Analysis: The Struggle To Define Terrorism

The word ‘terrorism’ can be traced back to the French Revolution and the reign of terror committed against the population of France in the 1790s. During this time, thousands of people were killed and the general population was severely oppressed. Also, some of the first instances of terrorist tactics, such as assassination and intimidation, were witnessed in the killing of prominent officials and other opponents of the Revolution. In general, terrorists aim to incite fear in the population through pre-meditated violent acts and gain publicity as a medium in achieving their goals. Such acts include taking hostages, bombings and assassinations, all of which create fear and compliance in a victim or audience. Terrorism can be distinguished from other types of political violence through its disregard for and intentional harming of innocent civilians. Also, terrorists usually adopt a state of mind where one side is always good and any opposition is bad and deserves to be punished. As a result, terrorists will always have some supporters who share the same radical thoughts as them and thus terrorism, as a whole, will always be accepted as a legitimate use of violence. This is the reasoning behind the famous phrase by Gerald Seymour, “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter”(QUOTE

Terrorism is defined as an act of violence that is committed by an organization or a single person in order to be heard. Terrorist acts are usually based on a couple factors such as, historical grievances, foreign policy decision, poverty, and religion. Terrorism is not a new act amongst the world but something that has been around since the beginning. To understand a criminal you must think like a criminal, and understand why they committed a crime or a violent act, then you can prevent and conquer.

The term terrorism is used widely in present day especially in the United States. Terrorism is a double standard, the people who commit those terrorist acts, commit the acts out of beliefs and in their eyes ok. Terrorism can be described as the illegitimate use of force to achieve a political objective by targeting innocent people (Laqueur, 1987). To me the definition mention above is a great definition to describe terrorism as a crime. To aim for innocent people to prove a point which lead major injuries or death in most cases is to most people would be a crime, no questions asked. According to Martha Crenshaw (1995), “Terrorism cannot be defined unless the act, target and possibility of success are analyzed”. So to think, terrorist are people who commit these acts as a way to get their political or religious point across. If we look at the some of the most famous terrorist acts they are automatically labeled crimes. 9/11 was a crime because the persons affiliated with the act, targeted the

There are many different definitions of terrorism. Encyclopedia.com defines it very broadly as “the use of violence to further a political or social cause”. (2003). Another source states “Terrorism has been described variously as both a tactic and strategy; a crime and a holy duty; a justified reaction to oppression and an inexcusable abomination” (Terrorism Research, n.d.). Our unit one lecture reminded us of the adage “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter” and pondered whether the Boston Tea Party could be viewed as an act of terrorism (Bethel University, 2017). Regardless of the exact definition one chooses to use, our nation faces a wide range of threats from those who intend to do us harm. The individuals and organizations who threaten us are as

In the book War on Terror, by Patrick Coaty discusses issues that reference to terrorism. His main focus was the attack on 9/11 the terrorism issue has been more aware to the public on how dangerous it can be. According to Coaty terrorism was formed during the ending of the revolutionary France by the Jacobins they thought it was “cleanse” that it would take away all evil (Coaty 84) . The concept of terrorism was a form of have “power” over people a legitimate system was used to fear the public. In modern-day terrorism does not obey the law or have any law. Terrorism is not only based on bombing, killings and amonio, the government needs a title for a group it can be an individual whose against the government. A more popular group on terrorism is the Islamic fundamentalism. Terrorism comes from history, but recent it had shocked the world by different terrorist attacks and many innocent lives.

Terrorism is defined as the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion. It’s a problem that the United States and other countries have dealt with since before 9/11 but more significantly afterwards. On September 11, 2001, there was a series of four attacks by the Islamic terrorist group known as al-Qaeda. Two planes crashed into the North and South towers of the World Trade Center in New York City and a third crashed into the Pentagon, which houses the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense in Virginia. There was a fourth plane that was on track to Washington, D.C. but crashed into field in Pennsylvania. Several lives were lost, a total of 2,977 according to a CNN report. However 9/11 was only the beginning of terrorist attacks. Although 9/11 happened in the United Sates, terrorist attacks are felt worldwide and happen in countries other than the U.S. Recently, there have been terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels. In 2015-16 alone there have been 10 known terrorist attacks in places such as Syria, Nigeria and Iraq, which doesn 't include the minuscule ones that the media doesn 't cover. I will describe the beginnings of terrorism. Second, I will show the influence of religion on terrorism, particularly Islam. Lastly, describe the effects of terrorism on different parts of the world and its causes.

This definition outlines that the actions within terrorism is contradicting to the law. The key component of definition of terror is that the people who are being targeted are civilians. The attacks of the 11th of September took place on the America soil, and soon after the expression and the definition of ‘The war on terror’ was set by President Bush. The Bush-Cheney administration defined terrorism as following:

Countries around the world also have different definitions of terrorism. The definitions of terrorism contain key ideas

Terrorism is a term the world hears more than we want to. ISIS is making its headlines and bringing fear into the world. Fear is what terrorist thrive on and it is key to get policy makers attention. Defining terrorism is difficult because it has so many factors but it simply has one key point and that is the act of violence. Violence is used by small groups to achieve political change and it goes back to state violence against citizens during French Revolution and historically that is how terrorism has come to be defined.

Joseph Fitsanakis, there is also a comprehensive list of things that an act must fit to be terrorism by being: pre-planned, organized, methodical, rational, involve threat or violence, the targets must be indiscriminate, it achieves something concrete, has far-reaching goals, and it must support political or idealogical views, and have clear objectives. If any act of violence lacks one of these characteristics, then it can not be terrorism. After 9/11, an attack on American soil that took 2,977 lives in a series of hijacked airliners crashes into two U.S. landmarks, terrorism was given a broader definition, which outside of its original context has been a word formed to describe mostly people from the Middle East, unike the definition of terrorism points out. Historically, it would be impossible for all terrorists to be Muslims, and fear or ignorance keeps educated people from making well founded remarks about those that use terrorism. While it is true that there are those out there that are both Muslim and terrorists, it is untrue historically that all Muslims are terrorists.

Terrorism is a word that can be defined in many different ways. Differences in the definition depend upon the entity defining the term, and many times the definition varies based upon who is victorious in a given conflict. Compare the simplistic definition of Walter Laqueur (1987, 1999), who defines terrorism as the illegitimate use of force to achieve a political objective by targeting innocent people, with the definition found in Title 22 of the United States Code, Section 2656f (d), which describes terrorism as “premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience.” Likewise, Alex Schmid offers a complex definition that conglomerates 13 elements common to most definitions of terrorism.

There is a difficulty in defining terrorism officially due to subjective worldwide views, however the state department in the USA call it “Pre-meditated motivated violence perpetrated against civilians, usually intended to influence an audience”

Terrorism is a violent act that is planned and committed to cause terror in the people while trying to achieve political goals. In the Prologue Magazine article of John Brown the author states, “Terrorists may hope for political change, but what they often want is to simply strike back at and harm those they oppose” (Finkelman, 2011). Terrorism is something that can happen in any country because there are people who disagree with another’s beliefs or political views. Terrorists usually target civilians or “non-military folk” because they aren’t able to defend themselves against an attack. They are also not concerned with how much damage they cause; they will use anything from a bomb to guns.

To attempt to understand terrorism and pass judgment on it one must look to the origin of the word itself. The word terrorism was first used during the “Reign of Terror” that happened after the French Revolution. The French word it is based on meant “one frightens” and primarily referred to state-sponsored acts. Although the current official definition of terrorism has remained mostly unchanged for decades it does not construe the use of fear and harm to non-combatants to force change be it political or not. The international community’s inability to precisely define what terrorism is further muddies the waters. The United Nations General Assembly in 1994 did record:

Terrorism is a premeditated, politically motivated violence to perpetuate against civilians by non-national groups. Terrorism is mainly used to induce fear in the minds of the people to make them feel unsafe. (Henderson 4) Terrorism is a method of combat in which random or symbolic victims serve as instrumental targets of violence.