Talk:Terrorism/Archive1

Terminate
"How terrorist Movements Terminate" This might be good info, but I don't understand the title. Does anyone know of the RAND project's report, and what they were really saying? Is it "Ways to end terrorism?" or is it "What drives a terrorist movement to kill" or what??-- 10:12, 9 April 2009 (EDT)

According to a study done by the Rand Corporation in 2008 on how terrorist movements terminate:


 * 43% by converting to mainstream political movements.
 * 40% by law enforcement apprehension
 * 10% by achieving their stated goals.
 * 7% by being neutralized through military action.

Since 9/11 the entire focus of the United States, at least (hopefully) until the Obama administration, has been on that 7 percent solution.


 * It is titled "How Terrorist Groups End". - User   10:45, 9 April 2009 (EDT)
 * And it's definitely worth putting in. Totnesmartin 11:08, 9 April 2009 (EDT)
 * That is entirely irrelevant. Al Qaeda cannot convert to mainstream politics within the USA as they are external and because they hail from regions that do not permit political organisation of this kind. MarcusCicero (talk) 12:49, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Dominant forms of terrorism
The reson I added that two dominant forms of terrorism are Islamic terrorism and communist terrorism is because throughout the cold war we witnessed communist terrorism all over the world like the Vietcong, or modern day communist terrorists, and in the post cold war era radical Islamist terror is certainly the dominant form of terrorism. Other types of terrorism like ecoterror, nationalist terror also exist, but they are less prevalent. Anyone disputing this? However nationalist terror is not universal and there are regional characteristics, so nationalist terror may also be included as a dominant form, it is open to discussion. --Steve (talk) 06:09, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Having, in my time, been personally shaken by bombs by both the IRA and ETA, I'm not sure that we'd want to downplay nationalist terror too much.--BobNot Jim 08:13, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
 * There's also capitalist terrorism. And wasn't the second-largest terrorist attack in the states the Murrah Fed building thing?  Although maybe one of the early union-busting affairs had a higher death toll...  18:28, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
 * So I went to Wikipedia putting in terrorist names as they occurred to me.
 * Red Brigades Marxist Leninist; Angry Brigade British libertarian communist; The Japanese Red Army was a militant far-left group; Aum Shinrikyo is a Japanese new religious movement; The Branch Davidian Seventh Day Adventists (also known as "The Branch") are a Protestant sect; The Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) is an Irish republican paramilitary organisation; The Ulster Defence Association (UDA) is a loyalist and Protestant[5] paramilitary organisation; Euskadi Ta Askatasuna or ETA is an armed Basque nationalist and separatist organization; The Vietcong or National Liberation Front, was an army in South Vietnam and Cambodia that fought the United States and South Vietnamese governments during the Vietnam War;  The Communist Party of Peru  more commonly known as the Shining Path (Sendero Luminoso), is a Maoist guerrilla organization in Peru.
 * Completely unscientific, and my definition of "terrorist" might be a bit off in some cases. Some religion, some nationalism, some mixtures.--BobNot Jim 19:15, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Notable terrorist groups
Many of those put on the list do not meet the criteria of an actual terrorist. The British Army is a government agency and the Founding Fathers did not target civilians. Researcher (talk) 00:58, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Actually the tea ships the founding fathers targeted were privatley owned so yes, they did target civilians. Not to mention the countless torrys who were targeted by the colonials--BenB (talk) 20:35, 10 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Vandalism does not equal terrorism. Therefore, the founding fathers still do not count.  Nor, for that matter, do the British or even Nazi armies.  Researcher (talk) 00:06, 11 May 2010 (UTC)


 * In that case neither does 9/11 as that was also vandalism. Vandalism is the malicious destruction of property. Terrorism is the use of violence to achieve political or ideological change. So when an act of vandalism is done in an effort to bring about change it is in fact terrorism. --BenB (talk) 04:04, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Interesting because I was under the impression that one of the 9/11 goals was to kill as many people as possible. If they were only interested in vandalism why not just spray paint "Osama waz here!" all over the place in the dead of night? Acei9 04:13, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Naw, they weren't trying to kill as many people as possible. They hit he towers early in the AM before the workers (probably the ones they really wanted to kill) had turned up.  No, they hijacked planes full of fuel for transcontinental flights, and relatively low on passengers, and attacked physical icons of what they hated.  04:44, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Notable terrorist groups 2
To say the truth, unless we are going to do as good a job as Wikipedia here ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_designated_terrorist_organizations ), is there even a point for that section? Sen (talk) 19:48, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

French Resistance
Should we add in the French Resistance? They did of course attack the recognized government of France. Imarcuson (talk) 17:16, 14 May 2010 (UTC)
 * But did they bomb civilians?  17:21, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Sloppy
We really need to get a bit more serious here. The American Revolution was not an example of terrorism - a free people made a conscious decision to secede, and did so by attacking the military infrastructure in place by the domineering force in power. Al Qaeda and associated groups clearly are 'terrorist' as they deliberately target civilians (Such as 9/11, the Madrid bombings) in order to instill absolute terror within the population. The way you conduct yourself is everything. MarcusCicero (talk) 12:47, 28 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes. The following should go:
 * Founding Fathers
 * US Army
 * British Army 19:02, 28 August 2010 (UTC)


 * It should also be noted that the Continental Army was recognized as a properly constituted fighting force, not as a "terrorist" or "criminal" organization. Also, in throwing tea into a harbor, no civilians were hurt or killed, unlike other terrorist attacks that included violence against civilians, even if unintentional or as a side-note.  (And, besides 9/11, AQ has launched numerous attacks whose purposes were definitely death and destruction.) Researcher (talk) 21:02, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Terrorism's Success Rate and Prevalence
In his recent book, The Better Angels of Our Nature, Steven Pinker refers to a couple of studies on the successfulness of terror tactics, noting that around 5% of terror groups ever manage to accomplish any of their strategic goals. This is in addition to noting that terrorism, and the rates of deaths caused by terrorism, have been in rather steady decline over the last several decades. Perhaps something discussing these facts should be included here? Siafu (talk) 23:20, 11 April 2013 (UTC)