ideological goals of the organization, while keeping another branch for the illicit activities. An ideological group splinters from the main body into branches, with pure criminal intent of personal enrichment of the leaders and their immediate followers. And finally, a political group keeps only its name and becomes a purely a criminal gang. At this point, the political base and the outside observers become fully aware of the complete metamorphosis.

Revealed preference: finding empirical solutions The confusion about a strict conceptual separation between acts of altruism and those of crime, however, is not unique to terrorism studies. Economists faced a similar problem. The discipline is firmly based on the theory that rational consumers maximize their utility by choosing the best basket of products that fits their budget. Suppose you are shopping at a grocery store with $100 in your pocket. If you had a meter to measure the utility each item that you wanted to purchase, it would be relatively easy. You would buy a mix of products and then add up the utility and, bingo! You pick the basket that gives you the most bang for your buck. The question, of course is: do you know exactly what “utility” you are getting from each basket? In a seminal article, Paul Samuelson addressed this problem by introducing the term, “revealed preference.”15 He argued that that while it is impossible to know the exact amount of utility we derive from a product’s consumption, we reveal it by allocating money among various items we purchase. Hence, if I spend 15 percent of my grocery money on beer, the ratio reveals my preference for the beverage. We can draw the logic of revealed preference to explain the criminality of a political group. Surely, it is impossible to know the ideological orientation of an organization. However, it would reveal its preference by engaging in activities that are

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generally associated with criminal syndicates as opposed to acts of political dissidence. Although we don’t have data on criminal behaviour, we have information on the various types of attacks that a terrorist group stages. Since suicide attacks are the clearest demonstration of self-sacrifice, the groups that are able to inspire their followers to strap on bomb-laden vests and pull the chord or fly an airplane into a building, are obviously more ideological than those that rely of hostage taking for ransom. Based on this simple logic, in Chapter 5 I constructed a continuum along which I would place various terrorist groups at a particular moment in time. However, this is a static representation of reality; the story of political rebellion is played out in a dynamic setting over time with deep interactions various internal and external forces. In order to understand the process, we need to examine more deeply the reasons for a terrorist organization to engage in criminal activities. Fortunately, of late, a much wider effort covering several academic disciplines has provided ways of testing several important hypotheses in this regard.

Reputation, necessity, and opportunity: a balancing act There is no disagreement about the fact that to an organization, money is the lifeblood. For a clandestine group, necessity to survive is at the heart of criminality, facilitated by opportunity, checked by the need to maintain the reputation of a true self-sacrificing revolutionary. As the milieu within which groups operate alters, opportunities wax and wane, leadership undergoes changes, and the process of adaptation requires each group determine its orientation. Let us examine these factors more carefully.

Reputation Experts agree that the conceptual distinction between a terrorist and a common criminal lies on the source of their primary motivation. Terrorists think of themselves as altruists, looking after the interest of the entire community, whereas criminals would rarely describe themselves as such and would accept the fact that their selfish interests were at the root of their actions. The large murals in the IRA controlled areas in Belfast that greet the passer-by are of those who gave their lives for the Republican cause. Nobody in the community would think of them as criminals. It would be true all over the world, where people are locked in a struggle in defence of their identity. It begs the obvious to state that we all operate from mixed motives and can often be clueless about our own motivation. I have argued that we can construct three kinds of “ideal types” for those who join dissident groups. They are the true believers, the mercenaries, and the captive participants. The principal source of incentive for the true believers is their ideological commitment to the cause. For the mercenaries, it is the prospect of money, power, reputation, sex,

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etc. And, the captive participants are forced to join the group; for them, the costs of refusal are much greater than their benefit of remaining neutral. All terrorist organizations are populated by the three kinds of participants. They need the help of the mercenaries to fill their coffers with money from criminal activities. The trick for the leaders is to maintain an optimal mix. The risk for a group to have too many mercenaries is its loss of reputation, as it can come to be recognized as a criminal enterprise.16 Within the game theoretic structure, it is akin to a “bar problem.” Suppose you are in a new town and are looking for a bar to have a drink. If you are looking for fun, you may skip a bar that looks empty and choose one that is full of people. However, after a certain point, when the crush of customers reaches a certain threshold of discomfort, you might start looking for a more accommodating one. For a terrorist organization, the logic holds. As more mercenaries join a group to make it financially strong, it starts losing its ideological reputation. Thus, the challenge for the leadership is to find an optimal point between true believers and mercenaries.17

Necessity “Necessity is the mother of invention,” as the adage goes; for a dissident group, it is the source of their criminal involvement. If the organization is assured of a continuous and reliable largess, the urge to find alternate sources of funding is tempered. Such support can allow a group to maintain its ideological purity. Lashkar-e-Taiba was established by the arms of Pakistani military establishment to carry out their proxy war within India, in the name of the Muslims in Kashmir.18 It also received generous funding from Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries.19 With the money, the group was able to develop a very strong following is Pakistan, especially as it carried out humanitarian relief efforts after natural disasters.20 In the absence of government services, it provided rudimentary public goods, such as primary education and health care. As a result, as far as I can assess, there is hardly any record of it or its leadership engaging in drug or human trafficking to raise money. Similarly, during the early days of al-Qaeda, being blessed by donations from wealthy benefactors in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries and his own personal fortune, bin Laden took extraordinary steps to ensure a reputation that was beyond reproach.21 In the midst of death, destruction, and moral decay, the al-Qaeda propaganda clips projected the image of an ascetic revolutionary, totally dedicated to the cause of bringing about a global Jihad against a common enemy, eschewing all the comforts of life befitting the scion of one of the richest men in the world. These reputation-enhancing images, along with the narrative, went a long way to establish al-Qaeda at the forefront of the fundamentalist Islamic rebellion. However, the experience of Lashkar-e-Taiba and al-Qaeda does not tell a story that is universal. Shaw, in a well-reasoned publication, combines the arguments of those who emphasize necessity with those who stress opportunity.22 He points to several reasons for collaboration with or transformation into a criminal group.

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These include the need to hedge against ups and downs of funding from benefactors due to change of leadership, altered socio-political and economic conditions, decentralization and fractionalization of the movement, and availability of easy money. The Iranian government helped create Hezbollah during the early 1980s as a fighting force for the Shia in the Lebanese Civil War. Since then its support from their state sponsor has gone through booms and busts, closely reflecting its own financial fortune.23 In the last decade of the past millennia, the group received around about $100 million.24 By 2006, flushed with money from high oil prices, Iran boosted its contribution to $300 million. However, being alarmed by Iran’s growing nuclear ambitions, the US and its allies imposed economic sanctions on the Ahmadinejad regime. A UN Security Council resolution in 2009 significantly reduced its ability to raise money in the oil market. Consequently, its support for their proxies in Lebanon went down by 40 percent. Soon, a rising tide of anti-establishment violence caused by the socalled Arab Spring reached the borders of Syria and threatened its minority Shiite dominated government. The tension caused Iran to increase its support for Hezbollah in 2012, which was cut again two years later. However, the signed Iran nuclear deal flooded the Iranian regime with fresh money, which they quickly invested in the radical group; the level of funding was restored in 2016 to the tune of about $300 million. The volatility of funding exposed the Hezbollah leadership to the need to seek financial independence from their benefactor regime. While there were reports of the group undertaking criminal activities during its early years of operation,25 researchers found evidence of Hezbollah intensifying its criminal activities and fostering a network among known crime syndicates.26 Shaw saw this as a clear sign for the organization to seek ways to avoid the vagaries of external support.27 The necessity to raise ill-gotten money increases when the main group is fractured. New groups may not comport with the political, ideological, or military goals of the old benefactors, causing them to seek funding on their own. Also, some groups may actually join the democratic system and become part of a nation’s political life.28 As a result, the breakaway groups are often left in the lurch and are forced to fend for themselves to raise money. The only option that is open to them is to look for criminal activities that can spoil the reputation of a revolutionary group.

Opportunity The most important opportunity to engage in criminal activities happens when the rule of law that binds a civil society together falls apart. This is when a society becomes fragile and veers toward what is known as state failure. In a power vacuum, there is a free-for-all, blurring the lines between legal and illegal.

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Al-Qaeda might have started out flush with donations from wealthy men from Saudi Arabia and other Gulf nations, but its fortune changed after the US invaded Afghanistan, drove out the Taliban, and tightened the screws on Pakistan to stem the flow of money going the group. With bombs raining down on the al-Qaeda strongholds, the Afghan government imposed by the Bush administration was unable to extend its authority beyond the city limits of Kabul and Kandahar, and the country rapidly became a free-for-all, lawless failed state. At this point, Dean writes, Al-Qaeda Central … was hemmed into a corner of Pakistan and running out of money. Friends who had stayed with the group after 9/11 told me stories about selling weapons for food and fuel. Soon the tail was wagging the dog; the smell of money began wafting from Iraq.29 The beleaguered group started attracting hardened criminals, such as Abu Harfs alBaluchi. Jailed in an overcrowded Saudi prison, he became radicalized. As soon as he was released, he found his way to his home province of Baluchistan, in Pakistan, where he started a wide-ranging smuggling operation, sharing his profits with alQaeda. Soon, others like him were financing the Islamic group through criminal activities, little to do with the religious goals of the organization. There are many other external elements that facilitate groups to get mired in criminality. Mincheva and Gurr identified a number of such factors.30 Many of these relate to the existence of porous international borders that exist in all parts of the world, from Latin America to Asia and Africa, especially if these border zones are located where an armed conflict if going on.31 Luckily, for al-Qaeda Central, the Taliban, and their numerous factions, being located on the international borders of Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iran opened up the doors for easy money. Afghanistan became by far the largest producer of opium, Pakistan, one the largest conduits of processing and transportation, and many smaller Jihadi groups became criminal gangs.

Follow the money A number of investigative journalists and academic scholars have shown that in order to sustain itself, every terrorist organization must develop a side line of both legal and illegal activities to raise money.32 An effective terrorist group, not unlike a business, must have division of labor and specialization of function or task. Within its structure, even the most ideological group must include members whose primary function is to raise money.33 There are several avenues for raising money. For some political groups, the primary source of funding is through voluntary contributions by their political base, wealthy benefactors, or interested foreign governments. They also raise funds through coercive means of extraction from businesses or the general population, money laundering, arms and human smuggling, and sales of narcotics (or at least

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extortion of drug dealers if investment in narcotics is unviable when weighed against the potential political fallout from doing so), and through various financial scams. With each of these methods of raising money comes a price tag to a terrorist group’s reputation and political legitimacy among its constituents. A number of Islamic charitable organizations, such as the Benevolence International Foundation (BIF), the Holy Land Foundation (HLF), and the alHaramain Islamic Foundation (AIF), were raising money in the US for years and were accused of diverting at least part of it to fund various groups, including Hamas, Hezbullah, and al-Qaeda.34 They escaped government detection, particularly until the 9/11 attacks.35 The BIF was founded in 1992 as a non-profit organization in Illinois and was affiliated with a group of wealthy donors, particularly from the Persian Gulf countries, who financed the mujahedeen in Afghanistan fighting the Soviet military. During its trial, it was revealed that it had transferred over $300,000 to various Jihadi groups in Bosnia and Chechnya. The HLF was established in 1998, originally under a more provocative name, “Occupied Land Fund,” and immediately started sending money to Hamas. Over the years, it sent over $12 million dollars to the radical group. The AIF was founded in Saudi Arabia in 1992 and became one of the most important centers for the conduit of money for the Wahhabi charities and had an annual budget of $30– $80 million, with offices located in over 50 countries.36 Based on a priori arguments, we can conjecture that voluntary donations carry the least amount of cost from the perspective of the support base, since the money is collected without coercion and, in the case of the Islamic groups, as a part of religious duty. Since every terrorist group is inspired by the promises of procuring public goods, we can surmise that in order to maintain an image of “non-criminality” and ideological purity, a terrorist group would prefer to raise money through what is perceived to be a “legitimate” source.37 Thus, contributions by the diaspora in North America and elsewhere in the world for the Provisional IRA and the LTTE would fall into this category. The same is true with support received from foreign governments. These activities do not tarnish the image of a dissident group. Hezbollah receives contributions from its patron states, Iran and Syria, while various Kashmiri groups are reportedly assisted by the Pakistani intelligence agency, the ISI. Beside these voluntary methods, terrorist organizations get involved in every kind of illicit activity, including drug trafficking, gun running, people smuggling, and identity theft, along with demands of protection money from businesses and property owners. It is often the case that until the target states wake up to the dangers of being associated with such financial flows, the fund-raising activities of these groups are left alone. After the 9/11 attacks, however, the attitude of many governments underwent a radical transformation. The publication of the US State Department’s expanded list of terrorist organizations made it more difficult for many of these groups, even those engaged in nationalist causes and not targeting the US, to openly collect contributions.

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However, costs to a group start to rise as fundraising activity becomes coercive. Along with the possibilities of retribution from the authorities, such activities can quickly generate resentment and loss of popular support among the client base of a dissident organization. In Chapter 5, I arranged terrorist groups across a continuum of “highly ideological” and “close to criminal behavior” in three broad clusters – ideological, professional, and anomic terrorists – according to their revealed preference for choice of activities. My empirical results suggest that among the groups in this study, al-Qaeda, Hamas, and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad fall into the category of “highly ideological.” This is because many of their characteristic tactics involve suicide attacks, requiring the ultimate sacrifice from their members. The second category of groups includes the Provisional IRA and Basque ETA. The groups in this category combine ideological intensity with a great deal of circumspection for the personal safety of their operators. The third category (near criminal groups) comprises groups such as Abu Sayyaf of the Philippines, Colombian FARC, and Peruvian Sendero Luminoso, which are much more tilted to money-making criminal activities.38

TABLE 8.1 Terrorist organizations and methods of funding

Dissident group

Method of funding

Ideological al-Qaeda (original)

Bin Laden’s personal fortune and a variety of his investments and business partnerships throughout the years have contributed to the pool of al-Qaeda funds. Additionally, al- Qaeda receives funding from charities from all parts of the Arab/Muslim world Hamas Iran (state-sponsored); donations (especially through Islamic charities); remittances from Arab expatriates; commercial enterprises (sewing and weaving centers and cattle farms) Palestine Islamic Jihad Iran provides an estimated $2 million of state-sponsored funding annually Hezbollah Iran and Syria; world-wide fundraising operation Professional ETA Kidnapping, extortion, robbery IRA Extortion (from Northern Irish Catholics); bank robberies; donations from Catholic-Irish descendants outside of Ireland (substantial amounts come from the US) Anomic Abu Sayyaf Largely self-financed through ransom and extortion; suspected to receive support from Islamic extremists in the Middle East and South Asia FARC Cocaine trafficking and production; extortion; kidnapping; hijacking Sendero Luminoso Cocaine trafficking Source: Compiled from information presented in the MIPT Rand website: www.tkb.org/Home.jsp

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Although there is no accurate data on the relative importance of the various sources of funding for these groups, by considering the nature of finance sources (see Table 8.1), we can see that their revealed preference for raising money corresponds closely to my findings based on the groups’ activities. The groups that are more ideological get their funding in greater proportion from voluntary contributions or state patronage, while those that are more criminally inclined fund their activities through the narcotics trade, hostage taking, and racketeering. In light of the above discussion, I present three broad hypotheses regarding collaboration between terrorist groups and organized crime syndicates. First, fighting with an organized government is an expensive proposition. Yet to be seen as being intimately involved with known organized crime syndicates is harmful to the reputation of a political organization. Second, facing acing this dilemma most terrorist groups would rather develop “in-house” capabilities for raising money through various extra-legal ways than develop long-standing collaborative arrangements with criminal gangs.39 Third, if such a relationship is established, it will be episodic rather than sustained.

The interactive relationship My static model is based on the factors of behavioral motivation and relative costs, offers insight into the process by which a group chooses its optimal mix of terrorist and criminal activities. However, in reality groups evolve due to the interactive interactions of perceived benefits and costs, shaping their choice of optimal mix. In this section, I will examine the conditions under which groups are likely to alter their strategic behavior.

Shift in ideology A dissident group’s ideological orientation may change as a result of a change in the attitude of the leadership, the altered composition of its followers, or a weakening of its ideological position due to an altered sociopolitical condition. Let us examine these three conditions of change. When a group is strictly hierarchical, its leadership may decide to develop the group’s involvement involved in criminal activities to raise funds in the fight against the forces of an organized government. In such situations, the leadership must decide precisely to what extent (and in what ways) it ought to become involved in criminal activities. A variety of challenges await terrorist leaders when this pathway is taken. Through various incentive structures, including a sense of planning (however informal) around rewards, punishments and managed expectations, the leadership faces a constant challenge of keeping its rank and file focused on the central mission of the group.40 Given the omnipresent temptation of easy money, a dissident group is likely to drift into the gray area of ideological confusion when the leaders are

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themselves attracted by money and power and allow the organization to be much more closely aligned with criminal activities. The loss of ideological compulsion can also happen when there is the loss of a strong leader due to death or capture. Perhaps the case of Abu Sayyaf provides one of the clearest examples of this. In 1990, after decades long struggle, a young ideological radical named Abdurajak Janjalani and Osama bin Laden’s brother-in-law Mohammed al-Khalifa founded the Muslim separatist group. At first the ideological purity espoused by al-Khalifa and Janjalani led to the jihadi character of Abu Sayyaf and bin Laden rewarded them with a $3 million contribution.41 However, soon it became involved in kidnapping and ransom taking. As Rogers points out, “members of the criminal underground had emerged in key leadership positions, and the group’s Islamic identity was subordinated to the quest for profit.”42 After Janjalani’s death in 1998 the group transformed itself into a “loose federation of bandit chiefs bound mainly by convenience.”43 Sageman reports that as soon as Osama bin Laden came to know of the true nature of the erstwhile Islamic group, he cut ties with the group.44 In December 1998, Janjalani was killed in a police operation.45 His younger brother, Kaddafi Janjalani replaced him as the group’s leader. However, without his brother’s charisma and organizational skills, Abu Sayyaf fractured into three loosely organized factions, and essentially became criminal organizations, making money by kidnapping foreign tourists.46 Between 2000 and 2003, these groups made immense amounts of money from ransom payments.47 In 2000, Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi paid millions of dollars to release a group of the hostages, only to encourage these criminals to invest in high speed boats and sophisticated arms, further fuelling their appetite for drug trafficking and other illicit activities. In general, when terrorist organizations cease to have a clear political orientation and ideology, if the group retains its organizational structure, it usually drifts toward hooliganism or criminal activities.48 Thus the IRA vigilantism became more savage toward its own people after a ceasefire was called.49 The groups that are linked primarily through “inspiration” are formed along small bands of isolated cells. The development of a group based on cells can happen when a counter-terrorism campaign deprives the group leadership of maintaining a strict hierarchical structure. Fear of detection will heavily influence a group to choose between either a network of centralized cells or forming independent, isolated cells. The example of a network-based cell structure can be found in the Hamburg-based al-Qaeda operation that was central to the 9/11 attacks. In this case, the cell operated independently and depended upon the alQaeda core (Sura Majlish) to funnel money and other logistical support. In contrast, the attacks by the Madrid and the London cells that carried out the train bombings, having come after the beginning of an intense counter-terrorism campaign, had to rely more on its own wits, without any direct involvement by the al-Qaeda leadership. Additionally, the attempted bombing by the groups in Casablanca in 2003 was largely bungled because of lack of central coordination and training.

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There are some violent social movements that start not with any ideological aspiration, but because of competition over natural resources. For instance, many civil wars, especially in the West African countries, are fought with very little ideological inspiration. In these cases, as Collier and Heffler point out, greed wins over grievances and the distinction between a political organization and a criminal group is largely lost.50 Finally, a group can lose its ideological compass when the primary reason for its existence becomes obsolete, while it retains its organizational structure. Thus, the Provisional IRA, the longest running dissident movement in the world, may have come to a dead end for its ideological position long before developments in the current peace process. The politics of the two Irelands started taking their own course almost as soon as the political boundaries demarcating the two were drawn. After Sinn Fein joined the parliamentary politics in the North, its military wing started becoming less relevant from a purely ideological position. Yet its strict hierarchical structure, in order to maintain that position, began to become turned inward. The number of victims from the PIRA violence became predominantly Catholic, as a part of vigilantism51 and extensive criminal activities.52 The ideological situation has become increasingly difficult and complex in Northern Ireland, with the primary goal of uniting the entire island under one flag taking a backseat in the Republic of Ireland, due to its own economic prosperity and a clear ambivalence towards the Troubles. Furthermore, while Europe is thinking about a continental unity, irredentist movements proposed by the IRA and ETA53 may be seen as anachronistic by a significant majority of their own bases. In such a case, the possibility of these two organizations’ contact with criminal elements will only increase.

Changes in relative costs From my arguments, it is clear that cost considerations enter into the calculus of a dissident group in several forms. When a group engages in questionable activities, its leaders attempt to minimize the costs of alienating its base by justifying these actions. For instance, the Madrid cell that financed its operations through drug trafficking claimed that the illicit activity was “for Islam.”54 The second cost factor is a part of the explicit imposition of punitive measures imposed by the target authorities. When it comes to this aspect of the costs, we may consider two extreme cases: where the difference in costs of engaging in the two activities is severe, and where the cost differential is negligible. A society that imposes an extremely stiff price for engaging in terrorist activities may exhibit a situation similar to those prevailing in the totalitarian communist states, where political dissidence was nearly non-existent, while there was a flourishing underground economy. In contrast, a failed state with a very weak government will have little ability to differentiate between the two and/or impose punishment for violation of the rules. I argue that such a situation is currently prevailing in Afghanistan and Iraq. In such a situation, the distinction between the two groups will likely be blurred.

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Thus, a significant transformation in a terrorist group’s orientation can also take place when an existing cost differential between the two types of activities is altered. The relative costs of engaging in acts of terrorism versus criminal activities can increase or decrease. For instance, the relative cost of terrorism increases when the authorities develop “get tough” policies by enacting new laws or starting extensive police and military campaigns against dissident groups. In contrast, however, the cost differential decreases when the government is weakened and starts drifting toward a condition of being a failed state. In this weakened condition, the state loses its capability to impose stiff penalties for both terrorist and criminal activities. Dishman argues that as an ideological group gets decentralized, perhaps as a result of increasingly effective counter-terrorism activities, there will be an increasing chance of some cells developing connections with criminal groups.55 As discussed above, the unintended consequence of a successful operation can set in a process of decentralization, which can weaken the ideological strength of a dissident group and push them toward criminality. Finally, when the state loses its ability to impose sanctions we can see that the distinction between the several types of groups begins to fade. This is because, under a condition of anarchy, the costs of collaboration will go down for both groups. Since a crime group is interested in making money, if the price for doing business with a politically motivated group is no different than being engaged in other criminal activities, there will be no disincentive for the criminals to establish linkages with terrorist organizations. Although data on this are understandably sparse, we can conjecture that the current conditions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, etc. point to the fact that as the hold of the existing social organizations disappears, the moral and behavioral restrictions that build a wall of separation between terrorist groups and organized crime will also tend to disappear. The relationship between terrorism and organized crime is indeed complex. In order to develop a proper perspective on terrorism and organized crime, we must develop an analytical framework and not approach it from a prejudiced perception. Thus, Schmid clearly warns: terrorism – that peculiar mix of violence, politics, and propaganda – should not be confused with mainly profit-driven organized crime. The vague narco-terrorism formula with its implicit call to fuse the “war on drugs” and the “war on terror” might offer a misleading intellectual roadmap to address the problem of terrorism.56

Evidence from real life In 2002, a study commissioned by the United Nations Centre for International Crime Prevention (CICP) asked world governments to indicate whether there was evidence of collaboration between the two kinds of group.57 Results from 40 responding governments indicate that only 22 percent of the groups engaged

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in sustained levels of collaboration both internally and externally. Furthermore, 30 percent of the groups showed no link whatsoever (see Figure 8.1). Based on this evidence, the study noted that, The nature of the links between the two types of groups seemed to be primarily logistical and financial, denoting the presence of alliances of convenience. It tended to be operational, in those relatively rare instances where there were also some ideological and political links between the two groups.58 Other studies, including a report by the Manhattan Institute’s Center for Policing Terrorism, while discussing the connection between terrorism and organized crime, only mention terrorist organizations’ involvement in various illegal activities and not their establishing working relationship with crime syndicates.59 Given the cost of cooperation for both the groups, we can assume that a marriage between the two is highly unlikely. Thus, Dishman concludes that “little evidence suggests that Mafia groups and terrorists are interested in pursuing collaborative arrangements with each other to traffic contraband or commit other crimes.”60 Second, I hypothesize that a group’s choice of fundraising activities would reflect its ideological orientation and the sensibilities of its support base. Although information on the financing is meagre, particularly when it comes to a comparative analysis among various groups, the MIPT RAND database does provide the composition of financing. I have presented the information in Table 8.1, which shows that the percentage of money coming from charitable donation is higher for the highly ideological groups, such as the original al-Qaeda or Hamas. It is also an important source of financing for the IRA. However, the anomic groups, such as FARC in Colombia, Sendero Luminoso in Peru, and Abu Sayyaf in the Philippines, are dependent mostly on kidnapping and extortion. The choice of

FIGURE 8.1

Cooperation between terrorist and organized crime groups

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these methods of fund raising also reflects the cultural tradition within which a group is operating. Drugs are strictly forbidden in Islam and are particularly so in the brand of Islam that al-Qaeda promotes. Yet US drug-enforcement agencies continue to accuse the puritanical group of dealing in drugs.61 I have seen absolutely no credible evidence of al-Qaeda’s dependence on drug money during the early years of its operation. However, it will perhaps not be unreasonable to conjecture that as the group moved from Sudan to lawless Afghanistan, where the harvesting of poppies is widespread, its prohibition against accepting money from the production and sales of narcotics began to wane. This dependence may have increased reflected the post-9/11 realities, when the central command was restricted to the failed state of Afghanistan, and Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf nations were somewhat more vigilant in their efforts at stopping the money spigot from zakat donations. Third, the allure of easy money is tremendous. In order to maintain a group’s ideological purity, the leadership must be vigilant at all times to maintain its reputation. Allegations of less ideologically oriented recruits getting involved in criminal activities have come from many sources. Thus, writing on the situation of the Northern Ireland conflict, Ignatieff comments: “The IRA bears as much relation to the Mafia as it does to an insurrectionary cell or a radical political party and the motivations that draw young people into the movement are often as criminal as they are political.”62 Strongly disputing this claim of the IRA developing a Mafia-type characteristic, O’Leary points out that interviews with IRA activists,63 evidence from autobiographies,64 as well as evidence of actual recruitment, contradict this often-repeated assertion about many dissident groups. O’Leary points out that unlike the Mafia leadership, neither the ordinary IRA foot soldiers nor their leadership lived in luxury. Some leaders, such as Gerry Adams, have become comparatively wealthy, in the case of Adams, primarily from his writings and lectures and not by skimming off the top of the funds raised for political purposes. In fact, recruitment for the group went up only when there were political provocations, including threats from paramilitary attacks, and not for greater “rent seeking” opportunities. These accounts also make it clear that when a member is found to have taken money from the IRA fund, he is either ostracized or faces vigilante justice.65 O’Leary is unequivocal in stating that while individual members may not always reflect the “austere virtues” of the IRA, as an enforced official policy, it “does not do drugs.”66 For instance, the Provisional IRA was deeply involved in acquiring money through contraband cigarettes and alcohol, and through extortion, but was keen on trying to portray a “clean image” by avoiding being directly involved in drug dealing.67 This policy of ideological puritanism created tension within the ranks of the IRA. Initially separated along ideological lines, when a small faction, the INLA, began dealing with drugs, the IRA began to fear for its reputation. Sensing the danger of losing political legitimacy within its own base, the IRA simply killed off the small band of rogue members during what is known as the

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“night of long rifles.”68 In contrast, the leaders of Sendero Luminoso in Peru, facing no such cultural constraints, delved into drug trading.69 It is entirely possible to assume that the two groups would develop a stronger tie of collaboration when they face a common enemy. Mincheva and Gurr, through a narrative of Islamic resistance in Bosnia and Kosovo, argue that network connections, which often include known criminals, are made through a common ethno-religious identity at times of war.70 This interesting case study, however, points to extraordinary periods in the history of a group: at times of an all-out civil war.

Transformation of groups After discussing the issues of collaboration, let us now turn our attention to the question of transformation. Based on my simple behavioral assumption, I hypothesize that while it is possible for a terrorist organization to turn primarily to criminality, it will be extremely unusual for a criminal organization to turn into a political movement. Since political organizations have a natural tendency to lose their ideological compass, in order to preserve their orientation, the leadership must exercise strict control. This is possible when the movement is structured along a hierarchical chain of command. When a group adopts a more flexible nonhierarchical pattern, the risk of some of its units becoming involved in unacceptable behavior increases. For instance, when the central command of alQaeda was portraying a picture of a rigid Islamic code of conduct, the independent Madrid cell financed its operation by selling hashish.71 If unchecked, there is a possibility that in time such activities would draw those whose only interest is making easy money through drug trafficking. In contrast, I argue that even when a criminal group starts out with some goals of attaining public goods, it will quickly revert to becoming an almost entirely criminal enterprise. That being said, a criminal group can sometime engage in limited altruistic behavior. The Medellin Cartel, headed by Pablo Escobar, made efforts to improve the lives of the poor people living in the area, perhaps in some ways not unlike the fabled Robin Hood. However, Escobar’s devotion toward providing public goods was short-lived at best and his generosity was closer to bribery than true benevolence.72 The case of the Italian Cosa Nostra provides another example in support of this hypothesis. After the invasion of Sicily by the Allied Forces during World War II, the help of the Mafia was clearly recognized. As a reward for their support, some members of the Mafia were not only allowed to carry weapons but were installed as mayors and law-enforcement officials throughout western Sicily. This process of political legitimization helped their expansion in the immediate aftermath of the war not only in Italy but also in the US.73 However, this opportunity to become part of the legitimate political process was soon abandoned in favor of making money. The Cosa

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Nostra demonstrates the clearest case where a criminal group was given an unprecedented opportunity to become a legitimate political force but essentially reverted back to its familiar ways. Are there cases where a criminal group may want to upset the status quo and attempt to terrorize an entire society in the same manner of a terrorism campaign? A criminal group would choose such an option only as a last resort, and almost always when faced with a decisive move by the government to eliminate it. However, in those cases where a group might target an entire society (and using terrorist tactics), its goals would still remain the attainment of quasi-public good without upsetting the status quo. For instance, the Italian Mafia started its campaign of car bombing in 1993, where it targeted a television personality, bombed a train, and planted bombs that damaged, among other cultural icons, such as the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Yet, these acts, while superficially similar to other acts of terrorism, differed in one important area: the aim of this campaign was devoid of any political aim. It did not purport to change Italian society but simply wanted to frighten the government into ceasing its law enforcement activities. Therefore, given this important distinction, these attacks cannot be classified as terrorism. When a criminal gang uses violence, it is generally to disrupt an investigation or an interdiction. Through the selective use of violence, it will try to dissuade the authorities from pursuing the group.74

Summary The relationship between terrorism and organized crime has often been shrouded in mystery, misconception, and speculation. Yet for policy purposes, it is imperative that we make a proper distinction between the two. Our task is complicated because of several reasons. When faced with challenges from groups that use extra-legal methods to address community grievances, every target government attempts to portray the members of dissident groups as common criminals to undermine their political legitimacy. Since it takes money to combat the forces of an organized government, all dissident groups engage in activities of various measures of illegality. Given the natural allure of money and criminal activities, it is not surprising that a dissident group may transform into a criminal organization, particularly when its political goals become fuzzy, organizational structure weakened, or the leaders are more interested in making money for themselves. When there is the possibility of external support, some criminal groups attempt to drape themselves in the cloak of political idealism as a cover for their illicit activities. Since it is impossible to remain an association of true believers, terrorist organizations should be viewed on a continuum from ideological to totally criminal. Theoretically, the two organizations are entirely different animals. Each faces a certain cost for cooperating and developing a sustained relationship with the other. Given the differences in motivations and costs, any marriage, other than one of convenience, is unlikely. However, in reality, since all work out of mixed motivations, the defining boundaries between the two are often blurred.

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Notes 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Harari (2017: 192–193). Byman (2005). US Security Council Resolution # 1373 (9/28/2001). US Drug Enforcement Agency (2017). 2017 National Drug Threat Assessment. DEADCT-DIR-040-17. https://www.dea.gov/sites/default/files/2018-07/DIR-04017_2017-NDTA.pdf. See, for example, Shelley and Picarelli (2002); Buzan and Waever (2003); Shaw (2019). Hoffman (1998: 43). Ruby (2002: 10, emphasis mine). I have generally accepted this definition of terrorism with some qualification of the term “non-combatant.” National Security Council, International Crime Threat Assessment web site www.ter rorism.com/documents/pub45270/pub45270chapl.html (emphasis mine). A more precise definition of organized crime was adopted by the United Nations Convention on Transnational Organized Crime (2001) as: “Organized criminal group” shall mean a structured group of three or more persons, existing for a period of time and acting in concert with the aim of committing one or more serious crimes or offences established in accordance with this Convention, in order to obtain, directly or indirectly, a financial or other material benefit. “Serious crime” shall mean conduct constituting an offence punishable by maximum deprivation of liberty of at least four years or more serious penalty. “Structured group” shall mean a group that is not randomly formed for the immediate commission of an offence and that does not need to have formally defined roles for its members, continuity of its membership, or a developed structure.

9 Jamieson (2005: 165). 10 Quasi-public goods are also known in the standard economic literature as “common pooled resources” or “club goods.” 11 While the story of Robin Hood, who robs the rich to distribute money among the poor is a work of fiction, there are other criminals who gained certain notoriety for helping out the downtrodden. Among the recent examples, the case of Pablo Escobar is, perhaps, the most well-known. Escobar did provide what we may call “public goods” for the ordinary people of Medellin, but his primary motivation was never philanthropic. His “charity” work was undertaken to ensure the loyalty of the local people, essential for his protection (see, Attwood, 2016). 12 Schmid and de Graaf (1982). 13 Dishman (2006: 367); see also Kenney (2003). 14 Shapiro and Siegel (2007: 405, 2012). 15 Samuelson (1938) 16 Hausken and Gupta (2015a, 2015b). 17 Hausken et al. (2015). 18 See, Stanford University, Center for International Security and Cooperation report on Lshkar-e-Taiba. https://cisac.fsi.stanford.edu/mappingmilitants/profiles/lashkare-taiba#highlight_text_12554. 19 “US Embassy Cables: Hillary Clinton Says Saudi Arabia ‘A Critical Source of Terrorist Funding’.” The Guardian. December 5, 2010. 20 Tankel (2013). 21 Shapiro and Siegel (2012). 22 Shaw (2019). 23 Levitt (2005a, 2005b). 24 Fanusie and Entz (2017).

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25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34

35 36 37

38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62

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Hernández (2013). Duijn et al. (2014); Levitt (2016). Shaw (2019). Levitt (2005a, 2005b). Dean (2018). Mincheva and Gurr (2013). Neumann (2013); Sundar (2016). See, for instance, Gunaratna (2002); Bergen (2002); Lilly (2006); Kochan (2006). Sageman (2004) has shown that even a less hierarchical organization, such as alQaeda, had a division of labor with a section of the core administrative group devoted solely to raising money for the organization. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime defines money laundering as a “three-stage process, which disguises illegal profits without compromizing the criminals who wish to benefit from the proceeds. This requires first, moving the funds from direct association with the crime; second, disguising the trail to foil pursuit; and third, making money available to the criminal once again with occupational and geographic origin hidden from view.” See Gartenstein-Ross and Dabruzzi (2007). See also Baker and Nordin (2007). Baker and Nordin (2007: 14). The importance of the support of the client base is well recognized in the literature. For instance, Bloom (2005) demonstrates the close association between popular support for suicide bombing among the Palestinian population in West Bank and the Gaza Strip and the staging of suicide bombings by Hamas, PIJ, and other dissident groups. Similarly, Kalvyas and Sanchez-Cuenca (2005) argue that how a group must choose its strategies is based on the cultural, religious, and political sensitivities of their base. There are differences even among these groups. Despite the widespread use of drug trafficking and hostage taking to finance their activities, nobody accuses the FARC leadership of living in the lap of luxury (Chernick, 2007). Dishman (2001); see also Horgan and Taylor (1999, 2003). See Crenshaw (1988) for the importance of leadership in maintaining group adherence to its ideological goals through selective incentive structure. Wells et al. (2001). Rogers (2006: 107). Ibid. Sageman (2004: 44). Filler (2002). Kurth Cronin (2009: 27). Rogers (2006). See Debray (1967). Silke (1998); see also Zirakhzadeh (2002). See, Collier and Hoeffer (2004). Silke (1998, 1999). Horgan and Taylor (1999, 2003). Alexander et al. (2002). Rotella (2004). Dishman (2006). Schmid (2005: 8). Dandaurand and Chin (2004). Ibid.: 28. Gartenstein-Ross and Dabruzzi (2007). Dishman (2001: 45). McGirk (2004). Ignatieff (2003: 122).

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63 64 65 66 67

68 69 70 71 72

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White (1989). Collins and McGovern (1999). McGartland (1997). O’Leary (2007: 207). Because of the needs of the terrorist organizations to keep a “clean” image, Dishman (2006: 374–375) has made an interesting point that when a hierarchical terrorist organization enters into a collaborative arrangement with a crime syndicate, the actual collaboration starts from the middle levels of the two organizations. For a history of the INLA, see J. Holland and H. McDonald (1984). See also reports of the Independent Monitoring Commission, at www.independentmonitoringcommis sion.org. For a detailed link between drug trafficking and political activities by Sendero Luminoso, see Palmer (1995: 278). Mincheva and Gurr (2013). Rotella (2004). There are many instances of brigands taking the role of the legendary Robin Hood to dispense public goods. In the forests of southern India, Veerappan, an elephant poacher and kidnapper, gained notoriety by taking the role of a protector of the remote and repressed village of Gopinathan in the state of Tamil Nadu. He escaped many capture attempts by the forces of the Indian government, primarily through the support of the villagers. However, his luck ran out in October 2004, when he was killed in a shootout with the security forces. Jamieson (2005: 167). Williams and Savona (1995).

9 DEMISE OF DISSENT

[Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi] “was whimpering and crying and screaming all the way” to his death. (President Donald J. Trump announcing the death of the leader of ISIS1)

Great exaggeration “The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated” Mark Twain famously quipped when rumors started of his passing. So it is for terrorism. On May 1, 2003, President George W. Bush, having promised to root out terrorism, stood before an oversize banner on the deck of the aircraft carrier, Abraham Lincoln, proclaiming “Mission accomplished.” Fifteen years later, Donald Trump tweeted, “We have defeated ISIS, my only reason being there during the Trump Presidency.”2 Although typical of Trump’s fractured phrases, especially within the confines of 142 characters the message seems to be a bit garbled, its central idea was crystal clear. After the US forces drove out the last few ISIS soldiers from the last holdout of the caliphate, Baghouz in Syria, the president was claiming the annihilation of ISIS as a terrorist organization. Each time, many weary Americans breathed a collective sigh of relief, hoping that their leaders were right: the threats of terrorism from al-Qaeda and ISIS were no longer.3 Alas, as I write, the ideologies, spawned in the Islamic world around four decades ago, show scant signs of dissipating. The fog of war that has engulfed a large part of the Middle East and North Africa, created confusion about the identity of the various groups and raised questions about the meaning of the end of terrorism. The inevitability of death or detachment from a cause catches up with individual terrorists; some are killed or imprisoned, some leave the movement, while others join criminal gangs. Terrorist groups disappear from the pages of history. The extant grievances take on a new form, new groups are spawned.

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When state authorities react to the new threats, the cycle of retribution continues. At other times, the ideology that created a movement becomes a spent force. As we examine the issue more closely, the line demarcating active participation and quitting for individuals become as murky as the question of life and death for political groups and movements. As before, to answer this vexing question, we must distinguish among the perspectives of an individual, a group, and a movement.

Turning back and dropping out: individual perspective The followers Individual activists leave terrorism for the same reasons they join. The dissident groups offer of a strong collective identity that acts as a powerful source of motivation for the volunteers. They fulfil the fundamental human need of belonging to a community of like-minded people and hating a shared enemy. It may also accord rectitude and respect from family, friends, and community. Moreover, the macho image of a gun-toting rebel may attract attention from the opposite sex. The group may also provide a means of support for the participants by offering monetary rewards for services. In other words, joining a group fulfils many of the basic needs of self and group utilities. When such utilities are no longer there, or the cost of perpetuating them outstrips the benefits, the erstwhile terrorists leave their rebellious lifestyle. In a series of detailed publications, Horgan has analyzed and documented the reasons for individual decisions for leaving terrorism behind.4 His study clearly indicates that when people decide to leave the life of a terrorist, they do not make such decisions at a moment of epiphany. Rather, for most of them, similar to the decision to join a group, it comes slowly over time, often blurring the distinction between a terrorist and a non-combatant civilian. Reflecting Horgan’s findings, I argue that the pursuit of self and group utilities is not a binary – “either/or” – decision but a matter of trade-off in everyday lives. Horgan argues that the process of disengagement follows two lines: psychological and physical. He points out that: “The psychological disengagement manifests through disillusionment with some aspect of the group, at least resulting from in a change of attitude, beliefs or identity,”5 a situation, which Leon Festinger calls, cognitive dissonance.6 Cognitive dissonance takes place when observed realty contradicts an individual’s deeply held beliefs, creating psychological discomfort. It may loosen the ideological grip on the followers.7 The ideological hold on the followers may slip for several reasons. For instance, an operative may experiences a moral dissonance witnessing the suffering of those whom he had dismissed as “enemies.” Such a psychological conflict may also present itself when he begins to question the basic premises of the ideological struggle. A follower may become disillusioned by the conduct of the leader or may develop severe disagreements with the decision taken by the

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leadership. Every movement, large or small, starts with an idea offered by a leader, which inspires a multitude. However, when staying in power is the only idea that inspires the leadership and it becomes evident to many, unless the group can offer financial or security incentives, a movement faces an imminent danger of defection by its rank and file. The physical disengagement takes place either voluntarily or involuntarily. Voluntary physical disengagement is the result of psychological separation. Involuntary disengagement happens when they are ejected from the movement by the leadership for violating the group’s code of conduct or are apprehended by security forces.

The leaders When a rebel group gives up arms through negotiated settlement after a protracted war, it either goes into some sort of a direct power-sharing arrangement or become part of a democratic political process. For either of these to happen, the leaders must be sure of their personal safety when they lay down their arms, be confident about maintaining their popular base of support and, in the case of a decision to take part in a democratic process, the country must have a strong democratic tradition. Until now, I did not delve into the question of how leaders take their momentous decisions. While the importance of leadership is recognized in the terrorism literature, few have closely examined the way the leaders make important choices. However, recent advancements in decision theory have advanced a polyheuristic perspective, significantly adding to our understanding of the complex process by which leaders make up their minds.8 Rational choice theory assumes that an actor faces an unlimited choice of possible actions.9 The actor evaluates each action against its expected outcome and chooses the one that gives her the greatest benefits compared to the cost. The problem with this approach is that nobody can consider an infinite set of possible actions. Nor can we conduct an elaborate evaluation of the uncertain outcomes. The polyheuristic approach is the combination of a diverse work by economists, political scientists, social psychologists, and cognitive scientists.10 In the 1970s and 1980s, Nobel Laureate economist Herbert Simon argued that human beings do not have an infinite brain capacity, and nor do they have the time to evaluate each action to arrive at the point of maximum satisfaction.11 Instead, as Simon called us, we are “cognitive misers” and look for ways to achieve a “satisficing” solution, which would simply be sufficient to satisfy our needs, given the constraints of time, resources, and cognition. Others, including Kahneman and Tversky, have shown through numerous experimental designs that rational people do not complete analyses of most outcomes and, instead, depend on shortcuts or heuristics to arrive at a solution.12 These heuristics can be based on personal experience, religious faith, or ideology.

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By combining many of these diverse research approaches, Mintz explains polyheuristics as a two-step process where, in the first step, the menu of choices is significantly narrowed by the decision-makers based on a “noncompensatory” method.13 That is, some of the options, regardless of compensation or apparent “rationality,” will not be acceptable due to their political and ideological implications. After the elimination of the unacceptable options, in the second stage of the process, the remaining ones are evaluated for optimality solution in the traditional economic sense. This explains why a leader would choose a dangerous path of confrontation when other avenues for a negotiated settlement were summarily rejected out of hand. For instance, in July 2007, a group of extremists under the leadership of some radical mullahs developed a base in the famous Red Mosque, a landmark in the Pakistani capital city of Islamabad. The mullahs were running a madrassa, which was attended mostly by students from poor families in the tribal north-west frontier provinces of the country. From this base, the students would fan out and enforce their Taliban style of strict Islamic laws. They would close down music stores, firebomb stores selling alcohol, and would “arrest” and punish women, accusing them of prostitution. They also stockpiled huge amounts of arms and ammunitions. Finally, after trying to appease them for several months, President Parvez Musharraf decided to lay a siege of the large mosque compound. After a bloody exchange of fire, the Pakistani military gave an offer of peaceful surrender to the leader, Abdul Rashid Ghazi, which he rejected immediately. The siege ended with the death of scores of people, including many young students in their early teens, along with their leader.14 The question is, how do we explain the decisionmaking process that led to the death of Ghazi and his charges? Mintz identifies a number of non-compensatory political and personal-loss factors, the presence of which will prevent a leader from accepting a compromise, regardless of the amount of the expectation of reward.15 These non-compensatory loss-aversion variables are: • • • • • • • • • • • •

Threat to a leader’s survival Significant drop in public support for a policy Significant drop in popularity The prospect of an electoral defeat Domestic opposition Threat to regime survival Intra-party rivalry and competition Potential collapse of the coalition, government, or regime Internal or external challenge to the regime Threat to political power, dignity, honor, or legitimacy of a leader Demonstrations, riots, and so forth The existence of veto players (e.g., pivotal parties in parliamentary government)

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However, we should remember that the weights that are placed on these factors would vary according to the ideological orientation, which is missing from Mintz’s explanation. For instance, in the explanation of the siege of the Red Mosque in Islamabad, the aspect of the leader’s personal safety, which is likely to feature prominently in the minds of most leaders, was secondary to other considerations of religious ideology. Therefore, for Ghazi, the choice set did not include an unconditional surrender as a viable option. In any case, the understanding of this two-step process provides us with a very useful set of tools to analyse the decision-making path and the outcomes of many world events, including the ones we are discussing. We can use this list to understand why bin Laden and others in al-Qaeda would not surrender or attempt a negotiated settlement, while the leaders of the IRA would.

Group perspective: success and failure Broadly speaking there are three things that can happen to a rebel group: it may achieve success, it may transform into a criminal gang, or it can face death and be no longer a threat to the organized society. I have addressed the issue of transformation in the previous chapter. This chapter will discuss the issues of success and failure. In her detailed work, Kurth Cronin identifies six factors that would cause a death of a group or a movement: (1) capture or killing of the group’s leader, (2) the group’s entry into the nation’s political process through power-sharing or through the electoral process, (3) achievement of the group’s political goal, (4) loss of public support, (5) defeat and elimination through brutal police and military action, and (6) transition from terrorism to other forms of violence.16 Of these six, I have already discussed issues regarding the achievement of ultimate political power. I have also addressed the issue of transformation of an ideological group into a criminal gang in the previous chapter.

Success: what does it mean? The title of Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz’s book, Why Terrorism Works, presumes that the terrorists are destined to win since the international community repeatedly rewards these groups with appeasement and legitimization, refusing to take the necessary steps to curtail attacks.17 In contrast, others have argued that terrorism and insurgencies rarely win.18 Looking at history, what does it mean to say that a terrorist group has been “successful?” Success can be measured in many different ways, some of which would contradict others.

Survival Perhaps for one simple reason, the most important metric of a group’s success is its ability to survive: if it doesn’t, it cannot make a significant impact on

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the political history of a nation. Rapoport was among the first to affix a number to the average longevity of a terrorist group.19 By his measure, over 90 percent of the groups disappear within the first few years. The devastation of the 9/11 attacks created the need for systematic research on terrorism. As a result, a number of outfits began collecting data for scholarly inquiries. Kurth Cronin studied hundreds of groups listed on the MIPT Database.20 She calculated the average life span to be approximately eight years. Her estimation of time of longevity, however, varies from that of the US State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO) list, which claims a group’s average longevity to be around 19 years. This discrepancy is the result of the fact that the US State Department only lists established groups, which the US government considers to be “terrorist” organizations. Kurth Cronin points out that the FTO only covers about 5 percent of the total number of groups listed on the MIPT database. There are, however, numerous obstacles to making a proper count of the groups. First, being clandestine organizations, they may not have a specific day of “launch” like a commercial firm or an observed day of official birth. Similarly, they may disappear without prior notification. Unlike a business venture, they neither incorporate themselves as legal entities, nor go through any formal process of dissolution. Sometimes, a trusted spokesman, either publicly or surreptitiously, might announce the founding of a group. However, there were no such announcements for al-Qaeda and many others we have come to know and study. Second, the groups may change their names or be known by different names by different people. Frequently, a group might announce its name, but the journalists, especially from the Western world, would christen it with a name that would be easy for their audience to hear and remember. Take for instance, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham. Al-Sham is the Arabic name for the region that does not adhere to current political maps. In the pages of Western newspapers and magazines, it came to be known by its acronym: the ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria), where someone translated al-Sham to Syria. The name stuck, especially after the New York Times started substituting the country’s name for the region. The Obama administration made a desperate effort at being consistent by calling it ISIL, where the word “Levant” is a more accurate translation of the region, known as al-Sham. This semantic difference led to confusion in many quarters. Furthermore, some Arabic-speaking leaders took to calling it Daesh. Daesh is also an acronym. It is based on the Arabic pronunciation of its longer moniker. This term, however, had a political overtone, as in Arabic, “Daesh” means “something one crushes underfoot.” A definite put down of the group. Third, as groups splinter, their factions can take similar sounding names. Thus, the IRA in Northern Ireland broke into the Provisional IRA (PIRA), the Real IRA (RIRA), Irish National Liberation Army (INLA), Irish Peoples’ Liberation Organisation (IPLO), etc. If a group is well known to Western researchers, it is likely to be classified correctly. Otherwise, there will be risks of it being mislabelled. This obfuscation resulting from names becomes particularly

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problematic when we consider small factional entities operating in a lawless conflict zone. Many splinter groups operating in the vast forested Indian territories spanning thousands of square miles are often lumped as “Naxalites” or “Maoists.” Thus, there are many groups in the war-torn areas that call themselves “Taliban,” “al-Qaeda,” “al-Shabab” etc. Finally, as terrorist groups wax and wane in their ability to threaten an organized society, their longevity might be incorrectly understood. A group can exist only in name, without much power to strike. For instance, al-Qaeda, established by bin Laden and his core group, no longer exists, as most of its leaders are either dead, imprisoned, or in hiding. To clarify this distinction, some scholars started calling the old al-Qaeda, al-Qaeda Central.21 Similarly, the Taliban has fractured into many groups; those based in Pakistan have little or no operational connection with those in Afghanistan and are often in conflict with each other. There are many Taliban factions, some of which are nothing more than bands of opium dealers. Without the protection of a brand name patent, the structures of these can lead to misunderstanding and provide false information.

Achievement of political goals A group may be disbanded when it loses its raison d’être by achieving a fundamental change in the political system by coming to power. That is success. And, it is easy to comprehend. However, is that its only political goal? Capturing state power may be its long-term objective, but what about its short-term aim? Through their macabre acts, terrorist groups send messages to their enemies, their constituents, and to other competing entities. They try to provoke, divide public opinion, and gain strength through mobilization. When the members of Black September killed Israeli Olympic athletes in Munich in 1972,22 or Hezbollah staged suicide attacks on US Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983,23 or school children fell victim to a bloody assault by the Russian security forces in Beslan in 2004,24 or the sending of a fedayeen25 squad by the Pakistani group Lashkar-e-Taiba to unleash indiscriminate killings on the streets of Mumbai in 2008, each group felt its missions – publicizing their cause, warning their adversaries, and providing assurance to their bases – were accomplished. Those were their immediate goals. Bin Laden & co. knew that by bringing down the Twin Towers they would not destroy the United States, and Lashkar-e-Taiba knew that killing innocent people on the streets of Mumbai would not make India give up its claims on the territories of Kashmir. They simply saw their acts as strategic instruments to communicate with their base, their enemies, and their competitors. Abu Musab al-Suri was one of the primary architects of global Jihad.26 By quoting a line for Koran, he explained ai-Qeda’s rationale to Aimen Dean: the need for suicide attacks, where large numbers of people are killed, was pressing, since “all of our plans will fail unless we rouse the believers. … We can only be

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the detonators.”27 As a result, the 9/11 hijackers were, in effect, the wicks that would ignite the bomb. By al-Suri’s measure, these groups were successful. As were the ancient Zealots. The first century Jewish group might have had the goal of awakening Jewish consciousness as they correctly assumed that their actions of an assassination campaign would bring down the wrath of the Roman occupiers of Palestine.28 The brutal repression would force the entire Jewish community to rise up in arms against their brutal oppressors. The Jewish revolt did start, but it did not end in victory for them. As Prophet Jeremiah wept, witnessing the destruction of the Jewish state, the temple, and all its religious traditions, he might not have considered the Zealots as victorious, but the group’s immediate goal was clearly achieved. Two thousand years later, bin Laden welcomed the US invasion as he foresaw a defeat for his enemy on the foreboding soils of Afghanistan as a result of his 9/11 attacks, and al-Qaeda’s immediate goal was achieved. The Zealots were relegated to the dusty pages of history, a short mention in the works of the Roman historian Josephus. Their beloved Jerusalem lay in ruins as the entire Jewish population was forced into exile. Black September was created to overthrow the reign of the Jordanian monarch. Nearly half a century later, the monarchy is still going strong, while the group was officially disbanded by the PLO from within its ranks as a result of relentless Israeli attacks on its members. Hezbollah is no closer to destroying Israel today than it was 40 years ago. Although the US military is still mired in Afghanistan, bin Laden was killed, and his body buried in the ocean. Mumbai is still a thriving city, with Kashmir being officially declared a part of India, abrogating its 70-year-old status as an autonomous region. Although these groups stake out a dubious case for success, there are others that have achieved their ultimate political goals. History is replete with groups that were able to achieve their political goals and became the rulers of their claimed lands, especially during the wave of anti-colonial movements. From their list it appears that those who undertake violent actions are best able to achieve their ultimate political goals against colonial occupiers. This is perhaps, because they share their enemy with most people of a country. For instance, the Mau Mau rebellion in Kenya began in the early 1950s, dominated by the Kikuyu tribesmen. Although it suffered a devastating blow after its leader, Dedan Kimathi, was captured in 1956, it was able to regroup and, after independence, a Mau Mau activist, Jomo Kenyatta,29 became the ruling face of the nation. Similarly, EOKA (Ethniki Organosis Kyprion Agoniston) in Cyprus30 and Irgun Gang (Irgun Zvai Le’umi) in Israel31 are prime examples of successful terrorist campaigns against their colonial rulers. The FLN (National Liberation Front), after a bloody struggle against French colonizers, was able to drive them out of Algeria. After decades of fighting, as a result of the Good Friday Agreement, the IRA’s political wing, Sinn Fein, joined the British political system and

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became part of the still “colonized” Northern Ireland. The Sandinistas in Nicaragua fought off the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)-funded Contras and subsequently came to power. Although not colonial rule, the brutal and morally indefensible apartheid system allowed the African National Congress to end minority white rule in South Africa. The Vietcong, with the help of the North Vietnamese military, prevailed against the might forces of the United States. Mukti Bahini (“Freedom Brigade”), during the Pakistani civil war between the east and the west wings of the country, was able to secure – albeit with active support from the Indian Army – independence for Bangladesh. The Portuguese colonized East Timor in the sixteenth century. It was granted independence in November 1975, however, within days, it was claimed and captured by Indonesian military forces. As a cycle of violent protest and recrimination began in 1999, with growing international pressure, East Timor became the first independent nation of the current millennium. In Afghanistan, the mujahedeen defeated the Soviet military machine in Afghanistan. In the ensuing civil war, the Pakistan-supported Taliban can to power. Is there a pattern to this ultimate success? I would argue that there are important reasons why groups are able to achieve their ultimate goal of defeating their adversaries and attaining political power. Where the vast majority of the inhabitants consider disputed landholdings see as integral part of their nation, no amount of terrorism can break political grip. Israel has lived through numerous terrorist attacks and survived. India has not given up Kashmir, and neither has Turkey acceded to the demand for an independent Kurdistan. When a minority holds power, they see their struggle as existential. They are willing to absorb any amount of cost, because the alternative is so horrifying. Great Britain might have given up its control of Northern Ireland but for vociferous opposition by the Loyalists, who feared loss of their identity in an integrated Ireland.32 Although the Protestants are the majority in Northern Ireland, if the entire island were to be unified, they would be a tiny fraction of the total population. Similarly, the fear of a minority in power means it can fight to the death when cornered. If we examine the response to the so-called Arab Spring, we see that those countries that did not have minority-led governments were able to accommodate at least part of the demands of the protesters without significant bloodshed. Thus, the ruling forces in Tunisia and Egypt could let their dictators topple.33 Morocco made some changes in their democratic system, as did Jordan. Those with ample financial resources, such as Saudi Arabia and the rich Gulf nations, bought off their citizens’ yearning for greater freedom. However, Yemen descended into a bloody civil war. The Shia majority suffered a brutal repression in Bahrain in the hands of the Sunni monarchy. In Syria, the prospect of horrible retribution by the majority Sunnis if they came to power, caused the Alawites, the Christians, and other Shias to put up a desperate fight, where no amount of punishment for the Sunni rebels was off limits.

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The endgame: how groups die Decapitation Killing or capturing the head of a terrorist group is often the primary goal of a victim nation’s security forces. It is also the most popular move for the head of a state. Although President Obama was measured in his reaction to the killing of bin Laden, he will forever be enshrined as the slayer of the most notorious terrorist in the world. From a law enforcement perspective, it is understandable that it would be a top priority to neutralize the person who ordered or masterminded a mass killing. However, the question of its efficacy as a counterterrorism measure remains largely unanswered. If the goal is to reduce the threat of terrorist attacks and not just exact revenge, then we must look at the history. Unfortunately, history does not provide us with an unequivocal response. The logic of decapitation is clear. If dynamic, charismatic political entrepreneurs can create movements and start dissident groups, their removal through imprisonment, exile, or death can cause group destruction.34 In a similar vein, Martha Crenshaw has shown that a significant factor behind the decline of the Black Panther movement was the loss of its leadership through police action or through internecine conflict.35 Take for instance, the assassination of Yahya Ayyash.36 Because of his mastery in manufacturing suicide vests for Palestinian bombers, who killed and maimed Israeli citizens, he was known as the “engineer.” In 1996, the Israeli security service, Shin Bet, placed an explosive in his cell phone. He was killed as he answered it and the bomb was remotely detonated. While many in Israel sighed with relief, the threat of suicide attacks did not go down.37 In fact, because Ayyash was celebrated as a hero by the Palestinians, his image adorned the public squares of Gaza City and streets were named after him. As a result, his killing offered a fresh impetus for Hamas supporters to give up their lives as suicide bombers. In contrast, Kurth Cronin shows several cases, where the arrest of a number of leaders reduced terrorist attacks, at least in the short run.38 The arrest of the Real IRA leader Michey McKevitt in 2001, following the Omagh bombing, meant that the frequency of their attacks went down dramatically. Similarly, when the guru of the Japanese millenarian group, Aum Shinrikiyo, Shoko Asahara was imprisoned for the infamous sarin gas attack at a Tokyo subway station, the group was disbanded. A more nuanced picture emerged in the case of the Kurdish group, the PKK. After the Turkish police nabbed its supremo, Abdullah Acalan, from Germany in 1999, the number of attacks carried out by its members went down drastically, only to increase after a lull of three years. Similarly, the killing of bin Laden dealt a blow to the al-Qaeda central but did little to stamp out the Jihadi ideology that spread in many parts of the Islamic world. The movement was eradicated by Indian police and security forces from Kolkata after the arrest and death of its leader, Charu Mazumdar.

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However, it picked up steam and spread through the tribal areas of India, posing a much greater threat to the nation’s security than ever before. Death did not prevent Che Guevara from becoming a global icon. As a revolutionary who wanted to spread communism throughout Africa and Latin America, he had little to show by the time he was cornered in a remote area and summarily executed by the Bolivian military with assistance from a CIA taskforce. Che might have achieved in death what escaped him life. He became a beacon of hope for Marxist revolutionaries all over the world.

Shutting off the money spigot Money is the lifeblood of any organization. Dissident groups are no exception. I have dealt with the issue of financing in the previous chapter. Money for terrorism comes from many sources: supporting governments,39 wealthy benefactors, and charities that collect contributions from ordinary citizens.40 Suffice it to say that the 9/11 attacks shook up the international community, realizing how easily money was transferred to sustain the suicide attackers. Since then, we have seen a heightened effort to turn off the money spigot by many countries in the world. However, not having a universally agreed upon definition of terrorism, politics gets in the way of stopping the money flow, as nations support or oppose groups based on their own political orientations. There is no doubt that in the past two decades, banking laws have been tightened, making international money transfer to a terrorist organization lot harder than it used to be. The problem of funding may not only weaken a terrorist organization and turn it into a criminal syndicate, but also, in its fight for survival, it can fracture a movement into competing groups.

Internecine conflicts: fracturing of groups When looked from a distance, terrorist groups may appear to be solidly united in their purpose. Yet, similar to all other human associations, they suffer from ideological divisions, interpersonal rivalries, and differences regarding tactics and strategies. The ideological conflict between the more fundamentalist Islamic orientations of Hamas put their members at odds with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. Stalin had Trotsky murdered and Mao killed Lin Biao. There were conflicts within al-Qaeda regarding the group’s strategy of targeting the “near enemies” (the rulers of the Arab countries) and the “far enemies” (the Western nations, in general, and the US in particular). As egos of the leaders’ clash, groups attempt to increase their “market share” of the political base, members disagree with tactics, and groups split. Many groups, when fighting a common enemy, such as a colonial ruler or an invading force, may band together. However, when the threat is removed, their divisions, along the lines of ethnicity, religion, or tribal origin become paramount. Thus, soon after independence, many nations become embroiled in

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open warfare against their erstwhile comrades in arms. Thus, the Taliban is primarily a Pashtun group. Thus, soon after the Soviet troops were expelled from Afghanistan, the country descended into a bloody civil war. The fracturing of the groups paves the path for their obliteration from forces within their organizational structures.

Entry into the political process: negotiated peace Acts of terrorism comes to an end when a dissident group comes to a negotiated agreement with state authorities or with a rival group, leading to power sharing. Kurth Cronin analysed data from 42 groups.41 She found that only about 80 percent of groups did not engage in negotiations, and of those who did, only about 10 percent of the total (5 out of 42) achieved limited success. If we want to understand the reasons behind such a small measure of success in ending terrorism through mediation and negotiation, we should look into theories of conflict resolution. The first requirement for any voluntary transaction between two human beings is trust. Suppose you find a brand-named purse at an informal marketplace, such as a flea market or in a different country. Although you like the purse, you are not sure if it is a cheap knock-off. If it is truly what the shopkeeper says it is, it is a real bargain. On the other hand, if it is a fake, it is a waste of money. You would certainly buy it if a respectable store were to offer it at that price. However, given the fact that you don’t trust the seller means you are likely to walk away from the deal. Now, if the product was genuine and the seller was able to offer you the low price because he did not have to pay for all the fixed costs associated with running a large store in the middle of the town’s commercial center, you could lose a great bargain. Your negotiation, however, would reach a dead end because of lack of trust. In game theory parlance, it is called a prisoner’s dilemma, where the lack of trust would prevent the players from reaching the optimal negotiated settlement.42 This lack of trust not only shows up in the other party’s willingness to adhere to the terms of agreement, but also to the personal security of those who might sit at the table. The safety of the participants must be guaranteed by the party that is attempting to broker a deal. Therefore, it is essential that everyone involved must trust the integrity of the broker. It is not only physical security that must be guaranteed, the negotiating groups must also be assured of the neutrality of the third party negotiator. In conflict zones, where trust is in short supply, a negotiated peace often eludes, even when there is broad support for it. Negotiations are best achieved when the combatants want to achieve peace. As Fisher and Uri in much a celebrated book, Getting to Yes, point out, the first rule of a successful negotiation is not to bargain over position.43 That is, if a group begins by saying that they want a certain portion of contested land, the negotiations would bog down in the minutia of the issues. In contrast, the

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parties must understand and negotiate over their respective interests. That is, they must understand what they want to see come out of the process. The problem starts when the parties conceal the true goals of the negotiated outcomes. This problem is especially acute when the two sides have a power imbalance. That is, when one group believes that the tide of armed conflict is turning in their favor. In that case, they have every reason to game the process to delay or to regroup or to wait out the conflict. In fact, in such cases of asymmetry, Fisher and Uri suggest each group develop their best BATNA (best alternative to a negotiated agreement). That is, essentially a strong “plan B” and leave the process of negotiation. Take for instance, the case of the Taliban.44 On October 7, 2001, the US and its allies launched a military invasion codenamed “Operation Enduring Freedom,” to oust the Taliban from power for its refusal to hand over the leaders of al-Qaeda for carrying out the 9/11 attacks.45 Although the group was easily deposed, it continued to wage guerrilla warfare and terrorist attacks, bogging down the mighty US forces in their longest war. Successive presidents, starting with George W. Bush, attempted negotiated settlements so that US forces could come home safely. The negotiations centered around three parties: the Afghan government, the Talban, and the US. On September 19, 2019, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) released an updated version of their report, “Afghanistan: Background and U.S. Policy.”46 The report paints a gloomy picture. The Afghan government has a problem with infighting along ethnic lines and a huge problem with the morale of its fighting forces. It has no trust in the Taliban and desperately wants the continuing help of the US military. The US, on the other hand, wants to leave the never-ending battlefield, which has already cost the nation an astounding several trillion dollars and thousands of lost lives. The Taliban, in contrast, believes that the only reason the current Afghan government is in power is because it is being propped up by a reluctant foreign power. As a result, there is hardly a reason for optimism for a negotiated peace. Apart from trust, there may be other issues. The acceptance of peace may not be up to the two parties at the negotiating table. There may be other parties who want to be part of the process but are left out. For instance, the attempted peace agreements between Israel and the Palestinians always assumed that the Palestinians spoke with one voice: the PLO. Yet, the ground realities were different. While Yasser Arafat and the Fatah faction of the PLO were willing to negotiate and get control over the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, other more militant groups, with significant popular support, such as Hamas, remained on the sidelines. There were other smaller groups, as well, such as Palestine Islamic Jihad. Being ignored by the PLO, the Israelis, and US negotiators, the resulting peace was fragile. Later on, a small civil war broke out between the PLO (then the Palestinian Authority) and Hamas.

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Destruction of dissent: military actions, mass internment, and Internet isolation Through their acts of extreme provocation, terrorist groups aim at polarizing a country, through which they aim to achieve their ultimate political goal of grabbing power from the current rulers of the state. Facing such egregious acts of cruelty, the state most often responds reflexively by unleashing repression, rarely discriminating between those who are guilty through active participation and those through simple association. Repression works when there is little public support for the extremist groups or when state authorities wield absolute power in dictatorships.47 In antiquity, the Romans were free to carry out mass murder and expel the entire population from Jerusalem to end the Jewish revolt; in the days of instant communications and consequent global condemnations, such efforts at extreme punishment are becoming rare. However, as we will see, when frequently facing acts of terrorism, state leaders almost instinctively respond with force. Kurth Cronin explains it best as she writes: Answering the threat of terrorism with repression, a state’s strongest means of defending itself, is natural – even instinctive. Terrorism is meant to frighten and provoke and state leaders are among those who get scared and angry. It is basic human instinct to fight fire with fire, force with force, and terror with terrifying responses.48 Thus, after the 9/11 attacks, President George W. Bush invaded Afghanistan with an unprecedented amount of public support. While Kurth Cronin’s explanation is apt, I may qualify it with a few caveats. If the source of terrorism is domestic, the authorities’ first choice of action is likely to be coercion. In the case of the IRA and the Naxalites, the British and Indian governments first attempted to crush the groups and their activities through joint police and military actions. So did the Sri Lankan government, when facing threats from the Tamil Tigers (LTTE). Sometimes this works. The first group of Naxalites was wiped out in early 1970s from Kolkata. After decades of fighting, after the last peace talks broke down, the Sri Lankan military launched an all-out attack, killing the LTTE supremo, Prabhakaran, and dealing the group a mortal blow. A similar fate awaited the Tupamaros in Uruguay, Sendero Luminoso in Peru, and the Chechen rebellion in Russia. Police operations eviscerated the radical European groups of the 1960s and 1970, such the Baader Meinhoff and the Red Brigade. While for government leaders, military and police options are open to eradicate domestic terrorism, when it comes to international terrorism, such reactions are tempered by the symmetry of power. The US felt confident in invading Afghanistan and then Iraq, as it did many times before in its Latin American backyard, but military strike back is not an option for decidedly weaker states.

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Fidel Castro was keenly aware of the CIA’s attempts at assassinating him and other Cuban leaders, but they did not consider a military intervention. Similarly, the Sri Lankan government accused India of supporting the LTTE in the 1980s. It is not only the ethnic Tamils in Southern India who sympathized and in part actively supported the dissident group, but also the Indian intelligence agency’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) was accused of training and working with the LTTE.49 Yet, launching a military invasion against India was not an option for the Sri Lankan government. The possession of nuclear weapons acted as a strong deterrent for India’s starting another war against Pakistan in the aftermath of the 2008 Mumbai attack by the Pakistani government-supported group, Lashkar-e-Taiba. The second caveat is that to invite harsh retribution from the state does not require acts of terrorism. What it needs is fear among the leaders of the nation. For instance, the Chinese Communist Party ruthlessly crushed the pro-democracy movement at Tiananmen Square in 1989, despite the fact that the gathering of student activists was peaceful. Thirty later, so concerned is the government that it has made every effort at obliterating all memories from its public. There are no books or journals mentioning the massacre. The Internet tightly regulates any search by the name or even its many nicknames used by activists to circumvent the ban. As a result, for most Chinese, too young to remember, this important event is not part of their collective memory. No nation in the world, with the exception of North Korea, can wield such total power over its citizens. Within China few dare to voice opposition to the forced encampment of the Tibetans and the Uighurs. Even internationally, only those nations that are not beholden to the economic behemoth can raise their voices.50 The fear of popular dissent has forced the Chinese communist rulers to imprison untold numbers of its own citizens in internment camps without trial, in a manner befitting Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. China is using social media to give each citizen a “social credit score,” which will measure each person’s trustworthiness (to the Party). These scores can be used for everything from access to higher education to jobs.51 It will be interesting to find out how successful the Chinese Communist Party is in keeping its billion plus people in strict compliance. Although nowhere near the scope of the Chinese “social credit score,” restrictions on the use of the Internet have been popular with dictators and authoritarian leaders all over the world. Authoritarian governments, such as Saudi Arabia, impose strict laws on accessing online information. The Hindu nationalist government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi abrogated Article 370 that allowed Kashmir to enjoy a semi-autonomous status within India. The reaction was predictably fierce from Pakistan and from within Kashmir. In its attempt at pre-empting disturbances, the government took a highly unusual step of cutting off electricity and all Internet connections within the territory of Kashmir. Surprisingly, foreign and domestic reaction to the electronic isolation of a state by its own government was muted. It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the long run.

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Clearly, measures of retribution in the face of terrorism are popular among the target population and their leaders. However, the question remains, how successful are they in quelling rebellion? Answering the question of whether coercion can be successful in quelling dissent is complicated by a number of factors. Furthermore, as we will see, even if stiff coercion is effective in destroying a group or a movement, after the leaders are neutralized and the group disbanded unless the causes that gave birth to the movement are addressed, there will be a good chance of its reincarnation.

Loss of political base Most devastating blow to a rebel organization is the loss of its political base. Ultimately, it is the strength of the base that holds up a group’s organizational structure. Similar to Samson’s hair, it is the source of their political strength. The base provides fresh volunteers, safe houses, and spread their propaganda political support. The group also depends on the base for financial help. Without popular support, an ideologically driven group is no more than a criminal gang, isolated, irrelevant, and scorned. Kurth Cronin points out that the process of fading into the political wilderness can happen due to three factors: loss of ideological relevance, loss of contact with the base, and strategic mistakes.52 History is full of examples of disappearing ideologies with changing time. The anti-colonial movements became irrelevant after gaining independence. The radical groups in America became inapt when conscription that was massively unpopular (especially among draft-age men) ended. The end of Vietnam War completed the process of irrelevance. Black extremism disappeared after the passage of civil rights legislation in the US. In India, Sikh militancy, largely funded by a small group of expatriates in Canada and the US, never caught on with the general Sikh population in India or in the diaspora.53 In Spain, the Basque separatist group ETA used terrorism to curve out a separate state. It failed. Alonso points out that with time Basque perception of the group as heroes declined to 4 percent in 2002, while those who viewed it as lunatic and criminal rose to 36 percent and 18 percent.54 Given its loss of a political base, it is of little wonder that ETA, despite nearly half a century of struggle, failed to secure its political goal. The same was true for the short-lived Red Army Faction in Germany and all other leftist groups in Europe and Japan.55 Dissident groups, especially those that engage in terrorist activities, face the daunting balancing act of being part of the masses and running clandestine operations. Often the leaders lead the life of the fugitive, hiding and evading constant surveillance. As a result, they tend to become increasingly isolated from their bases. The problem becomes even more acute when the state uses mass arrests and deprives the leaders of safe houses and the means to communicate with their sympathizers. The leaders also face the added problem of accepting fresh

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recruits for fear of infiltration by the enemy. With time, insularity brings about irrelevance. We have seen this with the handful of current al-Qaeda Central leaders who are still at large, such as Ayman al-Zawahiri. Even as he tried his best from his hiding place in Abbotabad, Pakistan, bin Laden became paranoid, cooped up in a house with his four wives and many children, desperately trying to maintaining his operational grip on al-Qaeda.56 Similar fates befell many other leaders on the run, causing the demise of their groups. Leaders of terrorist groups often misjudge their bases’ acceptance of strategies. Beheading of helpless captives may make instant Internet sensation but the cruel spectacle would repel those who might otherwise have been sympathetic to the group’s political and ideological goals. Taking over a hundred schoolgirls captive and giving them as gifts to its fighters, spread notoriety of the Nigerian group Boko Haram all over the world. Yet, this group, which is rooted in the brutal colonial past and enjoys significant support among certain segments of the population, did not help its cause of winning hearts and minds of those who were on the sidelines. In fact, it did just the opposite.57 To survive and be successful in attaining their goals, dissident groups require political legitimacy. When it disappears, so do the groups.

Summary Death is a complicated concept when it comes to a political movement. It is much easier to understand the demise of a particular group than its ideology. While a group can be disbanded, its leaders killed or imprisoned, a movement, fuelled by an ideology or tribal enmity, can linger on and reappear in many forms. Similar to the question of birth, death should be understood in the context of an individual, a group, or a movement. Individuals dissociate themselves from a dissident organization when they experience cognitive dissonance resulting in confusion, doubt, and abandonment of a group’s ideology or its leadership. The dissociation may not come in a moment’s epiphany but may fitfully evolve over a period of time. A group may face extinction, but the ideology and the larger movement that gave birth to it can survive and even thrive. Under certain circumstances, a group or a movement might die when it is decapitated, suffers a military defeat, experiences internal conflict, loses its financial support, enters into a negotiated agreement, joins the democratic process, or loses its political base.

Notes 1 2 3 4

Baker and Schmitt (2019). https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1075397797929775105?lang=en. Katz and Carpenter (2019). Taylor and Quayle (1994); Horgan (2005a, 2006).

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5 Horgan (2006: 35). 6 Leon Festinger (1957). 7 In the Preface of the first edition of this book, I mentioned my involvement with the Naxalites. It may make sense to understand why I left the movement. More than half a century later, as I look back to analyze my own motivations, I realize there were a few important events that led to my departure from the group. To be clear, my involvement did not go beyond activism as the president of the student body of my alma mater, Visva Bharati University. As I was organizing protest demonstrations and strikes, I learned about the killing of a man I used to know well. The man was stabbed to death by the Naxalites for being a police informer. I knew him and his family. I could not reconcile his killing with changing the political system in India. Second, unlike most of my comrades, I did have a way out. I was admitted to the Ph.D. program at the University of Pittsburgh. So I left India, while many of my friends and relatives remained with the group and some of them paid heavy prices for their involvement at levels much deeper than mine. 8 A special issue of the Journal of Conflict Resolution, 48(1), February 2004 is devoted to the understanding of the poliheuristics of decision-making. 9 Known as “unbounded rationality” in the literature. 10 Redd (2003). 11 Simon (1987). 12 Kahneman (1973); Kahneman and Tversky (1979, 1984); Kahneman et al. (1982). 13 Mintz et al. (1997). 14 Khan (2007). 15 Mintz (2004: 9). 16 Kurth Cronin (2009). 17 Dershowitz (2003). 18 Abrams (2006); Stoker (2007). 19 Rapoport (1992). 20 Kurth Cronin (2009: 75). 21 Sageman (2008). 22 Klein (2005). 23 Burton and Katz (2018). 24 Phillips (2007). 25 The word “Fedayeen” is an Arabic word, which means, “those who sacrifice themselves.” They are different from suicide bombers. For suicide bombers, the success of the mission is predicated upon the actors dying at the scene, as they are used as human bombs. The Fedayeens, on the other hand, undertake extremely dangerous missions but they don’t require the actor’s death. 26 Lia (2009). 27 Dean (2018). 28 Rapoport (1984); Aslan (2013). 29 Anderson (2005); Blakeley (2009). 30 French (2015). 31 Katz (1965). 32 English (2003). 33 Yerkes (2019). 34 Oots (1989). 35 Crenshaw (1985). 36 Gunning (2008). 37 Gupta and Mundra (2005). 38 Kurth Cronin (2009). 39 Tankel (2013). 40 Flanigan (2012).

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41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57

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Kurth Cronin (2009: 220). For a more extensive explanation of prisoner’s dilemma, see Gupta (2011). Fisher and Uri (2011). Giustozzi (2019). The operation codename was changed in 2014 to “Operation Freedom’s Sentinel.” Thomas (2019). Gupta et al. (1993). Kurth Cronin (2009: 112). “LTTE: The Indian Connection.” Sunday Times. January 19, 1997. www.sunday times.lk/970119/plus4.html. Clarke (2017). https://bicorner.com/2019/02/20/chinese-social-credit-score-utopian-big-data-blissor-black-mirror-on-steroids/. Kurth Cronin (2009). Gupta (1996). Alonso (2010). De Graaf (2010). Levy and Scott-Clark (2017). Thurston (2017).

10 LANDS OF THE FEARFUL Tribalism and authoritarianism, the fifth wave

Introduction So far, my book has dealt with terrorism. Yet terrorism is not the sole source of threats to global peace and prosperity. In the first chapter, I explained that while the title of the book includes political violence, it is incumbent upon me to broaden my discussion to include other acts of politically motivated actions that menace the dream of a world that lives in harmony. In this chapter, I will discuss the possible fifth wave of the spread of tribalism and authoritarianism.

Best of times, worst of times The attribution of the current state of the world depends on whom you ask. For some, it is globally integrated, increasingly affluent and largely at amity; for others, it is a time of high anxiety stemming from the prospect of the loss of income and status, unfair competition from abroad, and hordes of foreigners pouring into the country, bringing in crime and terrorism. The clash between these two opposing worldviews is creating new challenges to the world order. Those who are fearful are seeking out strong men with simple answers to solve the most complex social and economic problems. These leaders, after stoking fires of anxiety, are offering “common sense” solutions, which inevitably includes a clear identification of the enemy and the ways to punish “them.” Deep anxiety felt within large segments of the population in many countries – including in the bastions of democracy – is creating pathways for authoritarian leaders to come to power, pandering to our worst instincts. At the same time, those who are enjoying the fruits of global integration, are ignoring its adverse impacts on the lives of those left behind. Anxiety leads to fear. Fear to loathing, loathing to rage, and rage to the call for revenge. The rise of xenophobia and authoritarianism is leading the world into an

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unchartered territory of political instability and violence. Instead of non-state actors, the threat to global peace is frequently coming from states themselves. Rapoport detected four great waves of international terrorism and political violence.1 I might conjecture that if the current trend continues, what we might be witnessing is the fifth wave: the rise of tribalism and authoritarianism. The trend of paranoia, mistrust, and xenophobia undermining the foundations of democracy may cause a major disruption in the fabric of the world order similar to or far worse than what the previous four waves have wrought. It may be instructive to note that while Rapoport called these the waves of “international terrorism,” in a wider sense, these represent movements around a core ideology encompassing many other aspects of politically motivated violence. With this in mind, let me first distinguish between nationalism from tribalism. The word “nation” is relatively new in English and so is its derivative, nationalism. If we define nationalism as an awareness of a shared identity among a large group of people to determine their own destiny, its roots go back to the origins of organized societies. The story of Exodus, the Jewish Revolt against the Roman occupation, is among the first recorded accounts of nationalistic fervor. This shared identity that binds one group of people excluding all others is what we call a nation, and their urge for sovereignty is nationalism. The embrace of this identity is patriotism, where we imagine our nation as a father or a mother for all the inhabitants of a specific land. We give this psychological concept a physical manifestation by representing it with symbols, images, flags, and songs. Nationalism as a political phenomenon, however, is an eighteenth century European invention.2 Before that, people had allegiance to their local lords or kings. Witnessing a country-wide rebellion, the ideals of the French Revolution touched the entire continent, especially the Germans and the Italians. Riding on this wave of self-awareness, Bismarck and Garibaldi created single nations of German- and Italian-speaking people. Over time, the contagious idea of national sovereignty spread to the colonized parts of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. While nationalism is often associated with a nation seeking independence from an outside power, tribalism is a sub-national force, where groups develop strong collective identity along the fault lines of ethnicity, religious faith, or linguistic divisions within a sovereign state. Thus, in my definition, the rise of white supremacists in Europe and North America, Hindu fundamentalists in India, Sinhala nationalism in Sri Lanka, the Buddhists’ pogrom against the Rohingyas in Burma, along with Shia and Sunni sectarian violence in the Islamic world qualify as tribalism. If nationalism is ancient, wars between tribes have roots much deeper in the past. The Hebrew Bible narrates the story of an internecine war that pitted the Gileadites against the Ephraimites. The Gileadites had surrounded a group of Ephraimites on their way to their side of the Jordan River. The hapless prisoners falsely claimed that they belonged to the Ephraim tribe. Unable to differentiate them from their looks, the Gileadites ordered them

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to pronounce a whimsical word, “shibboleth.” The pretenders mispronounced it, revealing their tribal affiliation and were summarily cut down. This ancient story epitomizes tribalism, where minute differences in culture, language, or religious practices are used as amplifiers to foster extreme hostility. The study of nationalism, however, took a backseat after the horrors of World War II, which revealed the ugly side of extreme patriotism. Horrified, scholars eschewed nationalism, causing Anderson to lament “unlike most other isms, nationalism has never produced its own grand thinkers: no Hobbeses, Tocquevilles, Marxes, or Webers.”3 This trend of ignoring nationalism may also be caused by the fact that Marxism and later, pan-Islamic Jihadism, rejected the idea of nation-states. To the Marxists, it is a bourgeois concept and the entire world, as a part of manifest destiny, would become communist, obliterating national boundaries. In Islam, it is not the political entity of a country but the global Ummah (the Islamic community) that matters. Yet nationalism remains so insidious that it cannot be erased. The Soviet Union was founded on an ideology that transcends national identity. However, no sooner did its central authority dissolve, but wars broke out among many of its former republics along the lines of ethnic, religious, or linguistic identities. Armenia and Azerbaijan fought over the possession of Nagorno-Karabakh; the Chechens initiated a terror campaign for their own country. The Baltic states grappled with the issue of denying citizenship to ethnic Russians. The conflict between Russia and Ukraine is still roiling the world. Marshall Tito spent his life trying to instill a Yugoslav identity among his people. Yet shortly after his death, ethnic conflicts led to horrific genocides once more on European soil. The historian Eric Hobsbawm was right points out: “Marxist movements and states have tended to become national not only in form but in substance, i.e., nationalist. There is nothing to suggest that this trend would not continue.”4 Hobsbawm’s prescience about nationalism can be equally applied to the Islamist movements. Pakistan was the first country in the world to be formed on the basis of religion. Yet, the country split in two when Bengali nationalism yearned to break free of West Pakistani dominance. In Afghanistan, the largely Sunni (and Pashtun) Taliban were opposed by the members of the Northern Alliance during their civil war. In the Middle East, ISIS has carried out a brutal war against the Shia, who have also reciprocated in kind, especially with the help of Hezbollah, the Houthis, and many other Shiite groups.

Anxiety and roots of authoritarianism The Reign of Terror, which gave the word “terrorism,” began during the days of extreme fear and anxiety in France immediately after the Revolution. Having overthrown the Ancien Régime, the country boiled over with revolutionary fervor; people clamored for the promised paradise of equality, fraternity, and

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liberty for all its citizens. Sky-high hopes mixed freely with extreme fear as the nascent Republic came under siege from foreign powers and their domestic allies, vowing to restore the old monarchy. There were also deep divisions among the various factions within the ranks of the revolutionaries. France faced a civil war as the revolutionary leaders called for a total war (lévee en masse) with invading countries and their domestic adversaries. Everyone was to become an active soldier for the country. In the chaos and confusion, when discerning between friends and foes became impossible, Robespierre and the Committee of Public Safety began the Reign of Terror. They called “terror” a necessary tool to preserve order – a good thing. Guillotines lopped off thousands of heads and many times more were shot. Ironically, over time the meaning of “terrorism” changed; it came to be associated with non-state actors, working against organized states by sowing fear through their acts of extreme cruelty. It implied something terrible. Why did the French accept state terror and the rise of dictators and afterwards, emperors? A widely felt anxiety is the primary ingredient for the rise of authoritarian rulers. When faced with mass disquiet, no nation, not even the most advanced ones with long-standing democratic traditions, is immune. At times when the world around us shifts at an alarming pace, concerns over losing our power and position hold us in a tight grip of fear. Panicked, we seek to hold on to our identity, which tells us who we are and where we belong. When we do not recognize the world where we grew up or what we strongly believed to be self-evident, we turn to those who claim to offer simplistic solutions to bring back the familiar. Having created the identity of “us” and “them” in the starkest terms, the leaders assure us that we can get our old status back if we follow them along a clear, well-defined road of suppression, expulsion, and elimination of our enemies. By tredding the well-worn script, every authoritarian ruler comes to power. That is why, when we compare their rhetoric, all dictators and demagogues sound eerily similar across time and space.

End of hope, not history It seems as if it happened eons ago. A new global order was on the horizon. The dream of a borderless world began with the signing of the Schengen Agreement in 1985, which aimed at integrating Europe under one common economic and political unit. Standing in the midst of the bombed-out ruins of Berlin and Paris, after the end of World War II, who would have thought of a not-too-distant a future where the French and the Germans would embrace each other as friends, use the same currency, and carry the same passport? Four years later, in 1989, the world woke up to the sound of people of East Berlin destroying the most pernicious symbol of a divided world, the Berlin Wall, brick by brick with hammers, chisels, and pickaxes, exactly how 200 years ago, the Parisians demolished the Bastille. People of the communist world finally were free to choose their own lives. Giddy optimism filled the air. The

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Cold War was over. Liberal democracy had won its final battle; the evolutionary history of human civilization had come to a standstill. An exuberant conservative philosopher Francis Fukuyama boldly declared the “end of history,” where there would be no more history of conflict between individual freedom and repressive collectivism.5 Earlier he wrote: What we may be witnessing, is not just the end of the Cold War, or the passing of a particular period of postwar history, but the end of history as such: that is, the endpoint of mankind’s ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government.6 Hagel (and borrowing from him, Karl Marx) saw history as a dialectical process, where an established order (thesis) gets challenged by a counterforce (anti-thesis). Their struggle creates a synthesis, a newly established norm, which, in turn, becomes the thesis prompting a rebellion. This is the zig-zag path through which history evolves. However, neither Hagel nor Marx thought that this evolutionary process was endless. They saw an end of history, where the victory of liberal ideals for Hegel and the establishment of world communism for Marx would create a steady state, stopping the societal evolutionary process. In the destruction of the Berlin Wall, Fukuyama was certain that Western-style liberal democracy had finally overwhelmed the call of the collective.7 But, did it? Or, did the force of the Hegelian dialectic go on along its course of yet another cycle of convulsion, conflict, and conflagration? There were ample reasons for celebrating the forward march of liberal democracy. If we define democracy as a political system, where the top government officials are elected through universal suffrage, in 1900 there was not a single nation on earth that could be considered democratic. In 2019, according to the widely used “Democratic Index,” the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) claimed, nearly 50 percent of nations (75 out of a total of 167) could be classified as democracies.8 By measuring the extent of pluralism, civil liberties, and inclusive political culture, the EIU classifies democratic nations into two groups: “full” and “flawed, with 20 countries were classified as “full democracies,” and 46, as “flawed.” Democratic reforms were touching not only political lives, but also altering economic reality. Fareed Zakaria pointed out that under the liberal order, the world was turning increasingly democratic economically and culturally, where access to prominence is not determined by birth.9 For instance, in traditional societies leaders achieved their positions through hereditary lines, populating the top echelons with scions of the powerful. However, today we see a new elite in all areas of society of those who rose through the ranks not by birth but by merit. As the playing field became increasingly level, the freshly minted millionaires and billionaires or cultural icons did not come from the traditional path of inborn privilege.

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Finally, traditionally, the flow of culture used to be unidirectional: flowing out from the Western nations to the rest of the world. Historian Arnold Toynbee famously predicted that with time, the entire world would be using the Julian calendar, wearing Western clothes, and speaking European languages, notably English. His prescience did come true. However, with globalization, the cultural stream fused into a melting pot, where people all over the world would dance to the latest Bollywood tunes, wear clothes fashioned by South Korean designers, read books by authors from Turkey and Egypt, drink Argentinian wine, and use innovative products of every sort manufactured in China. Today, we do live in a global village. In most major metropolitan cities in the developed world, when we hail a cab, like a crapshoot, we have no idea which part of the world the driver might be from. In contrast to this rosy picture of assimilation stands the authoritarian world. This is the world where dissidents live in constant fear of being physically harmed. In these countries, the minorities must lie low. Freedom of speech and expression must bow before the needs of the country, as defined by the rulers. The most extreme examples of these countries include the communist or former communist nations, such as North Korea, China, and Russia, theocracies such as Iran and Saudi Arabia, and some of the most brutal dictatorial nations of Africa and the Middle East. None of these nations ever had a democratic tradition. It is the case of democracies that are turning toward authoritarianism is our primary concern.

Globalization and its malcontents From time to time, societies seem to go collectively mad.10 The ease with which an entire nation is swayed by the words of a leader to willingly take part in genocide has mystified scholars since the end of World War II. The effort to understand the mindset of ordinary Germans who became Hitler’s willing executioners11 led to the path-breaking study by Adorno et al.12 Although the authors identified a number of personality traits that lead to accepting the unquestioned authority of a leader, they did not link the development of “authoritarian personality” to the external conditions. That link was established earlier by Eric Fromm, who analyzed Nazi ideology and linked it to the psychology of the German people and their deep yearning for restored national pride.13 Fromm suggests there is a propensity to submit to authoritarian regimes when nations or ethnic groups experience a sense of loss and agree to give up their freedom. He called it “negative freedom.”14 Seeking simple solutions to complex questions, people follow the pied pipers of politics into the societal abyss. Xenophobic fear, however, does not spread through the entire population uniformly. Many remain immune to the destructive demands of the demagogues. Although the path to perdition varies from country to country, if we generalize the findings from a wide variety of academic work, we can safely claim that those who are the most vulnerable and need assurance of their place

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in a changing society would be the most vociferous supporters of the politics of division. This vulnerability may be the result of a lack of education, economic opportunity, and exposure to the world outside. Take, for instance, the case of the United States. An exit poll after the 2016 presidential election clearly shows this pattern (Table 10.1).15 The data demonstrate that although the economy is equally important to both the groups, those white voters who are vulnerable felt most afraid of terrorism and immigration and voted for Mr. Trump. For them, the economy was not the most important issue; they were more afraid of immigrants and terrorists. Since in the minds of the most fearful, immigration is closely linked with terrorism, consider Table 10.2. Since the 9/11 attacks, the total number of deaths on American soil from terrorism up to 2017 was 302, which is less than 19 per year. Moreover, about

TABLE 10.1 Exit poll of US election 2016

Voter breakdown (%) Gender Men Women Race White Black Hispanic Asian Other Age 18–29 30–44 45–64 65+ Annual income < $50,000 > $50,000 Education by race White/college graduate White/not college graduate Non-white/college graduate Non-white/not college graduate Most important issues Economy Foreign policy Immigration Terrorism

Clinton (%)

Trump (%)

48 52

41 54

53 42

70 12 11 4 3

37 88 65 65 57

58 8 29 29 37

19 25 40 16

54 50 44 45

37 42 53 52

36 64

52 47

41 49

37 34 13 16

45 28 71 75

49 67 23 20

52 13 13 18

52 60 33 39

42 34 64 57

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TABLE 10.2 Terrorism in the US, 2002–2017

Year

Number of incidents

Number of deaths

Number of injuries

2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 Total

33 33 9 21 6 8 18 11 17 10 20 20 29 38 64 65 402

4 0 0 0 1 0 2 18 4 0 7 23 26 54 68 95 302

11 0 0 0 14 0 13 41 17 2 7 436 19 58 139 932 1,689

Source: National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism Research and Response to Terrorism

half of this number was the work of Islamists, inspired by the call for global Jihad. The rest of the fatalities were the result of far-right hate groups, with a tiny fraction committed by eco-terrorists. Compare these statistics with those of deaths from car accidents and non-terrorist gun violence. The National Safety Council estimates that in 2017 the yearly average was 40,000 car fatalities.16 Yet, a large number of US citizens consider immigration and terrorism as their primary concern. Let us examine more closely the data from the largest constituency of Mr. Trump: Caucasian men. Figure 10.1 presents the voting behavior of this group. I have plotted the demographic data of white males on their preference for the two presidential candidates in the 2016 general election.17 I have arranged the groups according to the difference in the percentage of votes cast for Clinton and Trump. The largest separation of the voting public comes for Evangelical white males, where there is a 60 percent deficit for Clinton. This group ia particularly afraid of being on the wrong side of the culture war. They abhor the availability of abortion, recognition of same sex marriage, and downgrading of the Christian faith in the everyday life of the country. They grew up believing that theirs was a country based on Christian values, steeped in European culture. For them, Mr. Trump’s promise of returning the country to the old days was irresistible. The next group is comprised of white men from rural areas. It is natural for people to be afraid of those with whom they are unfamiliar. Living in isolation, among similar kinds

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77 80 63

70

60

60 50

30

37

31

40 17

20 10 0 Evangelical

Rural Clinton

FIGURE 10.1

Non-College Trump

Voting patterns among white males, 2016

of people, would make them more fearful of foreigners than the urbanites who interact with people from all over the world on a daily basis. Familiarity allows us to recognize the humanity of those who are different from us. The Midwesterners have also felt deeply disrespected by the bi-coastal elite for their beliefs and their lifestyle. Those with deep faith in traditional religious beliefs felt pushed aside. As for the men without college degrees and older Americans, who have struggled to find their place in the high-tech sector, they have seen their opportunities increasingly shrinking. The United States used to be the center of manufacturing and mining in the decades following World War II. These high-paying union jobs – which did not require a college education – assured everyone of middle-class life. However, these jobs started disappearing with the ascendance of cheaper manufacturing in China and elsewhere. By promising to bring those jobs back, Mr. Trump won their support. We should remember that while some of us may celebrate diversity, for others, it represents the closing of doors to economic opportunity. For those who fear that the world passed them by, it was natural to prefer Trump over Clinton. Opinion polls, published in a Brookings Institute Report, further emphasize the feeling of despondence among poor, working-class whites, who see their future in the bleakest possible terms on a scale of 0–10.18 Although not exclusively, these disaffected groups of people form the bedrock of Trump’s support base. No wonder, structural changes like these are causing extreme concentrations of income and are sowing deep economic anxiety among people, clearing the way for protectionist ideologies all over the world. Bill Clinton made famous the golden rule of American politics by saying: “It’s the economy, stupid.” This implies that at the end of the day, it is the pocketbook that determines how someone votes. Yet time and again electoral

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outcomes show that people are inspired to choose a candidate who promises not just prosperity but also embraces their ideological stance, even at the cost of their personal wellbeing. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics, in its annual report, notes that the two sectors that saw a downturn in the otherwise booming economy are agriculture and mining, two mainstays of President Trump’s political base.19 Yet, at the time of writing this book, surveys reveal that his political base has remained largely intact. Many who had lost out due to the president’s trade war with China have accepted their losses as a part of their patriotic duty. In other words, while economics may determine a person’s voting decision, we cannot discount the strength of their collective identity. If we define rationality only by rules of economics, as I have argued, we would have but a truncated understanding of human decision-making processes. From voting to willingly taking part in suicide bombing, the tug of the collective is undeniable. Revolt against globalization has also been on full display in Great Britain as the country pondered if it should remain within the European Union or leave. Similar to the Trump voters, analysis of those who are for Brexit shows that people with less education, older, with lower income, and married (the singles are, presumably more relaxed, while the parents are worried about their children’s future) are more likely to vote for a breakup.20 It is also instructive that while the slogan for the Trump campaign was “Make America great again,” it was “we want our country back” for the Brexiters. To the voters on either side of the pond, the underlying messages of these slogans were crystal clear.

March of authoritarianism When people feel alienated and unmoored, they seek strength in their leaders, who can articulate the vigor and deep conviction in an uncertain world. As a result, authoritarianism is on the march across the world. In 2019, Freedom House reported 13 consecutive years of decline in political rights and civil liberties around the world.21 Soon after the world welcomed the new millennium with wild exuberance, we woke up to the horrifying shock of the 9/11 attacks. In retaliation, the US invaded Afghanistan and then Iraq with the expressed goal of exterminating the menace of terrorism. The shock of these massive assaults destroyed the political order in the Arab Islamic world and made the world even more volatile. Open conflicts in the volatile Middle East were kept in check by a triad of the balance of power among the Sunnis, the Shia, and the secular Baath Party dictatorships in Iraq and Syria. The destruction of Saddam Hussain’s regime toppled the proverbial applecart, pitching the two religious factions – one supported by Saudi Arabia and other by Iran – into frenzied proxy warfare. It affected many countries in the Muslim world, where the Shia and Sunni had lived side by side, albeit often in uneasy peace. The full brunt of the internecine conflict manifested in Yemen and Syria. In Yemen, the Iranian-backed Houthis

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challenged the entrenched powers of the rival Sunnis, financed by Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries. In Syria, the Sunnis fought the Assad regime under the black flag of ISIS and other al-Qaeda inspired groups. When the so-called Arab Spring began, it threatened countries such as Syria and Bahrain. Both are ruled by minorities: Syria by the Shia and Bahrain by the Sunni. Bahrain was able to squash the rebellion with help from fellow oil-rich Sunni Gulf countries. The desert spring did not bloom flowers of liberal democracy in the arid soil of the Middle East. Beside some token progress in Tunisia and Jordan, the dreams of democracy died on the vine. In Egypt, after the ousting of the military dictator Hosni Mubarak, the electorate voted in the Muslim Brotherhood, which immediately set out to undermine democratic reforms and was soon thrown out by the Egyptian military in a coup d’état, placing Abdel Fattah el-Sisi in power. In Saudi Arabia, hopes soared with the ascendance of a young prince, Mohamad bin Salman, to power. He was widely hailed as a reformer. Yet hopes for progress quickly disappeared along with the dismembered body of the dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The worldwide demand for freedom for the Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi got her out of almost two decades of house arrest. Through the electoral process she became the equivalent of the prime minister of Burma. Yet, dreams for democratic reform were dashed as she lent support for gross human rights abuses against the Rohingya, who had to flee across the border to Bangladesh to face a yet unknown future. India, the largest functioning democracy in the world, fell for the authoritarian spell of Narendra Modi. His Hindu nationalist Bhartiya Janata Party is becoming increasingly assertive in making secular India a Hindu nation.22 Hopes were also high for democratic reform in China when, in 1977, Deng Xiaoping launched “Beijing Spring,” attempting to liberalize the communist country. However, the demand for political freedom far outpaced what the ruling Chinese Communist Party was willing to grant. In current China, Xi Jinping is consolidating near-absolute power at an increasing rate and is poised to become chairman for life. The Philippines saw the election of Rodrigo Duterte, a man who freely admits to killing people and enthusiastically advocates extrajudicial killings of drug lords and criminals.23 With the possible exception of Japan and South Korea, strong men, arriving through “democratic” processes, are ruling nearly the entire Asian region and showing little or no adherence to the values of liberal democracy. This also appears to be the case with many of the former Soviet republics in Central and Eastern Europe. A plurality of Russians is comfortable electing and re-electing Vladimir Putin, rotating between presidency and prime ministership. People who risked so much to defect to the West, or dreamt of introducing Western liberal democratic values to their own countries, are now choosing to be ruled by dictators and former Communist Party bosses. In Israel, the right-wing Likud Party and its increasingly

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authoritarian partners are being repeatedly voted into power. The rule of the authoritarian and demagogic Robert Mugabe went on unimpeded in Zimbabwe for decades until his death in 2017. In Latin America, populism built on the electoral successes of Hugo Chavez and his successor Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela spread into neighboring Ecuador and Bolivia and also into other countries.24 Brazil elected Jair Bolsonaro, an authoritarian far-right leader, often dubbed the “Trump of the tropics.” Even democratic Chile, forgetting the lessons of a brutal military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, is reversing the course of democracy. While fighting rising protest demonstrations caused by a stalling economy, President Sebastián Piñera is following the path that reminds many observers of the country’s sad history.25 Even in Western European nations, which have long been a bastion of democracy, the far-right authoritarians are in ascendance. In France, Marine Le Pen of the Front National showed her electoral strength by winning in the first round of the presidential election in 2017. We have seen unprecedented gains for the rabidly anti-immigrant Lijst Pim Fortuyn party in the traditionally liberal Netherlands, which took a sudden right turn after the assassination of the television personality, Theo van Gogh by a fanatical Islamist in 2004. Similar gains have been noted for the People’s Party in Switzerland and Denmark, the Austrian Freedom Party, and the Swedish Democrats. Drawing on data from ParlGov.data, Norris and Ingelhart have shown that the percentage of votes cast for authoritarian candidates in 34 countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in the past five years has doubled since the 1970s and 1980s.26 Finally, it is quite revealing to see that a global fraternity is developing among the authoritarian rulers. Such a development may portend an ominous future for democracy all over the world.

The future of fear Is the world becoming more violent over the years? Some scholars, most notably MIT cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker, would argue that despite the contrary perception, we are living in the best of times. In his much-discussed book, The Better Angels of Our Nature, Pinker assembles records of homicide and violence from the Paleolithic period.27 He argues that these days we are much more likely to die of natural causes than from homicidal violence. By examining fossil and other historical and anthropological records, he argues that for those of us living in the organized states (apart from the “failed states” and other conflict zones), our chances of facing a violent death are minuscule. Although it can be argued that the decline in death rates is, at least partially, the result of improved medical technology and rapid interventions both in the battlefields and in the large cities, there is no reason to doubt his claims.

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However, looking into the post-World War II era, we can see evidence of increasing political violence, as shown in Figure 10.2. Forecasting is a perilous job. However, if we understand the causal links that bind what we are about to forecast (the dependent variable) to a number of determining factors (causal variables), our job becomes somewhat easier. If migration, labor replacing technology, the penetration of the Internet, and the effects of global warming have contributed to the rise of widespread fear, we can hazard an informed guess by looking at the trends.

Migration Migration has been part and parcel of human societal evolution, even before the species staked its claims for humanity. The pre-humans, such as the Neanderthals, the Denisovans, and long before them, the likes of Homo Erectus – when the distinction between humans and apes was not well defined – spread across the African continent and then to the rest of the world. There is no documented fossil record – other than their interbreeding, detected through the breakthrough in genomic technology – of what happened when the Cro-Magnons first came across the Neanderthals. However, if chimpanzee behavior is any guide, we can assume that the meetings were not always amorous. Since then, the peripatetic have colonized every corner of the habitable earth in continuing waves of migration, causing violent conflicts. It is of little wonder that the speed of migration of people, culture, and ideas would sow discord. In the US, anti-immigrant sentiments gave birth to the virulent nativist “Know Nothing” party in the mid-1800s. Its wrath was aimed at the newly arrived Catholics, especially from Southern Europe.28 Rumors started spreading 60 50 40 30 20 10

1946 1949 1952 1955 1958 1961 1964 1967 1970 1973 1976 1979 1982 1985 1988 1991 1994 1997 2000 2003 2006 2009 2012 2015 2018

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FIGURE 10.2

Number of armed conflicts

Source: Data courtesy of the Uppsala Conflict Data Program.

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that the pope was sending his flocks to wrest power from the Protestants. Since most people were first- or second-generation immigrants back then, when asked which foreigners they were targeting, the xenophobes would answer, “I know nothing.” Their blind rage gave the Native American Party the unflattering nickname. Today, migration is changing the demographic and cultural landscape of the world at an ever-increasing rate. In 1950’s census, 89.8 percent of the US population was classified as “whites.” In 2010, when the last census was taken, this number had reduced to 72.4 percent. This pace of demographic shift is projected to accelerate in the coming decades and, by 2050, whites are likely to lose their majority status. In France in 2000, 84.9 percent of the population was born of both French parents; by 2010 the percentage of this cohort had reduced to 80.1 percent.29 This pattern is evident in nearly every single Western nation.30 There are currently 64 million forced migrants in the world fleeing wars, hunger, persecution, and the effects of climate change, in search security and a way out of poverty. United Nations forecasts estimate that there could be anywhere between 25 million and 1 billion environmental migrants by 2050. Understanding the climate change–migration nexus will prove instrumental in addressing our current climate emergency.31 I have plotted the number of international immigrants in Figure 10.3, with the dotted line showing an exponential trend. As the Rohingyas spill over the borders of Bangladesh from Myanmar, the North Africans into Europe, and Central Americans into the United States, the native population gets rattled. In the US, the waves of immigration from Ireland and Italy created political consternation. For the natives, the firm grounds of racial, religious, linguistic, and national identities get shaken up, making them anxious, insecure, and hostile.

300 250 200 150 100 50 0 1970 FIGURE 10.3

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Source: UN World Migration Report 2018.

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The sight of mass suffering creates a heart-wrenching dilemma in countries all over the world. As a result, natural human empathy battles with the fear of not only welcoming strangers in our midst but also the prospect of losing our own national and cultural identities. As some strive to open the doors to the refugees, others vow to keep those firmly shut. Research in social psychology is unequivocal in demonstrating the anxiety people feel about the actual or imaginary prospect of losing their dominant majority status, even in a laboratory setup.32 This fear of outsiders, however, does not get distributed randomly throughout the population. Those who are protected by their wealth, education, and specialized skills tend to feel secure enough to cast a benign eye to the newcomers. In contrast, those who already feel vulnerable see them as sources of potential competition. Many political leaders exploit this deep-seated anxiety and use it effectively to gain power.

Technological changes From the time humans developed tools, every invention has been designed to reduce the need for labor, creating winners and losers. However, at the core of peoples’ concerns over new technologies is the assumption that the job market and other opportunities are played along the predictable outcome of a zero-sum game, where one man’s gain is another man’s loss. This is an ageold argument. At the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, in 1589, when William Lee wanted to get a patent for his stocking frame knitting machine, Queen Elizabeth refused his application, saying “Consider thou what the invention could do to my poor subjects. It would assuredly bring to them ruin by depriving them of employment, thus making them beggars.”33 Nearly 300 years later, in 1811, another panic spread among the textile workers in Nottingham, England. They organized a protest movement based on a secret pact among its members to attack the factories and smashing the machinery. The Luddites, a name taken from the movement’s leader, Ned Ludd, had to be suppressed with extreme violence by the factory owners and the government. Since then there have been other major disruptions in the market, such as during the mid-1800s with the introduction of electrical power and in the mid-1960s with the use of computers and automation. While these innovations brought unimaginable wealth and prosperity to the world, there were losers among those who were replaced by the new technologies. Unlike the Luddites, we don’t smash up new instruments of production, but we do feel the same anxiety. This anxiety is fueling fear and loathing in many parts of Europe and North America. In 1940, 23 percent of the population of the US was employed in the manufacturing sector. This number dwindled to only about 10 percent in 2010. This disappearance of manufacturing employment was filled by service sector jobs, which registered an increase from 19 percent to 48 percent during the same period.34 This structural change in employment has had a profound impact

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on the dwindling of the middle class and the putative “American Dream,” which guaranteed a comfortable living to anyone working hard. Today’s “gig economy,” much hailed by some, is basically an unstable source of livelihood. The news of self-driving cars or robots delivering packages can bring joy to those who don’t drive trucks or cabs, but can truly frighten hundreds of thousands of those who do. While it is a hotly debated matter of what the employment structure is going to be like in the future, it is clear that since the end of the hay days of manufacturing in the US, many of those who lost their jobs, failed to find something that paid as much as their old factory jobs, protected by the unions.35 Jobs declined in mining and agriculture. Many had to drop out of the labor force or take jobs in the booming service sector for a much lower salary.36 In the long run, however, it is clear that technological progress creates a positive sum game, where the economy prospers and most people win out. Unfortunately, this winning is not uniform. Many suffer; small towns that depended on manufacturing, mining, or agriculture die out or become shadows of their old selves. Families get torn apart, some have to settle for less attractive places and never regain their old levels of living. And, meanwhile, such changes cause intense fear and apprehension.

Income gap The market is guided by one inexorable rule: it continues to concentrate in the hands of the few. Even in the countries that offer the greatest social mobility, the forces that combine money with power and privilege with opportunity, create conditions where fewer and fewer people accumulate more and more money. Until the nineteenth century the mercantilist philosophy of selling products abroad for gold and restricting imports ran supreme among the policymakers and common people alike. In 1817 David Ricardo shook up the prevailing wisdom by arguing the virtues of comparative advantage. According to his theory, each country should specialize in producing commodities that it can manufacture with the greatest efficiency and then obtain the maximum benefits by trading these goods freely with others. This law of comparative advantage has been one of the few rules of economics that its practitioners can more or less agree upon. The advent of communication and transportation technologies opened up the floodgates of trade. World Trade Organization data show that the volume of global trade increased by nearly five folds in current dollars between 1993 and 2014.37 The data also show that this is an increasing trend. As burgeoning transnational trade lifted millions, particularly in China and India, out of abject poverty into the middle class and significantly reduced consumer prices in the OECD countries, the richer nations went through a painful restructuring where well-paid manufacturing jobs, secured by strong labor unions, dried up. These were substituted by low-paying service jobs with little or no job security or prospect for advancements. The character of the United

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States has changed. If we take 1991as the baseline, in 2011 employment in the non-manufacturing sector went up about 35 percent, while it declined by almost the same percentage in the manufacturing sector. The restrictions on upward mobility for those with less education and exposure to the outside world, coupled with the growing economic advantages of those with higher education and with entrepreneurial flair, are deepening income inequality. Millennia ago, Aristotle (322 BC), looking for causes of political upheavals identified the middle class as the pillar that holds up the big tent of a stable society. When the middle class is weakened and society is divided into two extreme classes, he foresaw crime and revolution. Recent studies lend support to the ancient scholar’s sagacious assertion.38 The current data, coming in various forms, clearly demonstrate the steady erosion of the middle class in the United States and elsewhere. Taking a different angle, Sharma examined the rise of billionaires in the world between 2009 and 2014.39 In every country, the number of these super-wealthy has registered a sharp increase. Among all the countries, however, the US has registered by far the largest increase from 1,011 to 1,826, an astonishing 80 percent jump during the five years of his study. Simon Kuznet, in his influential work, argued that across the path of economic development, income distribution resembles a U-shaped curve.40 That is, when a country is mired in poverty and in a pre-industrialized state, most people are almost on an equal basis. However, when industrialization is introduced, the agricultural sector falls behind the fast-moving industrial sector, causing a large disparity of income. However, when the country reaches a certain level of development, science and technology impact how crops are grown, stored, and sold, allowing the traditional agricultural sector to achieve its industrial revolution. At that point, income disparity is reduced. Previously, the process of industrialization used to take generations to penetrate. However, in the age of computers, the Internet, and global trade and commerce, market forces are making income distribution worse, not only between but also within nations. In my previous work, I showed that when the distribution of income creates a society where the middle class begins to break down, it creates conditions for political instability and violence. Recent technological progress is exacerbating this trend.41 Today, the world’s richest 1 percent – those with more than $1 million – own 45 percent of the wealth. Adults with less than $10,000 in wealth make up 64 percent of the world’s population but hold less than 2 percent of global wealth. The world’s wealthiest individuals, those owning over $100,000 in assets, total less than 10 percent of the global population but own 84 percent of global wealth.42 Today, even in the OECD countries, the gap between rich and poor is at its highest level during the past 30 years. The richest 10 percent of the population in the OECD area earn 9.5 times the income of the poorest 10 percent; in the 1980s this ratio stood at 7:1 and has been rising continuously ever since.

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However, the rise in overall income inequality is not only about surging top income shares; often, incomes at the bottom grew much slower during the prosperous years and fell during downturns, putting relative (and in some countries, absolute) income poverty on the radar of policy concerns.43 The yawning income gap and its derivative, the disparity in infant mortality between the rich and the poor, can be seen when we take a look at the ratio between the richest and the poorest nation. Let us compare the wealthiest and the poorest nations on earth: Luxemburg and the Central African Republic. According to the CIA World Factbook for 2019, Luxembourg, with a per capita income of $105,100 has an eye-popping ratio of 150 to the Central African Republic with a per capita income of $700. A child born in the Central African Republic has a 25 times higher probability of dying then a newborn in Luxembourg (84.3/1,000 births vs. 3.4/1,000). It should come as a little surprise to understand why people from poor countries would want to migrate to the affluent parts of the world.

Information, misinformation, and 24-hour news cycle On February 27, 1968, the CBS news anchor Walter Cronkite came out against the Vietnam War. The entire nation took notice. Thirty-three days later, realizing that if he had lost Cronkite, he had lost the nation, President Johnson announced that he would not seek re-election. For the Americans in the age before the Internet and cable news, there was no other source of information but three national networks. Today, information is not only instantaneous but also its sources are numerous. With so much information floating around, there is no trust in any single source. In fact, over time, peoples’ trust in every national and international institution has eroded. Some of us don’t trust the government, especially if the message does not match our beliefs. We dismiss data from the Census Bureau or the Bureau of Labor Statistics as “political.” We don’t trust public servants. Some of us don’t have faith in medical doctors or academics, assuming they are in the pockets of powerful economic actors or are blinded by their ideologies. We uniformly don’t trust the news media as some show clear ideological biases. There is an erosion of trust in expertise, in general. A lifelong pursuit of knowledge stands on an equal footing with gut feelings. A 2019 survey found how confused the public is about the veracity of the daily information they receive.44 An anarchic world without trust weakens civil society, paving the way for falsehood to be embraced in the presence of provable facts. In desperation, some of us succumb to conspiracy theories, allowing the demagogues and other conspirators to come to power. Anxiety abounds. In the past, the news of terrorist attacks and acts of political violence took place out of sight of most people. Today, every sensational attack is carried out in front of cameras, often in real-time, and later to be played over and over on our television and computer screens.

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Acts of terrorism, by definition, are a mixture of violence with theater, where the perpetrators stage the macabre, adding to our sense of shared insecurity. In laboratory experiments, when mice receive a mild electric shock if they go to one particular corner of the cage, they learn to avoid it. However, if they are shocked at random intervals and random places, they become confused and disoriented and start exhibiting behavior typical of being under extreme stress. Their brains show the physical impact of enlargement of the centers of emotion. Current neurological research is establishing connections between reports of terrorism and stress that we all feel. There are reasons to believe that the constant news of random human cruelty from beheadings to sexual enslavement of young girls, as well as attacks in neighborhood churches, mosques, temples, and synagogues, replicate in humans the stressful conditions in the brains of the laboratory mice, making us prone to seek quick but reckless remedies. In his inaugural speech in 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, facing the perils of the Great Depression and a war in Europe, made famous the phrase “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.” In this environment of intellectual vacuum, fear feeds on itself as we open ourselves to be manipulated by well-coordinated meddlers. Fear leads some to seek authoritarian rulers, while others become radicalized and join terrorist organizations. An in-depth RAND Europe study reported the process of radicalization through the Internet of 17 individuals who took part in terrorist activities.45 The Internet creates opportunities to become radicalized by allowing people to establish virtual networks of like-minded people in a digital world, disregarding geographical distances. For instance, Andres Breivik, the Norwegian terrorist made a common cause with anti-Muslim Hindu extremists through the Internet.46 In these virtual communities, participants develop their own echo chambers, complete with hierarchy and nodal points, where some of them accumulate social capital to become leaders within the community.47 The central message of some of these virtual communities is that their religion, culture, or ethnicity is facing an existential threat. The only solution to this menace is to rise up in violent retribution against the “enemy.” The spread of these messages through the works of the digital influencers and rabid cable and radio talk shows, as well the words of the national leaders, pours fuel to the fire of xenophobic hatred. When ordinary citizens demand retribution against a group that has perpetrated a violent act, the opportunistic leaders seem all too eager to oblige them. In their zeal to inflict demonstrated pain on the offending members of the terrorist groups, nations often overreact. The brutal reprisal perpetuates the cycle of violence. It is not only the volume of media coverage that generates public concern about terrorism, but also the pronouncements of the political leaders that make the general public fearful. Expedient political leaders, by their overstated rhetoric, promote a culture of hysteria. This exaggerated fear causes many to seek simple and “common sense” solutions. These so-called solutions, however, are often inimical to the democratic principles and processes of the

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state; the lands of the fearful turn toward authoritarian leaders, giving up their rights and freedom.

Cyber attacks and cyber security The Internet that would change the world was created with a humble ambition. Funded by the Department of Defense’s Advanced Research Project Administration (DARPA), the prototype built in the late 1960s was an experimental project designed for a small network of users to communicate among themselves. It took its current form in 1990 with the invention of the World Wide Web. Today, the Internet is so intertwined with our day to lives that we cannot even imagine life off the grid. Such dependency, however, has brought not only the wonderful world of digital convenience, but it has also created the possibility of attacks that disable order and tear into the very fabric of our social and political lives and military security. I have discussed the issues of online radicalization. Besides radicalization, there are other areas where a foreign actor can inflict serious damage on democratic institutions by a coordinated effort at undermining electoral processes. We have witnessed the specter of foreign intervention in the US and French presidential elections. These days, malicious conspiracy theories float through virtual space infecting many minds. As we network with friends and like-minded people through social media, we can mobilize an army of disaffected people. Facing criticism that the giants of social media, Facebook and Twitter, are destabilizing our democratic system, these tech companies along with the rest of us face a dilemma. Who determines what is proper and what is not? Can we rely of a handful of computer programmers, using an algorithm, to fish out the false stories from trillions of messages? Similar to any instrument, the Internet can be used for promoting democracy or to tighten the grip of oppression by authoritarian regimes. The demand for democratic reforms during the Arab Spring began when young men and women started mobilizing using social media. They organized protests everywhere by using Twitter and Facebook. Being concerned, Hosni Mubarak in Egypt closed down the Internet. The authoritarian rulers in China, Saudi Arabia, North Korea, Iran, and elsewhere define inappropriate discussion based on what is good for those in power.48 To have total control over online activities, China created its own version of the Internet and social media, where even a mention of the Tiananmen Square massacre or political upheaval is automatically blocked or the author may be identified and punished. In other authoritarian countries, any criticism of the rulers would meet with the same fate. Anticipating widespread protest when India decided to scrap Kashmir’s special status in 2019, it barred the residents of the state from using the Internet.49 In contrast, democracies restrained by their constitutions guaranteeing freedom of speech and expression, find it nearly impossible to impede the flow of willful

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misinformation. How we deal with this important threat is part of a heated debate. Apart from promoting protest demonstrations and online radicalization, the Internet is a potent weapon in the hands of those who can stage sustained cyber attacks. Our dependence on the Internet for nearly every aspect of our lives makes us vulnerable. Malevolent actors can attack the electric grid, air traffic control, banks, hospitals, and every government or corporate entity. Cyber attacks are not designed to kill people. However, there is a possible exception in the use of the Stuxnet virus.50 It is a computer “worm” that was in the making for some time by the members of the US and Israeli governments to thwart Iran’s nuclear ambitions.51 The computer bug made the centrifuges – the fast-spinning machines that enrich uranium – hidden deep inside a mountain in Iran spin out of control without the operators detecting their erratic speed. As a result, the centrifuges start exploding. Stuxnet destroyed 1,000 of Iran’s 6,000 centrifuges. Iran claimed that the resulting explosions killed Iranian scientists and machine operators. If so, Stuxnet was the first computer virus to kill human beings. We can be assured that this is just the beginning. Although we all recognize the perils of a devastating cyber attack, we do not know the best strategy of deterrence. If a country sends out a group of terrorists across its border or shoots missiles, they come with a return address. The captured terrorists talk and the missile fragments lay bare where they were manufactured. However, there is no such declaration of the origins of cyber attacks.52 The attribution of a specific source of the attacks proves to be a major obstacle for a policy to meet the hazards of state-sponsored strikes in the digital space. If we falsely attribute a hit to another country, there can be major retaliation. Also, if we keep our eyes on the known adversaries, other countries can find an opening due to our lack of attention. On the other hand, if we do not respond to these attacks, we may embolden our enemies and open ourselves for more serious assaults. In any case, given our ever-increasing dependency on the Internet, there is no doubt that the threat of cyber strikes is likely to increase significantly with time, perhaps leading to actual warfare in real space.

Climate change When we look at the television newscast, we often see desperate people running for safety into other countries to evade armed conflicts. Yet, experts at the US national security agencies believe that the problem is far more acute and likely to intensify from the effects of global climate change.53 According to a Department of Defense report, natural disasters, caused by the warming of the world and the rising of sea levels are among the primary national security concerns.54 Throughout history, changes in the world’s climate have altered the course of human social evolution. Periodic warming and cooling of the earth, caused mostly by natural phenomena, have led to huge displacements of people from

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the affected areas, giving rise to violent conflicts across time and geographic space. Indus Valley civilization disappeared as a result of the changing course of the River Sindh. Climate change is a major suspect behind the displacement of people, especially in Mesoamerica. Before the formation of nation-states, largescale migrations created tribal warfare. These days, they give rise to ultranationalism and consequent political violence. Yet, perhaps due to the multidisciplinary nature of the question, the link between climate change and conflict has remained largely unexplored. As the process of global warming accelerates, the danger of violent conflicts increases. Advancements in technologies have allowed a third of the global population to live within 100 kilometers of the coast, where human suffering is likely to be the greatest.55 As a result of this accelerated warming process, aided by human activities, hurricanes and typhoons are intensifying, putting at risk many coastal areas. Rising sea levels are likely to obliterate several island nations. The Quadrennial Defense Review shows that not only are coastal countries and major cities affected, but also there are over 30 US military bases and installations that are currently being impacted.56 A Google search of future maps of large metropolitan cities by the coast yields a frightening picture. The impact of global warming will not be restricted to coastal flooding. The warming trend might make large swaths of land across the world virtually uninhabitable. The melting of glacier ice in the Himalayan mountain range will have a severe impact on the flow of the most important water system feeding the needs of the entire subcontinent of nearly two billion inhabitants by around 2050. While those in the wealthy nations might be better able to adapt, the residents of the poorer nations will far more be exposed to the loss of lives and livelihoods. Climate change is already causing large-scale migrations to other countries by the least educated and the least prepared to be internally displaced, creating widespread xenophobia. The rise of social media and cable television is adding fuel to the fire. Like a perfect storm, this alarming trend is being reflected in the rise of authoritarian regimes in many parts of the world. In psychological terms, the deep division along ideological lines is known as affective polarization. This is a situation where divergent views of politics are not restricted within the sphere of discussions and debates but become so emotive that people experience deep distress when having normal social interaction with people with opposite views.57 They dislike and distrust one another to the point where they form social groups exclusively of like-minded friends and relatives. Study shows that in the 1960s, in the US only 5 percent of the people thought that they would be unhappy if their child married someone with opposite political views. In 2019, the same figure was over 30 percent.58 Scholars blame compartmentalized sources of information, the rise of social media, and most importantly, social, political, and entertainment elites promoting division. The outcome of this widespread fear and uncertainty may be catastrophic for global peace and prosperity. In March 2020, the global watchdog group

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Freedom House announced its ominous findings with the headline, “Democracy and Pluralism Under Assault.”59 Compared to 2018, the report claims 64 countries experienced a deterioration of their political rights and civil liberties, while only 37 experienced improvements. Both in democracies and authoritarian regimes, ethnic and religious minorities have experienced increased abuses.

The fragility of an integrated world: the consequences of the death of trust Perhaps, I should end this chapter with the as-yet unfolding story of the spread of the novel Coronavirus. The sudden spread of the pathogen, raising the specter of a pandemic around December 2019, sent a shockwave testing the fragility of the superstructure, which allowed us to invoke the image of a global village. The assault from an invisible enemy created a common enemy with no regard for national boundaries, religion, culture, or even wealth. From everywhere along the political spectrum, there were calls for the setting aside of “politics” and building of a united front, obliterating all boundaries. However, if the presence of a shared enemy was supposed to unify the world, the presence of nationalism cast a shadow over international cooperation. President Trump started calling Coronavirus the “Chinese virus,” while China saw the dark hands of the US in creating and spreading it across the world. Even in the US, ideology colored the perception of the looming threat. While investors lost over a third of their asset value, the major cities were in lockdown, and social distancing a mantra, a Monmouth University poll found a strict political divide in how Republican, Democrats, and independents viewed the crisis.60 It found that 60 percent of Democrats considered the situation as having a major impact, while only 40 percent of the Republicans believed so. Not only that, despite the clear and present danger of a major recession and pandemic, 75 percent of Republicans thought that the country was on the right path. In contrast, about 10 percent of Democrats saw it that way. Predictably, the independents fell in the middle. While it is impossible to forecast the course of the disease or its immediate effect on the global economy, it is clear that the tear in the fabric that kept the world together will take a long time to mend. The future course of the world depends on our leaders’ abilities to keep in check their populist urges for political gains. Given our history, there is hardly a reason for reassurance. In times of crises, while leaders consolidate their power, their political ambitions may add more fuel to the spread of tribalism and authoritarianism. In sum, as our individual interest of “every man for himself” comes into conflict with the needs of the collective, unless we are able to listen to our better selves, then based on current trends, the world might well be on its way for the fifth wave of political violence and terrorism.

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Summary Today the world rotates between hope and fear. While the recent decades of unprecedented global prosperity have raised billions out of abject poverty, they have also seen the rise of extreme inequality in wealth, both within and between nations. Spectacular technological progress has made products cheaper, but at the same time, the resulting rapid changes have created a condition of high anxiety among many. This anxiety has spawned xenophobia, which is giving rise to a disturbing trend toward authoritarianism and tribalism. While fear is a necessary ingredient for the preservation of life, at a societal level, it leads to xenophobic hysteria. I argue that there are three broad areas of anxiety: economic, cultural, and demographic. Having to compete with workers in a global marketplace has taken away job security, especially for the unskilled and semi-skilled. At the same time, the dramatic advent of communication and transportation technologies is rapidly altering the cultural and demographic patterns, especially through large-scale migration. At the same time, the swift penetration of the Internet and social media has been a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it has spread the ideals of freedom and human rights; on the other hand it has facilitated the dissemination of hateful messages of ethnocentrism, religious fanaticism, xenophobia, and a cult-like embrace of the strong men in power. These mega-trends of tribalism and authoritarianism are likely to intensify from external forces, particularly, global climate change, with consequent sea-level rises and shortening planting seasons. The nations that are least able to withstand such changes are sending out desperate refugees across their borders. This increasing trend, similar to a tsunami, is likely to threaten global peace and stability like no time in the past. Rapoport identified four waves of international terrorism. What is most disturbing is that when we need to act globally to address these problems, we are increasingly becoming more fractured. The political upheaval caused by changes may be the fifth wave that could rock the world.

Notes 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Rapoport (2005). Kohn (1965). Anderson (2003: 4). Hobsbawm (1977: 13). Fukuyama (1992). Ibid.: 1. www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/11/06/berlin-wall-fell-years-ago-itsshadow-looms-large/?arc404=true. www.eiu.com/n/. Zakaria (2007). Gupta (2001a). Goldhagen (1996). Adorno et al. (1950). Fromm (2013). Ibid.

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15 https://verdict.justia.com/2018/02/16/trumps-base-broadly-speaking. 16 www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2018/02/15/national-safety-council-trafficdeaths/340012002/. 17 www.dataforprogress.org/blog/2018/8/21/data-for-politics-14-who-is-trumps-base. 18 Putman et al. (2016). 19 www.bls.gov/emp/tables/employment-by-major-industry-sector.htm. 20 McGill (2016). www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/06/brexit-vote-stat istics-united-kingdom-european-union/488780/. Also see, Ashcroft (2019). 21 Freedom House. https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/freedom-world2019. 22 Chatterjee et al. (2019). 23 Miller (2018). 24 Garcia (2017). 25 www.nytimes.com/2019/11/01/opinion/chile-is-in-danger-of-repeating-its-past. html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage. 26 Norris and Inglehart (2018). 27 Pinker (2012). 28 Cogliano (1999). 29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_France#Births_by_citizenship_of_ the_parents. 30 Migration Policy Institute Report (2017) www.migrationpolicy.org. 31 www.climateforesight.eu/migrations/environmental-migrants-up-to-1-billion-by2050/. 32 Crano and Prislin (2008). 33 Frey and Osborn (2013: 6). 34 www.census.gov/newsroom/cspan/1940census/CSPAN_1940slides.pdf. 35 Editorial (2019) “Job Loss Due to AI – How Bad Is It Going to Be?” Skynet Today. www.skynettoday.com/editorials/ai-automation-job-loss DoD 11/5/19. 36 www.brookings.edu/blog/techtank/2018/04/18/will-robots-and-ai-take-your-jobthe-economic-and-political-consequences-of-automation/. 37 World Trade Organization Database (2015). https://timeseries.wto.org. 38 Gupta (1990). 39 Sharma (2016). 40 Kuznet (1955). 41 Gupta (1990). 42 Inequality.org. 43 OECD. http://englishbulletin.adapt.it/wpcontent/uploads/2014/12/oecd_9_12_ 2014.pdf. 44 State of Facts (2019) The Associated Press and NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. http://apnorc.org/PDFs/USA%20Facts%202019/Topline%20Results%20%20Early.pdf. 45 www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/RR400/RR453/RAND_ RR453.pdf. 46 https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Norway-killers-pro-Hindutva-rant-hasSangh-squirming/articleshow/9376574.cms DoD 11/17/2019. 47 Robb (2007). 48 www.nytimes.com/2019/11/19/opinion/iran-internet-ban.html. 49 By using machine learning algorithm, it is not only possible to track the spread of ideas through the Internet, but it is also possible to forecast when and where protests will take place (Ramakrishnan et al., 2015). In the hands of an authoritarian regime, such techniques can be tools of repression. 50 Nakashima and Warrick (2012). 51 Bergman and Mazzetti (2019). 52 Baliga et al. (2019).

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53 www.lawfareblog.com/climate-change-and-national-security-part-i-what-threatwhens-it-coming-and-how-bad-will-it-be. 54 www.npr.org/2017/09/10/549989643/how-natural-disasters-make-major-citiesvulnerable-to-national-security-threats/. 55 www.nrdc.org/onearth/climate-change-already-driving-mass-migration-aroundglobe. 56 www.dodworkshops.org/files/ClimateChange/Climate_Change_in_DoD_s_QDR.pdf. 57 Iyengar et al. (2019). 58 www.asc.upenn.edu/news-events/annenberg-video/faculty-videos/affective-polariza tion-understanding-division-american. 59 https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2020/leaderless-struggle-democracy. 60 www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/03/23/republicans-agree-with-trump-hesdone-enough-fight-pandemic-impact-will-be-limited/.

11 TERRORISM’S TRAP

Addiction to failure Revenge may be sweet when served cold, but it is sweeter when meted out hot, instantaneous, and laden with bombs and bullets. This is true for dissident groups determined to stage shocking incidents of terrorism as well as organized states that respond to such provocations, creating a never-ending cycle of violence. In this concluding chapter, I will outline the framework of public policies to curb our addiction to failure.

Call to revenge Being targeted for violence by a small group of extremists, particularly from another country, every society feels anger, insecurity, and confusion about how to respond. Among the US presidents, the highest approval rating belongs to George W. Bush. On October 7, 2001 he launched an invasion of Afghanistan. A Gallup poll published on October 21, found an unprecedented 90 percent approval.1 His record of popular support surpassed even his father’s – albeit by only a point – when a decade earlier, the US-led coalition forces returned home victorious against the Iraqi army of Saddam Hussain. However the afterglow of President George H. W. Bush’s remarkable victory in the First Gulf War was short lived. As buyers’ regret set in, he failed to secure a second term. As for his son, a CBS/New York Times poll conducted from May, 18–23, 2007 found dwindling support for the embattled president. By a 10 percent margin, the majority (52 percent) of Americans disapproved of the way George W. Bush was handling the campaign against terrorism.2 A few months earlier an SRBI survey published in Time found that 56 percent of

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Americans believed that US policies in the Middle East were hurting the war on terrorism, with only 29 percent believing that they helped.3 It is, however, ironic that despite a widely unpopular president pursuing a disastrous policy of pre-emptive intervention in Iraq, another CBS/Wall Street Journal poll conducted in March 2007, asked: If the federal government has evidence of groups or countries that are preparing to commit terrorist attacks on the US, should US policy be to attack these groups or countries, or not to attack them until they actually commit a terrorist act? Amazingly, 40 percent of respondents backed the idea of a pre-emptive attack. Only 39 percent thought that the US should wait for an actual attack to take place.4 Conundrum often plagues debates on what to do when terrorists strike. The sight of innocent, unsuspecting people being killed or injured gives all of us a collective sense of insecurity. Some have called post-terror-attack-psychology a product of “cognitive narrowing,” where a society in unison puts on blinkers. Our need for quick and decisive revenge overwhelms the lessons of history. Despite Dr. Martin Luther King’s warning that hate begets hate, on both sides of violent uprising, we tell each other that the only thing our enemies understand is “violent force.” Indeed, revenge is a primal sentiment, fulfilling many of our psychological needs, including righting the perceived injustice and making sure that such atrocities do not happen again in the future.5 Even among primates, the drive to correct past acts of injustice is strong. In fact, a number of studies as well as experiments in social psychology have established the sad fact that people often prefer a position akin to the proverbial cutting off of one’s own nose to spite others; we would readily accept less desirable outcomes just to avenge.6 It is no wonder the law of retribution enshrines “eye for an eye” in the Bible. As a result, the Prisoner’s Dilemma takes both sides hostage – what Mahatma Gandhi famously quipped was blinding everyone.

Optimism bias Why do we collectively delude ourselves by the thinking that all we have to do is to inflict pain on such a scale that the terrorists and their supporters will realize the futility of their actions? Why do we believe that with our fierce reaction, our enemies would cower into submission? When an American president threatens an entire nation with sending it back to the Stone Age through the use of American firepower, we think this it should be enough to knock some sense into these crazed men. During the course of his presidency (and much to the delight of his supporters), several times Donald Trump has threatened to obliterate Afghanistan.7 Let us consider an extremely unlikely scenario. What if we did drop nuclear bombs that killed all 32 million Afghans? Would that stop

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terrorism or the spread of radical Islam? Would we not see violent reactions in every part of the world to our action? In our minds, most of us realize the emptiness of the threat. Yet, why do many continue to believe its effectiveness? Cognitive scientist Tali Sharot studies optimism bias.8 She claims that human beings are irrationally positive about their abilities to shape the future. Jonathan Haidt has extensively studied human brains for the source of happiness and optimism. In his work, he chalks out the neural pathways that induce such a rosy picture of our future actions.9 Why do we have this unrealistic optimism? Sharot argues that optimism is so “essential for our survival that it is hardwired into our most complex organ, the brain.”10 If we were not unrealistic in our capabilities, we would not undertake dangerous missions risking everything. Columbus would have stayed in the comfort of the Spanish Court, Neil Armstrong in Florida, and bin Laden, lapping in luxury in Saudi Arabia.

Use of terrorism as a strategic weapon Acts of terrorism are only a strategy used by dissident groups. Apart from the proclivity to seek revenge and overestimate their abilities, groups take on seemingly mindless attacks out of cold calculation for achieving specific goals. As we have discussed before, some are carried out to bring entire societies into a direct fight, others for spoiling inevitable compromises between moderates on both sides. However, do they help them reach their short-term goals?

Starting a civil war Built in 944, the al-Askari mosque is among the holiest shrines of Shia Islam. The beautiful mosque, with its golden dome, has absolutely no military significance. Yet in February 2006 a small group of armed men walked inside, tied up the guards and set off explosive charges, destroying the dome and causing severe structural damage to the place of worship. Even in the tortured reasoning of sectarian violence such an act is hard to fathom. Yet the goals of the perpetrators were crystal clear: they were inviting a revenge attack from the radical Shiite militias. The forces of the firebrand preacher Moqtada al-Sadr were all too obliging. The resulting bloodbath, which was designed to destroy the middle ground of sanity and reinforced the worst suspicion among the combatants about their respective enemies, strengthened the hands of those who are at the extreme ends of the sectarian divide. Another similar attack on a mosque took place a year and a half later. Predictably, a leader of the black-bearded, black-shirted Shiite militia, the Mahdi Army, told a Western reporter, “The Sunnis made the explosion in Samara. Now we have only one road. If we don’t destroy the Sunnis, they will destroy us.” The radical Sunnis achieved their strategic goal.11 In the perverted logic of the extremists, the politics that invites carnage in their own community in order to increase their support base make perfect sense.

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Let us discuss why organized societies often fall into the terrorists’ trap, giving extremist groups strategic victories.

Being a spoiler Terrorist groups are also sometimes successful in achieving their short-run goals of compelling their opposition to alter the course of certain policies. As we have seen, many of the suicide attacks by Hamas were exquisitely timed to spoil the middle ground of a compromised settlement between the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the Israeli government.12 Predictably, the hawks within and outside the Israeli government won the internal debate. As always, in public debates, fear overwhelmed hope. The Israelis, following the extremists in and out of the government, refused to distinguish between Hamas and the PA. Without exploiting the division between the two and supporting the PA, they were far more interested in viewing the entire Palestinian community as a single entity. On the other side, Yessir Arafat, having less interest in governing the West Bank and the Gaza Strip than being a revolutionary leader, winked and nodded to the campaigners of suicide bombing, destroying the possibilities of trust building with the Jewish population.

Achieving long-term objectives The ultimate goals of radical resistance involve a fundamental change in the power relationship within a society: nationalists want independent states; communists, the end of the capitalist system; and religious fundamentalists, a society built around their own interpretation of the scripture. Scholars, journalists, and politicians alike have often downgraded the abilities of terrorist organizations to achieve their longterm political goals. Let us now examine the history of mass movements and terrorism to see how many of them have been successful in achieving their goals. History, of course, does not speak with one voice and the past is always open to interpretation. However, if we carefully examine the most popular interpretations of history, a certain pattern emerges. As we scrutinize the four waves of modern terrorism, we see that the anarchists did not succeed in making societies non-hierarchical. Their philosophy, which precluded the formation of hierarchical party organizations, did not allow them to achieve their ultimate goals of socio-economic equality. The second wave of terrorism was remarkably successful. The Stern and the Irgun gangs, for instance, were among the significant forces driving out the British and creating the sovereign nation of Israel. Through a campaign of bombing, they were able to create an atmosphere of terror among the British administrators and the war-weary armed forces stationed in the region.13 Similarly, the largely peasant movement, the Mau Mau, was able to successfully attack the European colonialists and the plantation owners to pave the road for Kenyan

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independence.14 After World War II, the French attempted to crush the Algerian independence movement by extreme force.15 Moran points out, Algeria’s National Liberation Front (FLN) rarely possessed the means to conduct sustained operation of any scale. They succeeded despite their limited resources because their adversaries were repeatedly reduced to fighting fire with fire, a disastrous tendency that finally ruined them.16 The more draconian a position that the French military and the associated paramilitary forces took, the stiffer the Algerian resistance became. The cycle of violence was spiralling out of control with the claims of over a million dead and the tales of torture reaching mythical proportion, when a tired French government of Charles de Gaulle, having lost public support at home, granted Algeria independence in 1962. Evidence tells us that the democratic countries, where public policies are determined by popular perception, are rarely able to sustain a repressive campaign, especially outside of their politically boundaries.17 A similar success story for a terrorist organization can be found in the history of Cyprus, which remained under British domination after the end of World War II. The EOKA was a Greek Cypriot nationalist organization that fought for the expulsion of British troops from the island and its political unification with Greece.18 The EOKA’s political aims were partially successful when Cyprus gained its independence in 1960, but, because of the opposition of its Turkish minority and their benefactor, the government in Turkey, the island could not become a part of Greece. The wave of anti-colonial terrorism waned as most of ] European colonies gained their independence in the 1960s, with the last armed resistance achieving its political goal in Angola. UNITA (National Union for Total Independence of Angola) and their rivals the National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA) were able to exhaust the Portuguese colonialists and gained independence in 1975.19 By that time, the third wave of terrorism was well under way. The leftist movements created a worldwide surge of violence. Unlike the anarchists, the new left movement, learning from the success of communist parties in Russia, China, and their client states, began their campaign by forming organized party structures. As the Cold War heated up, the communist giants, particularly the USSR, were also eager to support dissident movements in the West and in the countries of the Western allies. Other left-leaning rulers, such as Fidel Castro of Cuba and Muammar Quaddafi of Libya, lent support to the groups across the globe. As a countermeasure, the US and its allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) helped the reactionary and pro-establishment forces in the third world nations. Groups sprung up in North America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America that challenged the existing political and economic establishments. These terrorist groups and insurgencies, unlike the anti-colonial waves, however, met mostly with

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failure. The IRA, after nearly a century of fighting, failed to unify Ireland by force. The French-Canadian group the Front de Libération du Québec (Québec Liberation Front), commonly known as the FLQ, could not carve a separate French nation out of Canada. The Weathermen, the Symbionese Liberation Army, and the Black Panthers all failed miserably to achieve their political goals. In Latin America, radical groups from Sendero Luminoso to the Tupamaros, despite creating large-scale mayhem, could not change their societies and establish communist regimes. The Sandinistas in Nicaragua, after a long and inconclusive war, joined the democratic political process.20 The FARC in Colombia has been able to hold on to territories under its control in Colombia, only to transform itself into a criminal organization.21 In the Middle East, leftist groups such the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), after decades of fighting, were able to achieve some success in returning the West Bank and Gaza Strip, but were unable to drive the Israelis to the sea, or even get a truly sovereign state for the Palestinians. The Tamil Tigers, after some spectacular victories, suffered a total military defeat in Sri Lanka. In India, the Naxalite movement had little discernible impact on the social and economic structure of the nation. The irredentist Sikh extremist group, the Khalistani Movement, despite creating a huge cycle of violence, disappeared from the scene without achieving any of its political or territorial goals.22 Neither have the Kashmiri insurgents achieved their political goals after six decades of constant fighting.23 The achievements of long-term goals of the current wave of religious warfare are equally meager. With the help of the leftists and a broad coalition of antiShah opposition, the forces of Ayatollah Khomeini were able to establish a Shiite theocratic state. In neighboring Afghanistan – thanks to the assistance of Pakistan and its benefactor, the US – the Taliban were able to expel the mighty USSR military and, after a bitter civil war, were able to form a government in the image of their own Sunni Islamic ideals. At the time of writing this book, it appears that after the US-led forces ousted them, the Taliban are set to come back as a part of the ongoing peace process. However, the rest of the Jihadi movements, from Indonesia to Mali, from Chechnya to Israel, often after decades of fighting, have little to show. The radical Palestinian groups, after getting a Swiss cheese version of the West Bank and an encircled and isolated Gaza Strip, watch helplessly as Israel abandons the two-state policy. In fact, in the Arab world, real promises of change came not as a result of terrorist attacks, but from the non-violent Arab Spring. Although the promises of the movement remain largely unfulfilled, it was able to depose dictators such Zine Ben Ali of Tunisia and Hosni Mubarak in Egypt. The winds of rebellion caused some of the Arab rulers, from Morocco and Jordan to Qatar, to accede to some of the demands for political reform. Unfortunately, the leaderless movement could not sustain itself and the countries went back to their previous status quo. From our discussion, we see an emerging pattern. The most successful wave of terrorism included those groups that aimed at expelling foreign occupiers

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from their lands. From the anti-colonial movements in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, the current crop of successful groups fought an enemy that came across its political boundaries. The Taliban gained victories against the Soviet military, Hezbullah in Lebanon was successful against the Israelis, just like the Algerian FLN won against the French, while the Mau Mau in Kenya, EOKA in Cyprus, and the Jewish gangs in Palestine were able to drive out the British forces. After Indonesia invaded and occupied the island called Portuguese Timor in 1975 under the pretext of fighting communism, the East Timorians fought a brutal fight and were able to expel the ruthless Indonesian army in 1999 to form their own nation. It is extremely important to recognize that in each case the occupying force lost its will and did not consider the benefits of holding onto power to be worth the cost in lost lives, popular support, and international reputation. This is true not only for violent terrorist groups but also for non-violent movements, such as that led by Mahatma Gandhi in India. Thus, after a careful study of the history of the Indian anti-colonial movement, French is correct in pointing out, “the British left India because they lost control over the crucial areas of administration and lacked the will and the financial or military ability to recover that control.”24 The loss of public support is so-called “Vietnam syndrome,” and it is public support that finally makes terrorism and insurgencies victorious. In contrast, where a more powerful government (and the people it represents) considers the fight central to its national identity and does not lose its political will, decadesold or even century- old struggle by dissident groups, however bloody, fails to achieve its political goal. The IRA could not unite the entire island because, if it were up to the British government, it would have left its northern enclave a long time ago. It was the threat that the Protestant majority felt in being absorbed into Catholic Ireland that kept the struggle going.25 If, after the Brexit vote and the prosperity of an increasingly secular Republic of Ireland, the island is reunited, it will be without bloodshed. Similarly, despite 60 years of insurgency and violence, the Islamic militant groups based in Pakistan have not been able to loosen the grip of Indian government in Kashmir.26 The Indians, in general, accept the costs of the fight and refuse to give in. The Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka maintained a hugely expensive – both in terms of human lives and in terms of lost income – civil war, but they were not able to carve out an independent Tamil nation in the north.27 The lesson that we can draw from this discussion is that while terrorist organizations are most often able to achieve their short-term strategic objectives, very few can reach their long-term goals. They can do so only when the protagonist government loses its will to fight, which happens only when it does not consider the prospect of its loss as vital to its own political integrity. This insight predicts a dismal outcome for the ongoing US military presence in Afghanistan, just as history is against the Jihadis achieving their cherished goals of a global Islamic caliphate.

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Assessing the global threats of terrorism In the current climate of overheated and oversimplified political rhetoric and round-the-clock media coverage, it is easy to lose perspective on terrorism. When we look at the facts there often seems to be an utter disconnection between actual threats of terrorism and the state response.28 In terms of cold numbers, the comparison between the probabilities of death from international terrorism, where the attackers come from outside of the country, and other real dangers seems almost absurd. In the past 38 years, the MIPT RAND Corporation database has recorded on average 375 deaths from terrorism per year worldwide. This compares with roughly the same number of people who drown in bathtubs in the US alone (about 320).29 Even when we add this timespan’s total fatalities from terrorism around the world (approximately 23,000),30 they turn out to be less than the number of gun-related deaths (slightly over 28,000) for a single year (2018) in the US, according to the Center for Disease Control (CDC). These numbers, however frightening they might appear, pale in comparison to the millions of deaths caused by state-orchestrated genocides, civil wars, military interventions, and man-made famines.

The future of terrorism Given this past we may speculate on the future trend of global terrorism. In an insightful work, Lia explores the structural factors that will influence future trends.31 Terrorism is spawned within an ecology consisting of forces of politics, economics, technology, demography, and psychology. “Prediction is a hazardous job, particularly when it comes to the future,” goes the popular wisdom told in a jest. Yet, following Lia, we may venture at this perilous undertaking by examining the trends in these factors. Samuel Huntington described the current global political system as uni-/multipolar, where a strong hegemon (the US) is surrounded by a growing number of regional powers.32 The regional rivalries and the influence of the only superpower are creating a mix within which the forces of conflict are often strengthening. During the Cold War period, the predominant force was the tug-of-war between the US and the USSR. However, in the new era of a uni-/multi-polar world, many of the forces of conflict kept in check during the Cold War have been unleashed. The changing winds are fanning the fires of ancient hatred. This overall trend is being further complicated by the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the creation of new nation-states, and increasing ranks of failed states. The conflicts generated by these changing political realities are driving the need for intervention by the hegemonic and other regional powers. These interventions, through military might or through peacekeeping operations, are creating their own dynamics for the resurgence of terrorist threats. Within this bubbling cauldron of conflicting forces, non-governmental organizations are playing an ever-important role. While many of these organizations are working for peace

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and understanding, many others, through the guise of charity work, are in fact fomenting hostility and mutual suspicion. As I have discussed in the previous chapter, the economic structural factors influencing the global outcome of terrorism consist of economic inequities (both among and within nations), conflict and collusion between the business interests of transnational corporations and the political impotency of national governments, the influence of organized crime (providing an ominous nexus with terrorist organizations), and dependence on the flow oil of in some of the most volatile regions of the world.33 The trend toward greater income inequality within nations is being exacerbated by the influx of new immigrants, legal and illegal, from less developed to more developed parts of the world. This massive migration includes the developed Western world, where the new immigrants are often forced to live in segregated urban ghettos. But migration by desperate people is not restricted to the Western nations. Economic refugees from Bangladesh, for instance, have poured into the border states of India, creating or deepening existing hostilities among the population. The same is true in Africa and Latin America, where transnational as well as intra-national displacement and migration are at the heart of many violent conflicts. These demographic factors are likely being deepened as a result of global climate change causing rising sea levels and affecting planting seasons all across the world. Rapid population growth is putting additional demographic pressure on most of the lesser-developed nations. Rapid growth rates of population are characterized by a pyramidal distribution with a very large proportion of young men and women forming its foundation. This emerging cohort represents not only an insatiable demand on resources, particularly in the poorer parts of the world and among the migrant minority population in the affluent West, but also supplies the bulk of the foot soldiers of political radicalism. Contrast this with lowering of birth rates in the developed world. As a result, migration is proving to be another incendiary factor affecting the future trends of terrorism. The impact of changing technology on the future global trends in terrorism is becoming increasingly apparent. Since all technological improvements involve replacing human beings with machines, the advancements in robotics, automation, and artificial intelligence are likely to intensify anxiety about financial stability all across the globe. The technologies of communication and transportation, as well as the proliferation of social media, are making the prospect of peace more precarious. The Internet has truly revolutionized the world of terrorism by providing an incredible weapon for the spread of ideas across the globe.34 The mainstream economic theories of economic growth and development do not take into account the political and institutional environment within which a nation must achieve its economic goals. As a result, standard neoclassical economics predicts that all boats will rise when the tide comes in.35 As conflicts engulf the developing nations,36 they get mired in a retrogressive process of

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economic growth. This process, if unchecked, can drag a nation to the dreaded condition of a failed state with all its accompanying problems, for itself, its immediate neighbors, and the entire global community.

Intensifying addiction to failure Cognitive scientists Kahneman and Renshon argue that the reason we often seem to be addicted to failure is perhaps rooted in the way we process information. They observe that on the national scene: As the hawks and doves thrust and parry, one hopes that the decision makers will hear their arguments on the merits and weigh them judiciously before choosing a course of action. Don’t count on it. Modern psychology suggests that policymakers come to the debate predisposed to believe their hawkish advisors more than the doves. There are numerous reasons for the burden of persuasion that doves carry, and some of them have nothing to do with politics or strategy. In fact, a bias in favor of hawkish beliefs and preferences is built into the fabric or the human mind.37 Kahneman and Tversky and their associates have carried out extensive research that has revealed a series of important biases in perception that guide human understanding of uncertain outcomes.38 Based on these much-celebrated findings, Kahneman and Renshon argue that political leaders’ proclivity to be swayed by the hawks is rooted in three fundamental errors.39 These fundamental facts about human decision-making are equally applicable to all sides of a conflict. In a conflict, people are prone to commit the fundamental attribution error, where they fail to understand the context and constraints within which their adversaries must operate. As a result, we cannot understand the behavior of our adversaries and are apt to attribute the worst possible motives to their moves. At the same time, we have difficulty in seeing how our enemies may not understand our own motivations. Thus, in a conflict situation the political leaders of the target government are likely to trust those who anticipate the worst possible actions by a violent dissident group. Similarly, the leaders of radical groups are apt to misunderstand the moves of the heads of the target government.40 Finally, human beings are poor statisticians when it comes to the understanding of uncertainty.41 The precept of probability theory tells us that a rational individual will view probability on an even plain. However, in actuality we do not know how to process information properly. In a card game, if we are losing we are likely to ignore the fact that each successive hand is independent of the other and, instead, bet more money (“double or nothing”) by reasoning that since we have had a string of bad luck, it is bound to change in the next round. In the area of public policy to deal with the threats of terrorism, political leaders embrace the failed policies of the past in spite of evidence of their failure for the same set of reasons.

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As a result of these psychological forces, the leadership on both sides become prisoners of their rhetorical excesses, from which it becomes nearly impossible to extricate themselves. Passions are inflamed and the media plays a very important role. In a conflict media biases on all sides quickly drown out calls for compromise. Syndicated columnist Georgie Anne Geyer provided a graphic account of the creation of mass hysteria by the clever use of images by the media in the Yugoslav civil war in 1989. She writes: The most terrifying indicator of what was to come was the television in my hotel room in the Inter-Continental [in Belgrade]. There, on that little screen – part of the new technology that so many thought would unite the world – one saw hours of Serb propaganda. Serb cemeteries from battles lost 800 years ago vied with Serbian women crying at the grave – the Serbs as eternal victims.42 Anyone familiar with the media presentations all over the world, including in the West, can understand their role in creating a condition of frenzy. The media, being afraid of being labeled as disloyal, presents stories that paint the darkest possible pictures of the protagonists. Even the Internet, while providing contrary information from many sides, fails to bring about a balanced discussion. Most of us seek our own zones of comfort when it comes to political news.43 As a result, we see, read, or listen to news reports and discussions that fit our particular political orientation. Not having the same reference points, people tend to talk past one another. This tendency is most pronounced when it comes to highly charged emotional issues, such as terrorism and national security. Under such a polarizing atmosphere every politician would take the safest course of action, promising to be the hardest against the threats of terrorism. Similarly, within the dissident community, most often the most firebrand orators gather the largest followings. Given our natural tendency to repeat the mistakes of the past, it is incumbent upon the leaders to help create an atmosphere where prudent policies can be discussed and debated.

Outlines of long-term policies An understanding of the human motivations that propel a society to the path of violence can lend itself to the development of the outlines of policy prescriptions. Once again, if we understand the factors that influence terrorism increasing and attenuating forces – ideological factors, factors of self-interest, the cost of participation, and the external factors – we can sketch out the broad policy parameters that might help bring the levels of social violence down.

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Recognizing the power of ideology Since it is impossible to overcome problems of collective action without the presence of ideology, we must realize the power of radical political discourse. It is indeed painful for Western democracies, established on the foundation of freedom of expression, to deal effectively with speech that incites people to resort to violence to redress injustice. Therefore, more than punishing the flamethrowers, society must encourage the moderate middle by promoting an open dialog. It is not an easy task since ideologies are rooted in strong moral convictions. For many in Pakistan the support of the mujahedeen fighting the forces of India across its border is a moral issue. Similarly, in the Muslim community, many would support the basic premises of spreading Islam and living by its strict rules of conduct. In such a situation, the promotion of the middle ground must come from within.44

Distinguishing among ideologies I have argued that not all terrorist groups are based on the same ideological fervor, and nor do they espouse the same ideological goals. A blanket term such as the “Global War on Terror” only confuses the issue by seeking one-size-fitsall policies. The goals of the nationalistic groups are different from those of the millenarian groups. In nationalistic struggles, such as in the cases of Israel, Sri Lanka, or India, it may be possible to find a territorial or power-sharing compromise. However, no such solution can be sought while dealing with the millenarian groups such as al-Qaeda. A successful strategy to deal with these groups must come through a much more subtle understanding of their ideologies and finding appropriate responses to counter their appeal among their potential recruits. Similarly, there are groups that are very close to being criminal organizations. Governments must find ways to distinguish among these groups and find appropriate policies to confront them.

Addressing and acknowledging grievances of the community Violent conflicts arise when a community feels collectively aggrieved; when it believes that its members have been treated unfairly for no reason other than being born in a particular race, religion, linguistic group, or nationality. Such perceptions must be addressed. This would require meaningful actions addressing some of the most vexing issues that inflame passion among many in the Islamic world. For instance, it would certainly help the cause of peace if solutions could be found in the conflicts that are plaguing Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan, Kashmir, and Chechnya. It is important to note, however, that no solution to these intractable problems will ever eliminate violence, since there are no universally acceptable solutions to these long-festering battles based on zero-sum claims, where one group’s gain must come only at the expense of others. However,

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although the final outcome may not be universally accepted, if the process by which these issues are addressed is seen as fair by a significant majority of the population, peaceful resolutions may yet evolve.

Refraining from playing with fire – people’s extreme emotions It is indeed ironic that many extremist groups around the world were, at times, promoted by national governments as a strategic deterrent to some other force. For instance, the US found it expedient to befriend the religious zealots and to channel their fury against the Soviet occupiers of Afghanistan. Indira Gandhi found Sikh religious extremists to be a good ally against a moderate political party that was about to defeat the Indian Congress Party in a state election. Successive Pakistani governments have supported Islamic militants waging war in India and in Afghanistan. The Saudis have actively promoted religious fanatics as a part of their state policy of exporting Wahhabism. There is evidence to suggest that the Israeli government initially saw Hamas as a counterweight to Arafat and the PLO. In each case, the monster turned against Dr. Frankenstein; the mujahedeen and their fanatical allies in Afghanistan turned their guns against the US and the West, Mrs. Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards, the Saudis are waging an ongoing battle against terrorism from their erstwhile foot soldiers of religious hegemony, and Hamas is the biggest threat to Israeli security. Governments all over the world, therefore, must resist the temptation for quick solutions, particularly when it comes to supporting groups based on religious fundamentalism.

Dangers of overreacting Target governments all over the world must understand the aims of the extremists. The causes of the extremist groups are best served when the society becomes polarized. For instance, Hamas routinely stages suicide bombings and other acts designed to create outrage among the Israelis at critical points of the peace process and national elections. In such a situation, governments and their leaders must resist the temptation to dig into the national anger and dole out collective punishments to the community from which the terrorists emerged.

Clash of narratives: dissident group vs. the state At the core of a dissident movement as well as a nation-state are the narratives that tell the adherents who we are. When in conflict we also develop a narrative about our enemies. Both sides claim that they are the forces good while the others are evil; they are the victims and the others are the aggressors. In our minds we relegate the “others” outside our community and even deny their humanity. However, these mental creations of fraternity and enmity do not

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have to be eternal. History is replete with examples where boundaries are extended to include communities previously considered to be enemies. This is the key to permanent peace and resolution of conflict. I argue that just as mass movements cannot start without strong leadership, neither can peace processes. These leaders must be strong enough to overcome the siren song of those who sow fear. During the civil rights movement, President Johnson was able to appeal to the better instincts of American politics and boldly manipulate the body politics to defeat the segregationists. His efforts were surely aided by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s ability to avert the temptations of fighting violence with violence, promoted by groups such the Black Panthers and the Nation of Islam. The question is: how do we change the narrative? Governments attempt to change the narrative by trying to undermine the credibility of those who advocate violence.45 They attempt to do it by demonstrating ideological inconsistencies of the leaders. If the narrative is based on religion, they can promote alternate versions of the scripture, which embrace everyone and promote forgiveness over retribution. They can also impugn opposition leaders by showing the darker sides of their motivations. These efforts, however, only succeed if the state can develop credibility of its own. This is possible only if the government’s actions, rather than its pronouncements, reflect a true attempt at developing mutual understanding. The government must promote a new narrative of inclusion by incorporating political, moral, religious, social, and cultural acceptance. The problem of developing an alternate narrative, however, can be difficult, given long painful histories of cycles of violence. In the Islamic nations, in the madrassas, the Saudis and the Egyptian governments have attempted to develop counter-narratives by incorporating moderate preachers. However, if they are widely seen as the agents of a corrupt, repressive, and immoral government, they will have little impact on changing minds.46 If the authorities want to promote an alternate narrative, they must understand the target audience. For instance, what may work for the general public may fall flat with other groups, such as the inmates in prison. We know that prisons are one of the most important places for radicalization.47 They are the breeding grounds for most anti-systemic radicals from the Jihadis to the White Supremacists and the members of the MS 13. Brutal regimes within prisons create conditions where inmates join extremist groups for several reasons. Some join seeking protection from other gangs. Living under the most humiliating conditions, others find solace in religion. Religious faith gives them a way to feel absolved of their criminal past. If we want to stop people from joining the Jihadi groups, for instance, prison authorities must provide inmates with personal security. Without that, they may join radical groups regardless what the counter-narrative might be. For those who might seek spiritual guidance, preachers with moderate points of view could be a positive influence. However, in a prevailing situation of mistrust, government-appointed preachers must establish their personal credibility with their congregants. The extreme case of de-radicalization is illustrated in China’s

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effort at rooting out Islamic nationalism among the Uighurs. China’s deradicalization takes the most holistic approach imaginable, by combining legal, religious, cultural, ideological, and scientific aspects of the program targeting the entire Uighur population of over a million people.48 The program is not uniform and distinguishes among people depending on their levels of radicalization, which includes soft and hard pressure. The government also encourages community engagement where the ethnic minority is encouraged to be part of the mainstream Chinese population. This scary and mindboggling effort is only possible in a totalitarian nation. Time will tell the impact of this extreme effort.

From adversaries to stakeholders: promoting self-interest Since people are not inspired by ideology alone, one of the primary deterrents rests with a government’s ability to convince its citizens of its ability to provide the best opportunity for their own personal welfare. This can be done in many ways.

Reduction of poverty and income inequality The forces of globalization are increasingly concentrating income in the hands of the few. Research shows that the middle class acts like the pillar that keeps the integrity of the social structure. The societies that do not enlarge the size of the middle class are destined to experience increased levels of political instability.49

Demonstration of ability to provide public goods Our social contract with our rulers requires that they provide us with public goods, including health, education, provision of security, and a rule of law. When a government is unable to provide these, people look to others for these goods. Every successful dissident organization has been able to find firm footing among its support bases by providing public goods. Hamas and Hezbollah began as charitable organizations providing basic health care, child care, education, etc. Volunteers in troubled tribal areas of India promoting Maoism have been able to develop deep political roots by being integrated in the oppressed communities and providing some of their much-needed social services. The reason the paramilitary armies in Iraq became popular among many is because they provided security when the Iraqi military and the occupying US forces failed to do so. The Taliban in Afghanistan similarly enjoyed wide-ranging public support, as they were able to bring back a modicum of law and order after a hugely destructive civil war. Even the most unpopular US government was able to shed a lot of its negative perception among the Pakistani people after its quick humanitarian response following the devastating earthquake in 2005.50 According to a poll in the immediate aftermath of the delivery of humanitarian

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assistance, the percentage of Pakistanis with a favorable opinion of the US doubled from 23 percent in May 2005 to more than 46 percent in less than six months. Support for Bin Laden over the same period dropped from 51 percent to just 33 percent. In fact, 78 percent of those surveyed said that American assistance had made them feel more favorably disposed toward the US; even an astonishing 79 percent of those with confidence in bin Laden had a more favorable view of the US because of American earthquake aid. These results provide clear evidence of turning the tides of the toughest public opinion with the demonstration of goodwill.

Reaching political accommodation whenever possible Violent conflicts with non-state actors are always framed in moral terms. Each side, particularly the government, proudly proclaims that it does not negotiate. Yet history tells the opposite story. In nearly all cases where conflict grinds on, both sides are pushed to sit down at the negotiating table. In this test of will it is important to remember one important lesson: there are limits to power when it comes to coercion, particularly in a constitutional democracy. Being based on rules of law, democracies cannot hope to bring order through police and military action alone. Hence, whenever possible, it is best to come to a political compromise with dissident groups, particularly when there is broad-based popular support for the groups’ stated goals. Conflict in Nicaragua came to an end when the Sandinistas decided to join the democratic process. Similar examples can be found in many parts of the world, including Nepal and India.

Preventing rather than reacting Using law enforcement rather than the military In fighting terrorism it is most tempting and politically most expedient to look for a quick military victory. During my research for this book, I conducted extensive interviews with terrorism experts, law-enforcement officials, and military and civil intelligence officials from many affected countries. If there was one area where I found a dose of unanimity, it was in their unequivocal support for using the police instead of the military. As one of the experts told me, “after all, at the end of the day, the police officers go back to their homes in the community while the military personnel after an operation go back to their isolated barracks.” As terrorism is largely a social problem, the relative effectiveness of the two forces should never be doubt. Reflecting the same sentiments, Diego Gambetta points out: When the Italians and the Germans were confronted, respectively, by their Red Brigades and Red Army Faction (Baader-Meinhof), they did

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not lose their nerve, or round up half of the working class, or imprison scores of intellectuals, or suspend civil liberties and democracy. They hit the terrorists hard with better policing and effective legal tools.51 The military can be effective when it plays a secondary supportive role to police and intelligence services. The use of the military alone in fighting a social phenomenon such as terrorism can indeed be counterproductive.52 On the other hand, the Indian experience in combating Sikh extremism in Punjab and the Maoists in West Bengal clearly demonstrates the efficacy of using the military in a secondary role. In fact, whenever the military has taken the lead, such as in “Operation Blue Star,”53 where the Indian Armed Forces forcibly entered the holiest religious site of Sikhism, it only made matters worse by fuelling further rebellion.54

Using more intelligence Terrorists wage people-oriented war. From the earliest writings on terrorism and guerrilla warfare, it has been recognized that terrorists use their ability to melt into the general populace. Therefore, their suppression requires infiltration and other forms of surveillance based on human assets. Counterintelligence is gathered at international (INTERPOL, CIA, etc.), national (FBI), and local levels. After the 9/11 attacks, New York City decided protect itself by developing its own counterterrorism unit. It was a novel idea for a city to get involved in such activities. Yet, New York City’s success in preventing large-scale attacks surprised a lot of experts. Dahl argues that since attacks are most often carried out by local actors, it makes sense for a city of such importance and magnitude to be involved in counterterrorism activities.55 In fact, counterterrorism must be an effort at all levels of government.

Multinational approach Andrew Silke, in discussing counterterrorism policies, brings up an apt analogy from Greek mythology of Hercules fighting the multi-headed serpent monster Hydra.56 Apart from having many heads, Hydra had one extraordinary power – when one of its heads was struck off two more would spring up. In his adventure, Hercules was accompanied by his nephew Iolaus. As the battle went on, Hercules was on the verge of being defeated. Seeing his uncle in distress, the much weaker nephew grabbed a torch and every time Hercules cut off one of the heads, Iolaus would sear it with his burning torch and prevent the monster from growing back new heads. Although Hercules was credited with slaying Hydra, he could not have done it without the help of his nephew. This story appropriately serves as a metaphor for US foreign policy. In 1998, an influential blue-ribbon panel on international terrorism was

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assembled with bipartisan support from President Bill Clinton and the Republican Congress. After a year of painstaking work, the US Commission on National Security came to a prescient conclusion for the twenty-first century: “America’s military superiority will not protect it from hostile attacks on our homeland. Americans will likely die on American soil, possibly in large numbers.”57 Countering threats of international terrorism requires international cooperation. Since in an increasingly interconnected world the effects of instability and violence are not going to be restricted to where they originate, the global community must address some of the broader issues of combating terrorism and present a united front. This must be done not only through covert operations but also by publicly taking a stance against indiscriminate violence, wherever it may take place.

Constricting the lifeblood of the terrorist groups by restricting money Money is the lifeblood of any organization, including those waging clandestine wars. These funds come from both illegitimate and legitimate sources. Studies of terrorist group funding reveal a consistent pattern of fund raising. Some of the funds come from trafficking in drugs, cigarettes, alcohol, etc. Others funds are raised through small contributions by domestic constituents as well as the diaspora, transferred to the terrorist organizations through the informal money transfer system called Hawala. It is not unusual for a dissident group to acquire a few extremely wealthy financiers. Laundering money and investing it in legitimate businesses can also raise the necessary resources for terrorist organizations. Finally, many terrorist groups are funded by state sponsorship. Any policy of deterrence of international terrorism must develop a global consensus to stop the flow of funds to the extremist organizations.

Stop state-sponsored terrorism State sponsoring of terrorism is an intractable problem that is nearly impossible to solve. While every state is against “terrorism” as a concept, nearly all think of those that threaten them as terrorists. If they agree with the groups’ mission or they target their enemies, states are willing to look the other way or actively support their operations. That is precisely why the United Nations cannot agree on a definition of terrorism. Currently, Iran is sponsoring Hezbollah, the Houthis, and many other Shiite groups; some of the Sunni countries are either overtly or covertly supporting the Sunni extremists in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa; Pakistan supports those who target India; and the US was happy to work with the Kurds, who are considered terrorists by the Turkish government to fight against ISIS. This being the reality, how do we curb the national leaders’ proclivity to sponsor terrorism?

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Being realistic in expectation We must know that terrorism cannot be totally prevented, but with time, its support within its base may wane. There are many terrorist movements that pose threats to the global community. Most, if not all, will ultimately become spent forces. As they do, new ideas and ideologies will spring up along the same fault lines of the tectonic plates that have divided our societies for eons. In our pursuit of end of terrorism, we must know that there is no silver bullet. We cannot wish human proclivity to violently dissent with the prevailing order.

Demonstrated actions At the end of the day, actions speak louder than words. The most effective way a state can change the narrative through its actions. The United States could claim moral superiority because it quelled black rebellion through the passage of civil rights legislation and blunted the sharpest edges of overt racism. Similarly, in other parts of the world, where diversity has been celebrated and not viewed through extreme fear and suspicion, lasting peace has been achieved.

What are we fighting for? So, are we destined for self-destruction? Perhaps. As we become technologically more advanced, so does our capacity to kill at an even larger scale. On a bright summer day in 1914, a young man, Gavrilo Princip, assassinated Austrian Archduke Ferdinand and his wife, Sophie. However, a hundred years later, 19 hijackers killed 3,000 people in a very short time. If they could have acquired a weapon of mass destruction, they would have been happy to kill many more. So, is this the destiny of our planet? Some might agree with this dire prediction for our species. Others, such as the Stanford primatologist and neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky might argue that selfdestruction may not be our manifest destiny. He has seen how the most aggressive primates can change their behavior as a result of changing social norms that promote reconciliation over conflict.58 Violence is a learned behavior. As we learn to listen to our better angels, we become capable of changing our behavior. If we look around, we may realize that peace and cooperation are far more prevalent in our global ethos than conflicts and open hostilities. If this trend continues and we can stare acts of terrorism squarely in the eyes, replacing facts with existential fear, we might be able to manage terrorism far better than if we try to root it out by force. The core premise of this volume is that terrorism is born from the same cognitive behavioral fountainhead that allows us to work together and build civilization. That is why the cliché rings true that one person’s terrorist in another person’s hero. Our cooperative behavior sets us apart from all others in the animal world. Therefore, finding a solution to politically motivated violence would require less fear and more understanding, less hostility and most tolerance, less xenophobia and more acceptance of diversity.

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I began this book with a personal narrative. Therefore, it may not be inappropriate to end it on a similar note. In 2003 I had the honor of being invited to a panel discussion hosted by Nobel Peace Prize winner Eli Wiesel. The title of the panel was “Fighting Terrorism for Humanity.”59 Wiesel challenged the panellists by asking if it were possible to fight terrorism with humanity. At first blush, the simple question raised by the sagacious gentleman of peace may appear to be too dreamy, the musings of an impractical peacenik. However, a closer look at the intellectual gauntlet thrown down by Wiesel reveals its profound nature. In the final analysis, the struggle against terrorism is a contest for the hearts and minds of the people. In this contest, if the West is going to prevail, it cannot do so by dispensing with its most cherished values of tolerance, individual freedom, and adherence to the rule of law. In our quest for victory – on whichever side we are on – it seems important for us to know what we are fighting against, but it is even more important to keep in mind what we are fighting for.

Notes 1 Moore (2001). 2 www.pollingreport.com/terror.htm. 3 Time. August 30, 2006. www.angus-reid.com/polls/index.cfm/fuseaction/viewItem/ itemID/12966. 4 NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll conducted by the polling organizations of Peter Hart (D) and Neil Newhouse (R). 2–5 March 2007. N = approx. 500 adults nationwide. 5 Cota-Mckinley et al. (2001). Their study points out that men are more driven by revenge than women. 6 Tajfel (1981, 1982); Tudge (2002). 7 Zucchino (2019). 8 Sharot (2011). 9 Silvers and Haidt (2008). 10 Sharot (2011: xi). 11 Rubin (2007). 12 Gupta and Mundra (2005). 13 Begin (1972); Heller (1995). 14 Ignatyev (1977); Edgerton (1989); Maloba (1993). 15 O’Ballance (1967); Alexander and Keiger (2002). 16 Moran (2001: 110). 17 Gupta et al. (1993). 18 Crenshaw and Pimlott (2015). 19 Henderson (1979); Howe (2004). 20 Zimmermann (2001). 21 Roger and Ratliff (1993). 22 Oberoi (1987). 23 Bose (2007). 24 French (1997: xx, emphasis mine). 25 Dixon (2006). 26 Swami (2007). 27 Bloom (2005); O’Duffy (2007); Mohan (2015). 28 Mueller (2005). 29 Stossel (2004: 77). 30 Global Terrorism Index dataset (START).

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41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52

53

54 55 56 57 58 59

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Lia (2005). Huntington (1999). Rasch (2004). Arquilla and Ronfeldt (2002); Weimann (2006). Yotopoulos and Nugent (1976). Gupta (1990); Alesina and Perotti (1994); Alesina et al. (1996); Aron (2000); Barro (2000); Lennon (2003). Kahneman and Renshon (2007: 1). Kahneman and Tversky (1979). See Kahneman and Renshon (2007). Since terrorists aim at achieving public goods for their communities, it is interesting to draw a parallel between Prospect Theory, proposed by Kahneman and Tversky, and the problems of public finance. It is interesting to note while President Bush was proclaiming an easy victory in the “Global War on Terrorism”, Ayman al-Zawahiri, the second in command of alQaeda, was predicting that “an end of the West” was imminent. See CNN story “Al-Qaeda No. 2 Says End of West Imminent, Video Shows.” July 4, 2007. www. cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/07/04/zawahiri.video/index.html. On this see the work of another Nobel Lauriate economist, Allais (1952 [1979]). This anomaly in human assessment of uncertain outcomes is known as the “Allais Paradox.” Geyer (1997: E 3). Kernell and Jacobson (2005). Ibrahim (2002). De Graaf (2010). Horgan (2009a, 2009b). Hamm and Spaaij (2015). Zhou (2019). Gupta (1990). Brookes (2005); Haqqani and Ballen (2005). Gambetta (2005: 268). In some countries, particularly in non-democratic nations, the separation between military and police is not very clear cut. In Chile, although there is a formal separation between police and military, the constitutional missions of the military generally include internal order (Loveman, 2004). Furthermore, cases involving the police go to military courts, which provides a certain lack of accountability for officers accused of wrongdoing and removes constitutional rights and liberties from civilians in the military courts. It opens up an interesting research agenda regarding the efficacy of the police in suppressing terrorism in such societies without resorting to extreme brute force. In any case, we are on safer ground to note that any military or law-enforcement agency that is not grounded in the society that is producing terrorism will be ineffective. The current situation in the northwestern frontier provinces of Pakistan, where the government is increasingly losing its battle against the resurgent Taliban and al-Qaeda, may provide a case in point. Operation Blue Star took place on June 3, 1984, when the Indian military forcibly entered the Harimandir Sahib in Amritsar, Punjab, the holiest shrine of the Sikhs. Although it killed a large number of militants holed up in the Golden Temple, it was instrumental in spreading Sikh radicalism throughout the world. Singh (2002). Dahl (2014). Silke (2005). Kriesher (1999). Sapolsky (2018). “Fighting Terrorism for Humanity: A Conference on the Roots of Evil” forum organized by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Peace Academy, New York, September 22, 2003.

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INDEX

Abduh, M. 136 Abdulmuttalab, U. F. 3, 36, 37, 38 Abhink, K. 174 Abrams, M. 214 Abu Ghraib 162 Abu Sayyaf 83, 99, 102, 168, 185, 187, 190 Acalan, A. 112, 206 Acton, J. D., Lord 175 Adams, J. 174 Adorno, T. 221, 239 Afghan War 160 Ahmed, H. 123 al-Afghani, J. 136 al-Aqsa Martyr Brigade 11, 53 al-Azhar University 136, 137 al-Baghdadi, A. B. 5 al-Baluchi, A. H. 183 al-Banna, H. 107, 137, 162 al-Durrani, Ali 48 al-Haramain Islamic Foundation (AIF) 184 al-Maal al-Islami (DMI) 114, 115 al-Mahdi, M. 135 al-Qaeda 2, 10, 36, 53, 64, 69, 70, 79, 81, 82, 84, 87, 96, 98, 99, 102, 103, 104, 109, 112, 113, 114, 129, 139, 153, 162, 176, 181, 183, 185, 192, 195, 201, 202, 203, 207, 226, 252 al-Rishawi, S. 48–49 al-Sadr, M. 243 al-Shabab 69, 203 al-Sham 202 al-Suri, A. M. 203, 204 al-Wahhab, I. A. 132

al-Zarqawi, A. M. 5, 88, 153 al-Zawahiri, A. 82, 103, 104, 107, 130, 160, 161, 173, 213, 262 Alcock, J. 149 Alesina, A. 262 Alexander, M. 195, 261 Ali, Ben 38, 247 Ali, T. 150 Allais, M. 262 Alonso, R. 212, 215 Amazon 24, 71, 153 Anarchism 16 Ancien Régime 219 Anderson, B. 57, 67, 218, 239 Anderson, D. 89, 214 Anderson, S. 174 Apple 71 Apprentice Boys Parade 155 AQAP 4, 36, 69, 87, 153 Aquinas, T. 23 Arab Spring 235 Arab Spring 38, 83, 86 Arafat, Y. 8, 111 Aristotle 2, 6, 232 Arkansas University 46 Aron, J. 262 Arquilla, J. 262 Asahara, S. 206 Aslan, R. 19, 31, 71, 89, 214 Asoka, the Great 72 Assad, H. 4 Atran, S. 17, 18, 66, 67 Aum Shinrikyo 206

288

Index

Aurelius, M. 80 Austrian Freedom Party 226 Avalos, H. 67 Avalos, H. 67 Avery, P. 123 Awlaki, A. 36, 37 Ayyash, Y. 206 Azzam, A. 82, 107, 160, 161, 173 Baader Meinhoff 16, 43, 210 Baasyr, A. B. 109, 112 Baath Party 161 Baker, P. 213 Baker, R. 195 Baliga, S. 240 Ballen, K. 262 Bandyopadhyay, S. 67 Banerjee, S. 151, 173 Bank of Credit and Commerce (BCCI) 114 Banuri, S. 174 Barak, E. 117 Barot, D. 112 Bartles, C. 66 Basque Homeland and Freedom Party (ETA) 43, 99, 100, 102, 121, 185, 212 Bastille 219 Basu, J. 166 BATNA (best alternative to a negotiated agreement) 208 Battle of Boyne 139 Battle of Zenta 134 Bay of Pigs 114 Beaty, J. 124 Beevor, A. 172 Begai, J. 151 Begin, M. 261 Begin, M. 8, 18 Beijing Spring 226 Bell, P. 261 Benevolence International Foundation (BIF) 184 Benjamin, D. 123 Bergen, P. 195 Bergman, R. 240 Berkey, J. 149 Berlin Wall 219 Berman, E. 123 Berman, P. 150 Beslan (massacre) 39, 203 Bhagavat Gita 81 Bhatt, C. 67 Biggs, M. 38, 66, 172 bin Aalman, M. 226

bin Laden 2, 5, 9, 20, 21, 69, 70, 77, 78, 81, 82, 84, 85, 98, 102, 103, 107, 109, 111, 115, 160, 161, 162, 187, 203, 204, 213, 257 Bishop, P. 172 Bjorgo, T. 90 BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) 96, 226 Black Panthers 95, 121, 245, 255 Black September 204 Black Widows 39 Blakely, R. 214 Blandina 80 Bloody Sunday massacre 156, 159 Bloom, M. 18, 48, 66, 123, 195, 261 Boko Haram 69, 74, 213 Bolsonaro, J. 57 Bonchek, M. 90, 194 Borodin, M. 145 Bose, K. 8 Bose, S. 261 Bose, S. C. 167 Bouazizi, T. M. 38 Bowcott, O. 124, 174 Bowles, C. 173 Brandeis University 46 Breivik, A. 36, 234 Brennan, M. 172 Brexit 13, 225, 248 Bright, M. 124 Brookes, P. 262 Brookings Institute 224 Bueno de Mesquita, E. 92, 122, 123, 240 Buford, B. 67 Bureau of Labor Statistics, US 225 Burke, J. 173 Burton, F. 214 Bush, G. H. W. 242 Bush, G. W. 1, 7, 14, 87, 197, 209, 242 Buzan, B. 194 Byman, D. 194 Cagaptay, S. 8 Caiman, L. 151, 152 captive participants 33, 34, 63, 65, 103, 120, 180, 181 Carpenter, M. 213 Carsten, K. 149 Castro, F. 211 Çatal Hoyük 31, 49 Census Bureau 233 Center for Disease Control (CDC) 248 Center for Policing Terrorism 189 Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) 205, 211

Index

Centre for International Crime Prevention (CICP) 189 Charge of the Light Brigade 39–40 Chatterji, A. 140, 151 Chernik, M. 195 Chin, V. 195 Chinese Communist Party 211, 226 Chong, D. 35 Christian militia 53 Chu, L. 67 class identity 58, 147, 148 Claydon, T. 67 Clinton, H. 222 Clinton, W. 224, 259 Coca-Cola 73 Cogliano, F. 240 cognitive dissonance 198, 213 Coke, E. 7 Coleman, D. 69 Coll, S. 124 collective identity 45, 49, 51, 53, 55, 76–77, 79, 95, 106, 107, 147–149, 159, 198, 217, 225 Collier, P. 188, 195 Collins, E. 196 Communist Party of India (CPI) 145, 151, 164 Communist Party of India Marxist (CPI-M) 164, 165, 166, 167 Comte, A. 29 Congressional Research Service (CRS) 209 Constantine, Emperor 72 Constantine’s Donation 175 Contras 205 Coogan, T. P. 172 Coronavirus 238 Cosa Nostra 192 Cosmides, L. 149 Cota-McKinley, A. 261 Cowell, A. 172 Crano, W. 240 Crenshaw, M. 112, 123, 195, 206, 214, 261 Cronkite, W. 233 Cultural Revolution 167 Dabruzzi, K. 195 Dae-Jung, K. 3 Dahl, E. 258, 262 Dalai Lama 36 Dallah al-Baraka (DAB) 114 Damasio, A. 28, 29, 35 Dandaurand, Y. 195 Dange, S. 164 Dar ul Kufr 173

289

Darool Ulum 136 DARPA 226 Darwin, C. 20, 23, 25, 29, 30, 35 Das, S. 66 Dasgupta, B. 152 Davis, T. 152 Dawkins, R. 18, 22, 24, 35, 60, 67 De Dreu, W. 149 de Gaulle, C. 245 de Graaf, Beatrice 86, 90, 104, 23, 194 De Graaf, Bob 215, 262 De Waal, F. 30, 35, 40, 41, 66, 149 de-radicalization 255 Dean, Aimen 48, 66, 195, 203, 214 Debil, T. 122 Debray, R. 195 Deng, F. 150 Deobandis 136 Dershowitz, A. 201, 214 des Forges, A. 89 Descartes, R. 28 Diamond, J. 149 Diem, N. D. 38 Dingley, J. 172 Dishman, C. 178, 188, 189, 194, 195 Dixon, P. 261 Doctors Without Borders 45–46 Dollard, J. 66 Dreze, J. 124 Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) 176, 194 Duc, T. Q. 38 Duijn, P. 195 Durkheim, E. 66 Duterte, R. 57, 226 Earnest, J. 60–61 East Timor 205 Easter Rising 117, 154, 156 Eckstein, H. 5, 18 Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) 220 Edgerton, R. 261 egotistical deprivation 92 El-Sisi, A. 226 Ellis, H. 24 Elster, J. 66, 123 Enders, W. 172 English, R. 90, 117, 123, 124, 150, 159, 171, 172 Entz, A. 171, 194 EOKA 204, 246, 248 Erdog˘ an, R. T 6, 57 Escobar, P. 64, 192 Esposito, J. 149

290

Index

Facebook 15, 24, 71 Fair, C. 107, 123 Fanusie, J. Y. 171, 194 Fara, A. 160 Farace, R. 124 FARC 12, 65, 83, 99, 185, 190, 247 Farrakhan, L. 95 Faulkner, B. 156 Fearon, J. 93–94, 122 fedayeen 203, 214 Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) 176 Federal Networking Council 15 Feeney, B. 171 Feierabend, I 18, 66 Fernbach, D. 151 Fernbach, P. 60, 67 Festinger, L. 198, 214 Filler, A. 195 Fiorina, J. 28 First Gulf War 242 Fisher, R. 208, 209, 215 Fisk, R. 172 fitna 160 Flanigan, T. S. 214 Flint, J. 150 FNLA 245 Foreign Policy, Journal 94 Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO) 202 Foucault, M. 22, 35 framing 77 Franda, M. 173 free rider 25, 26, 97, 98, 102, 119 Freedman, D. 90 Freedman, R. O. 123 Freedom House 238, 240 Freedom Riders 85 French Revolution 7, 10, 217 French, D. 214 French, P. 151, 261 Frenkel-Brunswik, E. 221, 239 Freud, S. 24, 35 Frey, C. 240 Frohlich, N. 90 Fromm, E. 221, 239 Front de Libération du Québec (FLQ) 245 frustration-aggression theory 43 Fukuyama, F. 220, 239 Fuller, T. 90 fundamental attribution error 251 Galbraith, J. K. 66 Gallagher, F. 172 Galloway, S. 89 Gambetta, D. 18, 258–259, 262

Gandhi, A. 66 Gandhi, I. 254 Gandhi, M. K. 38, 77, 85, 167, 240, 248 Gandhi, R. 172 Gartenstein-Ross D. 195 Gash, D. 35 Gates, B. 76 gestalt law of the whole 126 Geyer, G. 252, 262 Ghazi, A. R. 200, 201 Ginkel, J. 123 Girijan Sangham 146 Giustozzi, A. 215 Glasser, S. 124 Global War on Terror (GWOT) 162, 252, 262 Göbekli Tepe 31 Goldhagen, D. 63, 90, 239 Goldman, E. 151 Goldstein, B. 118 Gonzales, J. 89 Goodall, J. 125, 149 Goodman, M. 31, 34 Google 24, 71 Gordon, L. 151, 174 Goulding, C. 159 Green Peace 30 Green Revolution 165 Guang, L. 173 Guantanamo prison 162 Guetzkow, H. 124 Guevara, C. 130, 148, 207 Guha, R. 151 Gulf War 161 Gunaratna, R. 124, 173, 195 Gunning, J. 214 Gunpowder Plot 7 Gupta, D. K. 18, 66, 67, 89, 90, 104, 123, 124, 149, 150, 151, 172, 174, 194, 214, 215, 239, 240, 261, 262 Gupta, R. K. 151 Gurr, T. R. 39, 66, 123, 183, 192, 195, 196 Gwynne, S. 124 Habyarimana, J. 74, 79 Haggmmer, T. 173 Haidt, J. 34, 35, 67 Hamas 11, 53, 99, 104, 105, 108, 139, 185, 209, 245, 254, 256 Hamid, T. 67 Hamilton, V. L. 90 Hamm, M. 47, 66, 262 Handgraaf, J. 149 Hansen, M. 240

Index

Hansen, T. B. 140 Haqqani, H. 262 Harari, Y. 67, 90, 92, 122, 192, 194 Harff, B. 89 hate groups 10, 76 Hausken, K. 174, 194 Hawala 115, 259 Heaven’s Gate 79 Heffer, A. 188 Hegel, G. 220 Hekmatyar, G. 161 Heller, J. 261 Henderson, L. 261 Hernández, J. 195 Hernden, T. 18 Hezbollah 12, 65, 108, 116, 117, 118, 153, 176, 182, 204, 218, 256 Hibbs, D. P. 13, 18, 66 Hill, E. 6 Hill, J. 35 Hill, P. 66 Hilton, A. 90 Hindutva 55–56 Hiro, D. 124 Hirschman, A. 26, 35 Hitler, A. 63, 74, 77, 79, 145, 151 Hobbes, T. 23 Hobsbawm, E. 50, 67, 219, 239 Hochschild, A. 89 Hoeffer, A. 195 Hoffer, E. 31, 35, 63 Hoffman, B. 18, 19, 172, 176, 194 Holden, D. 150 Holland, J. 172, 19 Holms, S. 52, 67 Holy Land Foundation (HLF) 184 Hopgood, S. 104, 123 Horgan, J. 17, 18, 66, 81, 90, 102, 122, 172, 195, 214, 262 Horner, J. 89 Houthi 218 Howe, H. 261 Hudson, M. 18, 66 Humanistic School of Management 81 Huntington, S. 51, 67, 248, 262 Husain, M. Z 150 Hussain, H. 111 Hussain, S. 2, 4, 87, 93, 161 Hutt, M. 18 Huxley, A. 211 Ibn Saud 132–133 Ibrahim, S. 262 ideological terrorist groups 101

291

Ignatieff, M. 195, 261 inclusive fitness 29 Indian National Congress 254 Indian National Congress 166 Indiana University 46 Inglehert, R. 226, 240 INLA (Irish National Liberation Army) 191, 196, 202 Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) 114, 162, 163 IPLO (Irish Peoples Liberation Organization) 202 Iqbal, M. 136 IRA (Irish Republican Army) 43, 47, 64, 82, 83, 99, 102, 103, 117, 129, 148, 154, 155, 158, 159, 168, 180, 185, 188, 190, 191, 201, 202, 204, 210, 245 Iranian Revolution 4, 109 Iranian Revolutionary Guard 12 Irgun Gang 204, 245 Isaacson, W. 70, 89, 153 Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) 4, 5, 12, 47–48, 69, 70, 71, 82, 87, 96, 176, 226, 259 Israeli Defense Force 116 Iyenger, S. 241 Jackson, J. 96 Jacobson, G. 262 Jacquard, R. 149 Jaffrelot, C. 140 Jahili/Jahiliyyah 137, 138 Jaish-e-Mohammad 12 Jamieson, A. 176, 194, 196 Janjalani, A. 187 Janjalani, K. 187 Janjalani, M. 187 Janus 62, 66 Jihad, Greater 53 Jihad, Lesser 53 Jim Crow Legislations 25 Jobs, S. 70 Jodice, M. 18, 66 Johnson, L. B. 233, 255 Johnson, P. 24, 35 Jones, J. 78 Jones, R. 150 Jones, R. P. 123 Jongman, B. 9, 18 Joseph, D. 89 Josephus 15, 21, 204 Juergensmeyer, M. 18, 53, 67 Kaczynski, J. 57 Kaczynski, T. 10, 18

292

Index

Kahneman, D. 199, 214, 251, 262 Kaltman, B. 18 Kalvyas, S. 195 Kamathi, D. 204 Kamikaze 40 Kaplan, J. 149 Kapogiannis, D. 149 Karim, S. F. 20 Kashirin, V. 195 Kassimeris, G. 124 Katz, B. 213 Katz, J. 67 Katz, S. M. 214 Kautski, K. 147 Keely, L. 149 Keen, S. 149 Keiger, J. 195 Kellen, K. 21, 31 Kelman, H. 90 Kendlehammer, B. 89 Kenney, M. 194 Kenyatta, J. 204 Kernell, S. 262 Kerner Commission 172 Khalistan movement 82, 114, 247 Khan, A. A. 214 Khan, A. Q. 115 Khan, M. S. 111 Kharijites 131–132 Khashoggi, J. 226 Khilafat movement 137 Khomeini, R. 86, 109, 133, 163 Kieger, J. 261 King, M. L. Jr. 25, 26, 38, 43, 77, 85, 95, 159, 243, 255 Klausen, J. 66 Klein, A. 122 Know Nothing Party (Native American Party) 226, 228–229 Kochan, N. 195 Kohn, H. 239 Kosnik, M. 172 Kramer, L. 149 Kriesher, O. 262 Kropotkin, P. 86 Krueger, A. B. 66, 92, 122 Kruglanski, A. 66, 90 Kuhn, T. 62 Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) 99, 112, 206 Kurth Cronin, A. 195, 201, 202, 206, 207, 210, 212, 214, 215 Kurtz, R. W. 66 Kuznets, S. 232, 240

Kydd, A. 35, 105, 123 Kyi, A. S. S 6, 226 Laitin, D. 93–94, 122 Lalich, J. 90 Lapidas, I. 89 Lapore, J. 67 Lashkar-e-Taiba 12, 82, 153, 181, 203, 211 Laupmann, E. 124 Law of Comparative Advantage 230 Le Bon, G. 59, 67 Lebanese Civil War 182 Lee, Jennifer 123 Lee, John J. 156, 172 Lehr, P. 18, 90 Lenihan, P. 150 Lenin, V. I. 13, 18, 83, 95, 130, 147, 148, 151 Lennon, A. 262 Leo IX, Pope 175 Levinson, D. J. 221, 239 Levitt, M. 194, 195 Levy, A. 215 Lewis, B. 19, 67, 134–135, 150 Li, Q. 122 Lia, B. 214, 248, 262 Lichbach, M. 35, 105, 123 Lifton R. J. 63–64, 90 Lijst Pim Fortuyn party 226 Likud Party 226 Lilly, P. 195 Lin Biao 207 Linard, L. 149 Liner, B. 19 Lipnack, J. 124 Livy 59 lone wolves 15 Loveman, B. 152, 262 Luddites 230 Luther, M. 176 Maas, P. 90 MacPherson, C. 35 Maduro, N. 226 Mahabharata 53 Mahdi Army 243 Mai Lai 78 Maimbo, S. 124 Maleckova, J. 66, 92, 122 Malenkov, G. 147 Malhotra, I. 150 Mallie, E. 172 Maloba, W. 261 Mandela, N. 8, 38

Index

Mao, Z. 79, 83, 95, 130, 148, 151, 167, 207, 256 Maquire, T. 117 Marighela, C. 148 Maruf, H. 89 Marx, K. 6, 13, 31, 32, 105, 145, 220 Maslow, A. 31, 35 Mau Mau (movement) 204, 245 Maududi, S. 137 Mayo, E. 81, 90 Mazumdar, C. 148, 165, 206 Mazzetti, M. 240 Mbeki, T. 74 McCain, C. 89 McCrystal, S. 153, 171 McDonald, H. 196 McGartland, M. 196 McGill, A. 240 McGirk, T. 195 McGovern, M. 196 McGreal, C. 89 McKevitt, M. 206 McKinley, W. 16 McLellan, V. 123 McMahon, B. 124 Medellin Cartel 192 Mehra, A. 150, 152 Merari, A. 18 mercenaries 33, 34, 63, 65, 66, 83, 102, 103, 120, 180, 181 Meyers, J. 195 Michael, J. 149 Migration Policy Institute 240 Milgram, S. 78–79, 90 Miller, John 149 Miller, Jonathan 90, 240 Million Man March 95 Mincheva, L. 183, 192, 195, 196 Minh, H. C. 95, 152 Minorities at Risk 97 Mintz, A. 199, 200, 214 MIPT RAND 190, 202, 249 Mishal, S. 123 Mitchell, R. 150 Mitra, D. 150 Modi, N. 6, 57, 211, 226 Mohammed, K. S. 109 Mohan, R. 261 Moloney, E. 172 Monge, P. 124 Moore, D. 278 Moore, T. 59 Moore, W. 105, 123 Moran, D. 261

293

Moussalli, A. 150 Mubarak, H. 226, 235, 247 Mueller, D. 35 Mueller, J. 35, 261 Mugabe, R. 226 Muhammad, Khalifa Abdullah 135 Mujahedeen 69, 84, 114, 160, 161, 163, 184, 205, 253, 254 Mukti Bahini 205 Mulvihill, M. 195 Munch, E. 75, 76 Mundra 104, 214, 261 Murphy, E. 66 Muslim Brotherhood 137, 226 Nakashima, E. 240 Napoleoni, L. 124, 174 Napolitano, J. 66 Narayan Swami, M. 172 Nasrallah, H. 117, 118 Nasser, G. A. 4, 137–138 Nation of Islam 255 National Liberation Front (FLN) 204, 245 Naxalites 16, 17, 43, 88, 108, 121, 129, 153, 164–167, 168, 203, 210, 214 Naylor, R. 18 near enemy 160 necessary condition for terrorism 95 Nechayev, S. 15 negative freedom 221 Netflix 153 Neumann, V. 195 Newberg, A. 67 Newton, I. 23 Night of Long Rifles 192 Nordin, J. 195 Normal Science 62 Norris, P. 226, 240 Norton, A. 90 Nugent, J. 262 O’Ballance, E. 261 O’Brien, C. 67 O’Connor, L. 66 O’Donnell, G. 94, 122 O’Duffy, B. 261 O’Leary, B. 157, 158, 172, 191, 196 Obama, B. H. 7, 75, 96, 205 Oberoi, H. 261 Occupy Wall Street 83–84 Olson, M. 25, 26–28, 35, 102, 123 Omagh bombing 206 Oots, K. 214 Operation Blue Star 258

294

Index

Oppenheimer, J. 90 opportunity cost 73, 94, 108–109, 166, 180, 231 Orban, V. 56 Ortega, D. 119 Osborn, M. 240 Oslo Peace process 118 Ostrom, E. 27, 28, 35 Ottoman Empire 87 Ozler, S. 262 Pagels, E. 89 Palast, G. 124 Palestine Islamic Jihad (PIJ) 11, 101, 104, 105, 139, 185, 209 Pallister, D. 124, 174, 196 Pape, R. 67, 93, 123 Pappi, F. 124 ParlGov.data 227 pathological altruism/altruist 38, 40, 41, 42, 60, 65 Pavier, B. 151, 173 Pelisuk, M. 124 Pennington, B. 67 Peoples Party, Denmark 226 Peoples Party, Switzerland 226 Perotti, R. 262 Perucci, R. 124 Peshmarga 12 Peterson, D. 149 Pew Research Center 2, 92, 107, 122, 123 PFLP 16, 43, 53 Phillips, T. 214 Piazza, J. 166, 173 Picarelli, J. 194 Pietraszewski, D. 149 Pimlott, J. 261 Piñera, S. 226 Ping, X. J. 57, 226 Pinker, S. 226, 240 Piscane, C. 15 Pizzagate 61 Plato 58–59, 67 Plisuk, M. 262 PLO/PA 16, 43, 111, 204, 209, 245, 247, 254 Pol Pot 50, 75 political entrepreneur 72, 74, 76–77, 80, 90, 95, 97, 107, 129, 138, 149, 168, 171, 206 polyheuristic perspective 199 Popkin, S. 13, 18, 123 Post, J. 17, 149, 151 Princep, G. 260

Prislin, R. 240 prisoner’s dilemma 208 private goods 176 professional terrorist group 102 propaganda by deed 15, 76, 86, 97, 147–148, 178 Prophet Jeremiah 204 Provisional IRA (PIRA) 154, 155, 157, 188 Prunier, G. 18, 67, 150 Public goods xvii, 11, 17, 18, 25–27, 62, 64, 88, 94, 106, 108, 119, 168, 178, 181, 184, 192, 194, 196, 256, 262 Purim 61 Putin, V. 56, 226 Putman, H. 240 Qaddafi, M. 157, 187 Qasim, M. 150 Quadrennial Defense Review 237 Quasi-Public Goods (Club goods) 26, 63, 64, 106, 111, 123, 178, 193, 194 Quayle, E. 214 Quintero, Q. 240 Quorchi, M. 124 Qutb, S. 107, 137–139, 150, 160, 162 Rai, M. 18 Ramakrishnan, N. 240 Rao, A. 151 Rapoport, D. 7, 15, 16, 18, 19, 67, 87, 90, 123, 149, 174, 201, 214, 217, 239 Rasch, W. 262 Rational Choice theory 26, 27, 28, 62, 79, 199 Ratliff, W. 261 Ray, S. 151, 173 Red Army Faction (Baader Meinhoff) 16, 43, 212, 257 Red Brigade 43, 121, 210, 257 Red Mosque, Islamabad 200 Redd, S. 214 Redding, W. 124 Reign of Terror 7, 218 relative costs 187–188 Relative Deprivation theory 43–44, 77 religious identity 5, 50, 128, 141, 149, 192 Renshon, J. 251, 262 Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) 211 revealed preference 33, 178–179, 185, 186 Revolutionary Organization 17 November 119 Ricardo, D. 230 Rida, R. 136 RIRA (Real IRA) 202

Index

Robb, J. 111, 112, 124, 240 Roger, M. 261 Rogers, E. 89 Rogers, S. 174, 195 Rohingya 7, 76, 229 Ronfeldt, D. 262 Roosevelt, F. D. 234 Rose-Ackerman, S. 27 Rose, R. 150, 172 Rosenfeld, J. E. 19 Rotberg, R. 122 Rotella, S. 195, 196 Roubini, N. 262 Roy, A. 173 Roy, M. N. 145, 151 Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) 154, 156, 160, 172 Rubin, T. 261 Ruby, C. L. 18, 194 Rummel, R. 18, 67 Runciman, W. 122 Rushdie, S. 52–53, 67 Rushenko, J. 66 Russel, R. 124 Sachs, C. J. 67 Sageman, M. 79, 90, 109, 111, 122, 123, 163, 173, 174, 195, 214 Salafi, Salafiism 110, 111, 136, 137, 138, 139, 162 Samuelson, P. 18, 25, 35, 64, 123, 179, 194 Sanchez-Cuenca, I. 195 Sandinista 119, 247 Sandler, T. 172 Sanford, R. N. 221, 239 Sanyal, K. 148 Sapolsky, R. 125, 126, 127, 149, 260, 262 satisficing 199 Savage, C. 66 Savage, C. 66 Savona, E. 196 Scarborough, K. 67 Schengen Agreement 218 Schlesinger, A., Jr. 124 Schmid, A. P. 9, 18, 86, 90, 104, 123, 188, 194, 195 Schmitt, E. 213 Schumpeter, J. 76–77, 90 scientific management 81 Scott-Clark, C. 215 Sela, A. 123 Selbourne, D. 67 Sen, A. K. 25, 35, 124

295

Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) 65, 83, 99, 185, 190, 192, 196, 210, 247 Sengupta, S. 124, 150 Sepoy Mutiny 86 Seton-Watson, H. 67 Shah of Iran 163 Shah, D. 11 Shah, N. 150 Shakespeare, W. 11 Shalins, P. 149 Shalvi, S. 149 Shapiro, J. 89, 178, 194 Sharma, R. 232, 240 Sharon, A. 117 Sharot, T. 243, 261 Sharpton, A. 96 Shaw, D. 181, 194, 195 Shelley, L. 194 Shepherd, B. 107, 123 Shepsle, K. 90, 194 Shibboleth 54, 218 Sicarii 15, 21, 107 Siegal, D. 89, 178, 194 Silke, A. 66, 150, 154, 171, 172, 195, 258 Silvers, J. 34, 35, 261 Simon, H. 90, 199, 214 Simon, S. 123, 262 Singh, K. 150 Singh, P. 173 Sinn Fein 154, 157, 159 Sixty-niners, the 160 Sloman, S. 60, 67 Sloot, P. 195 Smith, A. 23, 35, 123 Smith, Allison 46, 66 Sober, E. 35 Sonne, J. W. 35 Sons of Liberty 87, 123, 149 Soufan, A. 66, 90 Spaaiji, R. 47, 66, 262 Spanish Civil War 160, 172 Spencer, H. 23 Stalin, J. 145, 207 Stamp Act 87 Stamps, J. 124 Stanley, W. 18 START 18, 19, 44, 46, 261 State Department, US xvii, 9, 10, 115, 176, 184, 202 state failure 88–89, 94 State Failure index 94 Stern Gang 243 Stern, J. 112, 123, 124, 174 Stohl, C. 124

296

Index

Stohl, M. 35, 124, 172 Stormont Government 156 Stossel, J. 261 Stuxnet computer virus 236 sufficient condition for terrorism 95 Sultan Mustafa II 134 Sundar, N. 31, 149, 195 Sungkar, A. 112 Sura Majlish 187 Swagel, P. 262 Swami, P. 124, 174, 261 Swarup, S. 173 Sweeney, M. 18 Sweezy, P. 151 sword verses 173 Sylvester I, Pope 175 Symbionese Liberation Army 95, 247 Tajfel, H. 66, 261 Takfir/Takfiri 138, 139, 160, 161 Taliban 2, 65, 69, 83, 93, 162, 203, 205, 207, 209, 256 Tamil Tigers (LTTE) 53, 64, 82, 101, 104, 113, 114, 121, 247 Tankel, S. 194, 214 Taylor, C. 17, 18, 66 Taylor, F. 81 Taylor, M 17, 66, 123, 172, 195, 214 Taymiyya, I. 125, 132, 150 Tebhaga movement 145 Telengana movement 145, 164, 167 terrorism attenuating force (TAF) 106, 116, 119, 121, 122 terrorism increasing force (TIF) 106, 116, 118, 119, 121, 122 Thomas, C. 215 Thompson, T. 124 Thurston, A. 89, 215 Tiananmen Square massacre 86 Tichy, N. 124 Tilly, C. 11, 18 time and motion studies 81 Tito, J. 218 Tolstoy, L. 8 Tooby, J. 149 Townsend, M. 124 Toynbee, A. 221 Treaty of Carlowitz 134 Tripp, C. 173 Trotsky, L. 83, 173, 207 Troubles, the 154, 188

true believers 33, 34, 47, 63, 65, 66, 80, 83, 103, 176, 180, 181, 193 Trump, D. J. 3, 7, 57, 74, 75, 197, 222, 224, 243 Tsarnaev, D. 61 Tsarnaev, T. 61 Tucker, R. 90 Tudge, C. 261 Tullock, G. 27, 35 Tupamaros 247 Tversky, A. 199, 214, 262 Twain, M. 197 Twitter 15 Tyson, L. 3 Uighur 256 Ulster Workers Council 157 ummah 50, 131, 133, 218 unbounded rationality 214 Underdorben, S. 61 UNITA 245 Uri, W. 208, 209, 215 van Gough, T. 226 Van Kleef, A. 149 Varese, F. 18 Veldhuis, T. 66 Venieris, Y. P. 66, 124 Victoria University 46 Vietcong 205 Vietnam Syndrome 248 Visva Bharati University 214 Waever, O. 194 Wahhabi/Wahhabism 133, 136, 138, 170, 254 Waldham, M. 67 Walitzki, A. 240 Walker, T. 124 Walsh, K. 240 Walter, B. 35, 105, 123 Warner, J. 1 Warrick, J. 66, 89, 90 Warrick, T. 240 Washington, G. 77 Weber, M. 77–78, 81, 90 Webster, N. 55 Weimann, G. 262 Wells, J. 195 Whelpton, J. 18 White Nationalists 3

Index

White, G. 67 White, R. 196 Wiesel, E. 261 William of Orange 55 Williams, P. 196 Willis, M. J. 66 Wilson, D. 35 Wilson, E. O. 35 Wilson, J. F. 124 Wilson, M. L. 149 Wilson, W. 2 Wirathu, A. 76 Wolfe Tone Society 172 Woodward, B. 18 Woody, W. 261 World Trade Organization 230 Worldwatch Institute 150 Wrangham, R. 149

Wright, L. 69, 89, 90 Wyne-Edwards, V. C. 30, 35 Yerkes, S. 214 Yotopoulos, P. 262 Yusuf, M. 74 Zakaria, F. 220 Zakat 113, 114, 133, 170, 174, 191 Zasulich, V. 7 Zealots 15, 20, 204 Zhou, Z. 262 Zimbardo, P. 79, 90 Zimmerman, M. 261 Zirakhzadeh, C. 195 Zubaydah, A. 109 Zucchino, D. 261 Zuckerberg, M. 73

297