Put the following factors in decreasing order of significance in major terrorist attacks in the U. S. over the period of the last 25 years.
- The easy availability of semi-automatic weapons and high capacity magazines.
- The availability of automobiles.
- Telecommunications, e.g. cell phones, Internet access.
- Second generation immigrants, i.e. children of immigrants.
- Radical Islam.
A fundamental principle of optimization is that the best target for optimization is where there’s the most to optimize, in other words tackle the most significant factors first.
9/11 changed everything — we began doing a lot more to break up large, coordinated terrorist plots, intercepting communications, etc. So, I don’t think we can rank the factors over the past 25 years, as the list changed.
For the past 10 years:
C. Communications — more for the Internet, and self-radicalizing the lone nuts.
B. Automobiles — lugging a cache of weapons or explosives on public transportation is pretty much a non-starter. It’s an odd one to be on the list since it is so ubiquitous, but sure, whatever.
A. Assault weapons — they are the easiest way to kill a lot of people, and the current choice for people who are too unstable to create bombs, etc.
E. Radical Islam — it is one of the things that can radicalize people. We’ve also had terrorists inspired by abortion, and the Bureau of Land Management, and the entire sovereign citizen movement.
D. Children of immigrants.
I think that I would classify those as “risks” rather than “threats”.
E then D then C.
The capacity to kill a large number of people hasn’t really changed. One can dicker about gun capabilities, but it starts with target selection, people with regular handguns and a bag of 10-15 round magazines have easily kill a lot of people in target-rich environments like theatres, schools, dance-clubs, and churches.
I had an exchange yesterday with a Brit who was relieved that the man who killed the MP didn’t have a U.S. style “Rambo” gun which would have allowed him to kill more, but he seems to have missed the point. The murderer had a target and achieved his goal. Killing a lot of people requires a frame of mind to desire that end.
BTW/ Most terrorist attacks in the U.S. result in no fatalities. I think the most common terrorist attacks in the U.S. are by animal-rights activists, but as far as I know, they’ve killed nobody in the last 25 years.
Counting deaths by terrorists, 9/11 pretty much swamps the domestic data, but it would still be hard to argue that radical Islam which emerged within the last 25 years isn’t number one cause of the increase in major terrorist attacks. I do think that the U.S. has done well over the last ten years in policing the borders to prevent and deter foreign-directed terrorist acts, which leaves the problem of lone-wolf anti-government types and second generation Muslims inspired by what they’ve read on-line.
EEIOU and sometimes Y.
E. It’s so far ahead it almost makes all else second order or third order. It borders on a necessary condition.
Those in D who have the illness of E.
C. Spreading-recruiting for E and coordination have become key.
A. But it’s just a mechanism. Probably materially above others. However, airplanes, RPGs, knives and bombs will suffice in their absence.
I was tempted to go with E first also, but we have had radical Islam around much longer than 25 years. The Wahabi influence has existed in Saudi Arabia for a very long time. If you want to look at the beginnings of modern radical Islam, I think a lot of folks would place it with Qutb back in the 50s and 60s, with perhaps his Milestones book being the first big treatise. It seems pretty clear that something happened and changed the focus of radical Islam more outwards to the rest of the world. Perhaps radical Islam changed, the money and influence bin Laden brought might have been a factor, but I think it is probably more than a coincidence that the internet sprung up then and communications improved so drastically. So I am going with C, E, D, A, B. On the international level A is pretty important since the Cold War left tons of weapons lying around.
Steve
Islamists began travelling.
Dave,
What accounted for the growth of extremism was oil money.
“Islamists began travelling.”
Qutb certainly did, but then I am hazy on Arabs in the middle of the last century. It is my impression that a lot went to Europe for their education. That would surely have been seen as nearly as degenerate as the US, yet attacks didn’t really began on any kind of scale until late in the century.
Steve
From the perspective of U.S. self-interest, radical Islam only becomes a problem after two strains of thought converge: (i) jihad as a global struggle against the non-Muslim world (emerging with the 1979-1989 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan) and (ii) religious justification emerging for martyrdom operations (suicide attacks against civilians only begin in the early 1990s in places like Israel (mostly), Algeria and Chechnya).
Qutb is important, but ultimately his thought dealt with the 1924-1979 period which focused on the inadequacy of the pseudo-Islamist governments in the Arab world. He didn’t justify suicide attacks against civilians, and he saw the role of jihad as necessary to make sure that “the Message” was heard by all of the people. This last point was the basis by which followers would launch assassination plots, and could be used to justify attacks against countries that suppress religious freedom, but really the suppression I think he was concerned about was state control of the clergy in the Arab world. We wouldn’t be having this discussion if Qutb’s views were the issue.
If you are looking over 25 years, you have to either pick and choose what counts as a “major” terrorist attack, or you have to acknowledge that there has been a lot of attacks that aren’t because of radicalized Islam.
Off the top of my head:
– Timothy McVeigh
– Eric Rudolph
– Anthrax attacks (if they fingered the right man)
– Beltway sniper (more about slipping his ex-wife in there than anything)
– Unabomber
– Tiller assassination
– Robert Lewis Dear
– Dylann Roof
– Bundy takeover of the bird sanctuary
And, more if you want to start counting the people who were just crazy, had access to weapons, and perpetrated acts that would be terrorism if they had a political motive (a distinction without a difference to the victims)
If you focus all of your attention at radical Islam, you aren’t paying attention and you are leaving America vulnerable.
Good point about Afghanistan. The fighting there helped develop the theology needed to attack in the US. Algeria also went a long way towards that, probably even more than Afghanistan. However, you can also make the case that it was during Afghanistan that the jihadis (then they were the good guys) first learned to effectively use recruiting and organizational techniques that were dependent upon modern communications. They have then gone on to use those effectively in the attacks on the US. It has been difficult to find evidence of direct contact with actual jihadist organizations for an awful to of those who have killed in the US. What you find is influence via the internet.
Steve
I think you’re casting too wide a net, Gustopher. In many of the cases you’re citing we have more homicides in a typical weekend here in Chicago than were perpetrated by the criminals you’re talking about. And that’s a critical difference. They’re obviously law enforcement issues without discernible foreign involvement.
I don’t think it is reasonable to say that foreign involvement is necessary for terrorism to be terrorism. I would characterize terrorism as a violent attack against a non-military target for political purposes, by individuals hiding among the ordinary civilians with the intent of making everyone feel threatened.
And, by that definition, we’ve been running about 50-50 with fundamentalist Islamic terrorism and entirely homegrown terrorism.
I do think a case can be made that the homegrown terrorists are not as good at it as the foreign inspired terrorists, or not as lucky, or they want to get away, which limits their options a bit. Fundamentalist Islam has a pretty clean lead in terrorists who expect to die in the act.
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All crimes are political.