Should Street Gangs Be Considered Terrorist Organizations?

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

One of the main terrorist organizations in Peru is the Sendero Luminoso, which means Shining Path. This organization has a goal to destroy the institutions of the Peruvians and make the country into a communist institution. The Sendero Luminoso has approximately 100-200 members that operate in the rural parts of the country. The Sendero Luminoso opposes outside influence of foreign officials. During the 1990's, the Sendero Luminoso attempted to car bomb the US embassy located in Peru. Another terrorist organization that is operating in Peru is the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement or MRTA with approximately 100 members. This group wants to establish a Marxist regime and get rid of all United States of America and Japanese imperial groups in Peru. The MRTA is a group that has conducted bombings, kidnappings, and other terroristic activities in the past. Recently, these groups' activities have slowed down over the recent years, and the groups have been eliminated from the

The research topic that caught my interest is how gangs react in nonviolent ways when they see other gang members. My research question is gang members are always violent when they see other gang members in their neighborhood. To answer this question, I will observe the Latin Kings who are in my neighborhood. They usually hang out in front of stores, I will obverse them on Monday around 2.00 pm. On Monday I will visit these places. Of course, I will observe from afar. Other gang members in my neighborhood are not Latin Kings, so I will observe whether the Latin Kings will do anything when they see the Bloods or Crips or some other gang members coming through the neighborhood or coming inside the store.

Many agree that terrorism is a phenomenon that is hard to put a label on. Historically considered a crime it has deservingly become treated as an act of war in the post 9/11 world. Modern-day terrorism has blurred the boundaries between a crime and war and reshaped the traditional understanding of the concept of war itself turning the entire globe into a battlefield. Contemporary war is much less a confrontation of state armies fighting for territorial control, but terrorist, guerilla and paramilitary groups fighting military superpowers. Without much for the resources, terrorists were able to merge with the global civil society and threaten the state and international security by endangering and spreading the fear in the civilian population.

ISIS is a self funding terrorist group, one of the first of its kind. ISIS funds itself in many different ways. Primarily the Islamic State conducts oil smuggling operations from wells and refineries in territories they have seized in Iraq and northern Syria. It has been estimated that ISIS makes one million to two million a day on oil sales. They also receive large donations from wealthy sympathizers across the globe. Another tactic ISIS uses to finance themselves is through organized crime. Because there is virtually no law enforcement to reign in ISIS’s behavior, the Islamic State is able to conduct methods to obtain money from wherever they have established control. In many of the territories that ISIS controls in Iraq and Syria are highly

The three most critical national security threats confronting the U.S. over the next five years include the following: terrorism and non-state violent groups, cybercrime, and climate change. While some of these threats present different challenges and ramifications, I believe that within the next five years, foreign-hatched and homegrown terror attacks on the U.S. homeland will remain the most——as it is currently—— imminent threats to U.S. national security. The next critical threat is cybercrime on the U.S. critical infrastructure and other facilities of security importance. The third is the primary and secondary effects of climate change. I examined these threats below.

“Sociology had little to tell the world about the nature and causes of organized attacks by civilians against other civilians” (Roche, 2004), attacks such as the event that took place September 11th, 2001 caught the interest of sociologist and implored them to turn their attention to the subject of terrorism. “Terrorism is a form of collective violence”, against civilians, critical infrastructures, or natural resources, in an attempt to pursue a political agenda (Roche, 2004). The word terrorism Extremist and extremist groups are those that commit acts of violent extremism and have very different ideologies than those they have targeted. The definition of terrorism is broad and changes from agency to agency and even government. All terrorists

Terrorism, within modern society, has become a common strategy employed by various radical groups throughout the world. The utilization of terroristic tactics originated in Russia during the 19th century as a response to an autocratic Russian system that was believed to be well overdue for refinement. During this time, terrorism remained within its place of origin and was a carefully directed phenomenon. Thus, most acts of terror were aimed at specified targets who were chosen systematically, ensuring the message being conveyed was clear and no harm occurred to civilians. With the progression of society, terrorism has evolved into a more horrific strategy. Evolving from a once directed phenomenon to an increasingly unsystematic style of attack, that can occur anywhere at anytime. This change has caused many to believe that terrorism itself is a mindless act that serves no purpose other than to instill fear within society. This assumption is partially correct, but contrary to popular belief the use of terrorism by radical groups does serve a purpose. By instilling fear within society through violent acts, terrorists attempt to usher change. This is because “Terrorism is based on the idea that the kind of change desired can be achieved only with violence” . With this belief, many radical organizations choose to utilize terrorism as a tool to cause change, as they believe it is the only way to bring about change. Another effect of this belief is radical groups are

Recent trends in terrorism include evidence of links between organized crime and terrorist groups. Terrorists not only engage in criminal activities to fund their operations, but use organized crime to buy and sell goods and services, such as weapons and forged documents. (Knoke, 2015)

Peru is a country long plagued by political violence. The Shining Path is by far the largest and most successful of Peru's terrorist organizations. Shining Path initiated its first operations against the Lima regime in 1980. In the intervening years, it quickly became the most serious security problem that the Peruvian government faced. Few political movements, inside or outside of Peru, could match its fanaticism and extreme ideology. The Shining Path must be singled out for its simple ruthlessness. Murder, dynamite bombings, and arson are its instruments of political violence. Few terrorist groups in modern times have employed violence with the same determination, lack of discrimination, and widespread effect as the Shining Path.

Since 1980, terrorism has become a growing threat in Latin America. In the 1980’s, Latin America experienced more terrorist attacks (17,293) than all other regions combined (13,643), and nearly four times as many as the next most active region—Western Europe (4,729) (Jensen pg 1). Most terrorism in Latin America comes from within with groups like the Shining Path in Peru, the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) in El Salvador, and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) (Jensen pg 1). Violence decreased dramatically in the mid-1990s, after a number of governments waged successful anti-terrorism attacks at these insurgency groups. (Jensen pg 1). Although terrorism is a less prominent problem now, there are still threats,

Almost every country has experienced this type of political crime and violence, although some countries are targeted more than others. Some agencies and police officials don’t understand what terrorism is because of the complications of the definition.

Latin America is not exempt to the existence of terrorist groups and the violence that is exercise by these groups although with a lower incidence than in others regions of the world, which indicate that terrorism does not find a stronghold in the continent.

Terrorism by definition is difficult to describe and the definition tends to vary widely, but they usually start at a common point of departure. Most scholars, including Lutz, interprets terrorism as a ‘pejorative concept used to create power in situations in which power has previously been lacking.’ (Lutz et al. 2005)

Several books have wasted ink and money in attempting to define terrorism, what it is and why it happens. Terrorism has been present in our world since the earliest times of history and it can definitely not be seen as a novel occurrence. Usually when one tries to explain terrorism, the definition that emerges is ‘a holy duty’ and which has both a scheme as well as a strategy and it is seen as a justified reaction to maltreatment and unnecessary aversion. There are common patterns that are seen amongst terrorist activities and they all adapt to different forms such as kidnappings, threats, bombings, assassinations and airplane hijackings. At the end of the day, however, it all depends on whose point of view is being taken into consideration during this explanation. Terrorist organizations are usually considered to be small and are known to possess a secretive nature. This secretive nature tends to serve as an advantage to them when they attack since they do not provide their opponents with any clear organization to defend themselves or avert the attack. However, in a few cases, terrorism was used to maintain a war without the opponent ever recognizing the type of threat it poses to the country, thereby making terrorism a criminal activity.