Travel Broaden the Mind

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

International terrorism aspires to intimidate or coerce a civilian population, influence the policy of a government, or affect the conduct of a government and transcend national

Brian Jenkins (1998) offers a practical solution to the problem: terrorists are not typical criminals. They commit crimes for political purposes. When captured by security forces, they are not usually prosecuted as terrorists but charged with the crimes they commit. Terrorists strike targets for political purposes in a given situation, using crime as an incidental tactic. When terrorists cross national boundaries, they become international terrorists. Furthermore, terrorists are not exceptionally creative; they use a limited array of weapons and tactics.

However, as he mentions, it is when we go beyond this definition is when the problems arise.

Terrorism can be defined different ways by different people. “Terrorism is violence- or the threat of violence used to achieve a political goal” (Terrorism 1), that was Opposing Viewpoint’s definition of terrorism. Opposing Viewpoints says that [Terrorism] “differs

Terrorism has been in existence for many decades. Most recently, the events of September 11th, 2001 have sparked discussions and controversies on the issue of the war on terror. Many nation’s and organization’s have different definitions of terrorism, what laws should be used when dealing with terrorism, and whether or not it is time to rethink the rules of the war on terror. Twelve years after the attacks of 9/11 I believe it is time to reconsider, especially the United State’s rules, on terrorism and the war on terror.

For these reasons, historians of terrorism normally work with a wide definition, and social scientists do so much of the time. But philosophers may well prefer a narrow definition. They focus on the moral standing of terrorism and need a definition that is particularly helpful in moral discourse. Morally speaking, surely there is a difference—for some, a world of difference—between planting a bomb in a government building and killing a number of highly placed officials of (what one considers) an unjust and oppressive government, and planting a bomb in a tea shop and killing a random collection of common citizens, including children. While both acts raise serious moral issues, these issues are not identical, and running them together under the same heading of “terrorism” will likely hamper, rather than help,

The Central Intelligence Agency defines terrorism as “premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents” (CIA). This term was specifically created to differentiate terrorism between other acts of violence. These doings of terrorism are not just any act but are specific acts of violence. A dominant reason behind terrorism tends to fall upon religious beliefs and culture ties.

The term has expanded immensely during the twentieth century to include any type of political violence that an observer does not agree with; thus contributing to the confusion and the murkiness of the meaning of the word. The media and Politicians are quick to label any violent enemy as terrorist. Deeming any act of violence that one disagrees with as terrorism cause the term to lose its meaning and become a highly contextual and highly subjective. Some acts of violence are portrayed as terrorism by certain media outlets and this notion of legitimate is resisted by others. Confusion further depends by the fact that researchers and governments have more than one hundred working different definitions for the term terrorism. Critics believe that another contribution to the media’s confusion is the need to get the news first which can lead to inaccurate reporting and misrepresentations (Tuggle, & Huffman, 2007) or “blatantly false pretenses” (Greenwald,

This chapter was all about State terrorism and the different subtypes and examples. State Terrorism can be describe as; when the government is committed to using violence and extreme threats against their own civilians to get them to comply with the same views as the government to the point of submission. A country can involve in state terrorism with the aim of protecting the safety of its borders, guarding sovereignty or to achieving some political goal. The chapter breaks down state terrorism into two categories: internal and external terrorism. The first being internal terrorism, which is when the act occurs as a result against a domestic order, challenge to mainstream values, or internal human rights violation etc. A State may engage in terror acts for a variety of reasons. The main reason behind most state terror acts is to protect the sovereignty of the country. The government safeguards the independence and security of the country. This responsibility

Terrorism dates to 1605, and the term was coined in the French revolution, Donahoe, H (2006). Whether it be the UK or further a wide, ideologies are set, thus meaning terrorism can exist, because of competing theories of ideologies. This can be better explained by actions of the IRA and IS, and the analysis of their similarities.

For instance, the murder of abortion-clinic doctors is among the cases used to come up with the perceived reduction in the frequency of terrorist attacks. This raises the question of the exact definition of terrorism used by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism to come up with the statistics. It also includes other cases of attempted but foiled attacks in the United States. Arguably, whereas it is fallacious to extend the view and scope of terrorist attacks, it would have been better if the source had explained the exact meaning of terrorism used to develop the statistics (Plumer, 2013). Additionally, the source ignored other aspects such as the prevalence of fatal attacks, as opposed to generalizing cases of

makes the idea of terrorism difficult to define. On the other hand, it is not much more of social

abhorrence for violence which is indiscriminate and/or actively targets civilians, with the acknowledgement that some forms of political oppression may be so unjust as to legitimate violent action by the oppressed.21 While violent action was necessary to achieve decolonisation in many cases, and widely seen as legitimate when used for this purpose,22 the legitimacy of the use of violence in many present-day conflicts (Israel/Palestine being one example) is contested. If the use of violence for political ends is not seen as legitimate, it is frequently identified as “terrorism”. Hence the lack of agreement: whereas a group employing violent means to bring about political change may be seen by some as legitimately struggling against oppression, the same group can be viewed by others as terrorists.23 To date, the international community has failed to agree upon a definition of “terrorism” which overcomes this basic obstacle.24 Instead, a range of international conventions have been adopted to criminalise at the international level certain actions which are often employed by those described as terrorists, rather than criminalising (or defining) “terrorism” per

Terrorism, then, is a type of political crime that makes use of murder and destruction or the threat of such violence in order to promote change. It is a