Priorities for Homeland Security
The last line of defense against suicide terrorism--preventing bombers
from reaching targets--may be the most expensive and least likely to
succeed.
Random bag or body searches cannot be very effective against people
willing to die, although this may provide some semblance of security and
hence
psychological defense against suicide terrorism's psychological
warfare. A middle line of defense, penetrating and destroying recruiting
organizations
and isolating their leaders, may be successful in the near term, but
even more resistant organizations could emerge instead. The first line
of defense is
to drastically reduce receptivity of potential recruits to recruiting
organizations. But how?
It is important to know what probably will not work. Raising literacy
rates may have no effect and could be counterproductive should greater
literacy
translate into greater exposure to terrorist propaganda (in Pakistan,
literacy and dislike for the United States increased as the number of
religious
madrasa schools increased from 3000 to 39,000 since 1978) (27, 38).
Lessening poverty may have no effect, and could be counterproductive if
poverty reduction for the entire population amounted to a downward
redistribution of wealth that left those initially better off with fewer
opportunities
than before. Ending occupation or reducing perceived humiliation may
help, but not if the population believes this to be a victory inspired
by terror
(e.g., Israel's apparently forced withdrawal from Lebanon).
If suicide-bombing is crucially (though not exclusively) an
institution-level phenomenon, it may require finding the right mix of
pressure and
inducements to get the communities themselves to abandon support for
institutions that recruit suicide attackers. One way is to so damage the
community's social and political fabric that any support by the local
population or authorities for sponsors of suicide attacks collapses, as
happened
regarding the kamikaze as a by-product of the nuclear destruction of
Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In the present world, however, such a strategy
would
neither be morally justifiable nor practical to implement, given the
dispersed and distributed organization of terrorist institutions among
distantly
separated populations that collectively number in the hundreds of
millions. Likewise, retaliation in kind ("tit-for-tat") is not morally
acceptable if allies
are sought (41). Even in more localized settings, such as the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict, coercive policies alone may not achieve
lasting relief from
attack and can exacerbate the problem over time. On the inducement
side, social psychology research indicates that people who identify with
antagonistic groups use conflicting information from the other group to
reinforce antagonism (19). Thus, simply trying to persuade others from
without
by bombarding them with more self-serving information may only increase
hostility.
Other research suggests that most people have more moderate views than
what they consider their group norm to be. Inciting and empowering
moderates from within to confront inadequacies and inconsistencies in
their own knowledge (of others as evil), values (respect for life), and
behavior
(support for killing), and other members of their group (42), can
produce emotional dissatisfaction leading to lasting change and
influence on the part
of these individuals (43). Funding for civic education and debate may
help, also interfaith confidence-building through intercommunity
interaction
initiatives (as Singapore's government proposes) (35). Ethnic
profiling, isolation, and preemptive attack on potential (but not yet
actual) supporters of
terrorism probably will not help. Another strategy is for the United
States and its allies to change behavior by directly addressing and
lessening
sentiments of grievance and humiliation, especially in Palestine (where
images of daily violence have made it the global focus of Moslem
attention)
(44) (Fig. 4). For no evidence (historical or otherwise) indicates that
support for suicide terrorism will evaporate without complicity in
achieving at
least some fundamental goals that suicide bombers and supporting
communities share.
Fig. 4. Moslem youth with Quran dressed as
a Palestinian suicide bomber demonstrating outside the United
Nations office in Jakarta, Indonesia (April
2002). (Indonesia is the most populous Moslem nation.)
[Reuters/Darren Whiteside] [View Larger
Version of this Image (95K GIF file)]
Of course, this does not mean negotiating over all goals, such as
Al-Qaida's quest to replace the Western-inspired system of nation-states
with a
global caliphate, first in Moslem lands and then everywhere (see
supporting online text for history and agenda of suicide-sponsoring
groups). Unlike
other groups, Al-Qaida publicizes no specific demands after martyr
actions. As with an avenging army, it seeks no compromise. But most
people
who currently sympathize with it might.
Perhaps to stop the bombing we need research to understand which
configurations of psychological and cultural relationships are luring
and binding
thousands, possibly millions, of mostly ordinary people into the
terrorist organization's martyr-making web. Study is needed on how
terrorist
institutions form and on similarities and differences across
organizational structures, recruiting practices, and populations
recruited. Are there reliable
differences between religious and secular groups, or between
ideologically driven and grievance-driven terrorism? Interviews with
surviving Hamas
bombers and captured Al-Qaida operatives suggest that ideology and
grievance are factors for both groups but relative weights and
consequences
may differ.
We also need to investigate any significant causal relations between
our society's policies and actions and those of terrorist organizations
and
supporters. We may find that the global economic, political, and
cultural agenda of our own society has a catalyzing role in moves to
retreat from our
world view (Taliban) or to create a global counterweight (Al-Qaida).
Funding such research may be difficult. As with the somewhat tendentious
and
self-serving use of "terror" as a policy concept (45), to reduce
dissonance our governments and media may wish to ignore these relations
as legitimate
topics for inquiry into what terrorism is all about and why it exists.
This call for research may demand more patience than any administration
could politically tolerate during times of crisis. In the long run,
however, our
society can ill afford to ignore either the consequences of its own
actions or the causes behind the actions of others. Potential costs of
such ignorance
are terrible to contemplate. The comparatively minor expense of
research into such consequences and causes could have inestimable
benefit.
REFERENCES AND NOTES
1.
"Patterns of global terrorism" (U.S. Department of State,
Washington, DC, May 2002); available at
www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/pgtrpt/2001/. "The
U.S. Governmenthas employed this definition of terrorism for
statistical and analytical purposes since 1983."
2.
U.S. Code Congress. Admin. News, 98th Congress, 2nd Session, v. 2,
par. 3077, 98 STAT. (19 October 1984).
3.
Until 1983, official U.S. positions on "terror" followed the term's
common meaning in use since the French Revolution, referring to
state-sponsored terror. For example, under "sources relating to
Operation Enduring Freedom and the struggle against terrorism," the U.S.
Navy's Web guide on terrorism regularly links to Department of
Defense articles on Iraq
(www.history.navy.mil/library/guides/terrorism.htm).
4.
The recent Guatemalan truth commission report singled out the U.S.
Army School of the Americas (SOA), now at Fort Benning, Georgia, for
counterinsurgency training that "had a significant bearing on human
rights violations during the armed conflict." A 1998 human rights report
released by the Guatemala Archdiocese Human Rights Office also
linked SOA graduates in Guatemala's military intelligence (D-2, G-2) to
a
civilian-targeted campaign of kidnappings, torture, and murder that
left tens of thousands dead. References available online through Network
Solidarity with the People of Guatemala (NISGUA), "U.S. Army School
of the Americas cited in Guatemalan Truth Commission Report,"
17 July 2001; available at
www.nisgua.org/articles/school_of_the_americas. htm.
5.
B. Lewis, The Assassins (Basic, New York, 2002).
6.
M. Robespierre, "Principes de morale politique," speech delivered
to French National Convention, 5 February 1794; available at
http://membres.lycos.fr/discours/1794.htm.
7.
A. Axell, Kamikaze (Longman, New York, 2002).
8.
A precipitating event was the exiling of 418 Palestinians suspected
of affiliation with Hamas (18 December 1992), the first mass expulsion
of
Arabs from Palestine since 1948.
9.
Quran, chapt. 3, verses 140-146.
10.
Compare this statement with that of Hamas leader Abd Al-'Aziz
Al-Rantisi, Al-Hayat (London-Beirut), 25 April 2002.
11.
U.S. Department of Justice, Al Qaeda Training Manual, online
release 7 December 2001; available at
www.usdoj.gov/ag/trainingmanual.htm.
12.
"Suicide terrorism: A global threat," Jane's BioSecurity (2002);
available at www.janes.com/security/
international_security/news/usscole/jir001020_1_n. shtml.
13.
B. Lewis, What Went Wrong (Oxford Univ. Press, New York, 2002). The
notion of a distinct religious authority, or clergy, was traditionally
alien to Islam. The de facto modern clergy recognized by Islamic
suicide attackers includes mullahs of Pakistan and Afghanistan, as well
as the
19th-century administrative office of ayatollah in Iran and the
former Ottoman office of State Attorney, or mufti (e.g., in Palestine,
Syria, and
Arabia). Many in this "clergy" also oppose suicide bombing.
14.
D. Malakoff, Science 295, 254 (2002) .
15.
D. Chapin, et al., Science 297, 1997 (2002) [Free Full Text].
16.
D. Von Drehle, Washington Post, 7 October 2002, p. A1. Warner's
example of "rational deterrence" was the Cold War doctrine MAD
(mutually assured destruction). MAD's key premise was the
apparently irrational threat of guaranteeing one's own destruction in
order to
destroy the enemy.
17.
Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations, "Confronting
anti-Arab or anti-Muslim sentiments," 21 September 2002; available at
www.uua.org/uuawo/issues/respond/confront.html.
18.
S. Milgram, Obedience to Authority (Harper & Row, New York, 1974).
19.
L. Ross and C. Stillinger, Negotiation J. 7, 389 (1991) [ISI].
20.
R. Clark, Crime in America (Simon & Schuster, New York, 1970).
21.
White House news release, 22 March 2002; available at
www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/03/20020322-1.html.
22.
J. J. Jai, Christian Science Monitor, 10 December 2001, p. 7.
23.
G. Becker, Pol. Econ. 76, 169 (1968) [CrossRef].
24.
"They are youth at the peak of their blooming, who at a certain
moment decide to turn their bodies into body parts... flowers."
Editorial,
Al-Risala (Hamas weekly), 7 June 2001.
25.
Sheikh Yussuf Al-Qaradhawi (a spiritual leader of the Muslim
Brotherhood), Al-Ahram Al-Arabi (Cairo), 3 February 2001.
26.
A. Krueger, J. Maleckova, NBER Working Paper no. w9074, National
Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, MA, July 2002; available
at http://papers.nber.org/papers/W9074.
27.
T. Friedman, Longitudes and Attitudes (Farrar, Strauss, Giroux, New
York, 2002). Leaders of Al-Qaida's international cells are often
middle-class, European-educated converts to radical Islam. Family
histories indicate little religious fervor before emigration to a
solitary
existence in Europe and subsequent belonging to a local prayer
group or mosque (available tapes preach a revolutionary end to daily,
personal
alienation through collective action to destroy perceived
impediments to "restoring" Islam's values and dominance). As with other
radical Islamic
groups, ordinary cell operatives are often resident Middle East
bachelors from middle-class families.
28.
A. Merari, paper presented to Institute for Social Research seminar
series, "The Psychology of Extremism," Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI,
11 February 2002.
29.
R. Ezekiel, The Racist Mind (Viking, New York, 1995).
30.
N. Hassan, The New Yorker, 19 November 2001; available at
www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?011119fa_FACT1.
31.
B. Barber, Heart and Stones (Palgrave, New York, in press).
32.
D. Brooks, The Atlantic Monthly 289 (6), 18 (June 2002); available
at www.theatlanticmonthly.com/issues/2002/06/brooks.htm.
33.
Unlike people willing to blow themselves up, for frontline soldiers
in an apparently hopeless battle, there usually remains hope for
survival [ G.
Allport, J. Gillespie, J. Young, J. Psychol. 25, 3 (1948) ]. The
distance between no hope and some (however small) is infinite, which
represents
the ultimate measure of devotion that religions typically uphold as
ideal. While commitment to die for nonkin cannot be rendered within
standard
theories of Expected Utility, there are moves theorists attempt,
such as invoking "infinite utility." Using "infinite utility" to patch
theories of
rationality creates holes elsewhere in the system. Thus, expected
utilities are usually weighted averages, which has scant sense when one
term is
infinite. The deeper point is that notions of maximization of
anticipated benefits cannot account for such behaviors, and ad hoc moves
to maintain
rational utility at all costs result in a concept of rationality or
utility doing little explanatory work. In sum, reliance on
rational-choice theories may
not be the best way to understand and try to stop suicide
terrorism.
34.
D. Rhode, A. Chivers, New York Times, 17 March 2002, p. A1.
35.
"White Paper--The Jemaah Islamiyah Arrests," (Singapore Ministry of
Home Affairs, Singapore, 9 January 2003); available at
www2.mha.gov.sg. Recruitment and indoctrination into Jemaah
Islamiyah are similar in other radical Islamic groups: "The first stage
...
involved religious classes organised for a general mass... . The
second stage ... involved identifying those who were captivated enough
to find
out more about the plight of Muslims in other regions. [JI
spiritual leader] Ibrahim Maidan identified potential members from those
who were
curious enough to remain after classes to enquire further. He
engaged those students' interest and compassion and finally invited
those he
deemed suitable to join JI. This recruitment process would usually
take about 18 months. The few who were selected as members were made
to feel a strong sense of exclusivity and self esteem ... a strong
sense of in-group superiority."
36.
In much the same way, the pornography, fast food, or soft drink
industries manipulate innate desires for naturally scarce commodities
like sexual
mates, fatty foods, and sugar to ends that reduce personal fitness
but benefit the manipulating institution. [S. Atran, In Gods We Trust
(Oxford
Univ. Press, New York, 2002)].
37.
E. Sciolino, New York Times, 27 January 2002, p. A8.
38.
"What the world thinks in 2002: How global publics view: Their
lives, their countries, the world, America" (Survey Rep., Pew Research
Center,
4 December 2002); available at
http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=165.
39.
Reuters News Service, 11 June 2002; accessed at
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20020611/wl_nm/mideast_palestini.
40.
C. Lynch, Washington Post, 18 December 2002, p. A27.
41.
R. Axelrod and W. Hamilton, Science 211, 1390 (1981)
[ISI][Medline].
42.
M. Bazerman, M. Neale, Negotiating Rationally (Free Press, New
York, 1991).
43.
A. Eagly, S. Chaiken, The Psychology of Attitudes (Harcourt Brace,
Fort Worth, TX, 1993).
44.
One possibility is to offer and guarantee a clear resolution of
"final status" acceptable to majorities of Israelis and Palestinians.
Without clear
resolution of final status before implementation of "confidence
building" measures, with an understanding by all parties of what to
expect in the
end, it is likely that doubts about ultimate intentions will
undermine any interim accord--as in every case since 1948. [ S. Atran,
Politics and
Society 18, 481 (1990) ].
45.
N. Chomsky, 9-11 (Seven Stories Press, New York, 2001).
46.
Thanks to D. Medin, N. Chomsky, R. Gonzalez, M. Bazerman, R.
Nisbett, and reviewers.
Supporting Online Material
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