Suicide Attacks: weapon of the future?

[Stan]

Perhaps a tad earlier than 1980 ?

Kamikazes were the most common and best-known form of Japanese suicide attack during World War II

[TROUFION]

Yes the Kamikazi came first, BUT after 1945 the next round of suicide attacks came in the 1980's, hence the "modern suicide attacks" or better phrased "current threat from suicide attacks."

[Stan]

Thanks Troufion !
May have to get the book.

[Tc2642]

Interesting to note that it was the Ismali's who first came up with the suicide attacker, cira 8th century.

[Jedburgh]

Suicide bombing is simply a tactic, along the same line as IEDs - and both have been used to varying degrees of success in the COE. However, as has been noted repeatedly, it is often referred to as a "strategic tactic", as it's impact can be distributed far beyond its immediate messy consequences by the broadcase media and virtual comms.

Personally, I feel it is pointless to look at a "root of the problem" for suicide bombing per se - we need to look to the root of the conflict and move from there. Each region where suicide bombing has been used to any significant degree has to be looked at in its own unique context - although there are certainly similarities.

We're dealing with the issue in Iraq (unprecedented numbers) and Afghanistan, then we have the LTTE as mentioned, the phenomenon of the Chechen "Black Widows" as well as female suicide bombers used by the Marxist PKK, and, of course, the spectrum of Palestinian suicide bombings. There are other examples, but my point is that to treat any or all of these situations in an identical manner is a mistake.

I'd say Hizbullah beat the LTTE to the punch, but the LTTE really molded effective suicide terrorism in the 1980s. How many suicide bombers has Hizbullah used compared to the LTTE? Also, the LTTE I'd argue has been far more effective.

Hezballah moved on from suicide bombings to refining their use of IEDs in their campaign against the IDF and SLA in South Lebanon (as well as more conventional military raid/ambush tactics), whereas the LTTE has continued to use suicide bombers across the spectrum.

FYI, aside from buying the book, here's Pape's article from the Aug 03 issue of American Political Science Review: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism

...Perhaps most important, the close association between foreign military occupations and the growth of suicide terrorist movements in the occupied regions should give pause to those who favor solutions that involve conquering countries in order to transform their political systems....

In sum, at the tactial level, we've developed an entire spectrum of countermeasures, identified indicators and continue to train and raise awareness of our soldiers and LE professionals. However, threat TTPs continue to evolve in the face of our countermeasures - there will never come a point when we are completely protected from suicide bombers or IEDs. When it comes down to it, the ultimate solution is what the community here at SWC has long been pushing - improved implementation of effective COIN. Make your list of buzz-words regarding interagency cooperation and building governance capabilities - as Troufion stated in his post at the head of this thread, addressing root causes means more than killing bad guys.

[Merv Benson]

At their heart, human bomb attacks are explosive public relation events that strike at "strategic" pizza parlors and ice cream vendors. As noted above, Hezballah has moved to more effective tactical defensive measures against Israel's forces. There has to be some irony in the fact that Hezballah's rocket attacks against Israel killed fewer people than their human bomb attacks did especially on a per attempt basis.

Most terror attacks are for the purpose of grabbing media attention. They are acts of impotence meant to make governments look impotent, and too often the media follows that script.

[MountainRunner]

Jumping in late to the party, but I thought I'd through in a couple of pennies into the mix.

First, while Pape is cited, his message and his material wasn't contextualized very well. The most notable example is the references to LTTE in this discussion, including by TROUFION. If we're talking about Islamic terrorism, suicide or otherwise, we must explicitly exclude LTTE. They are virtually agnostic.

Also, if you cite Pape, know that he finds suicide terrorism is directly related to military occupation or location. Messages from OBL/UBL, for example, LTTE, and the 7/7 bombers etc all make specific references to placement of military combat forces in a region. This is the foundation of Pape's argument for off-shore balancing.

It is also worthy of noting that while "Civilizied peoples deplore, condemn and disdain suicide and suicide warfare", to quote TROUFION in the opening of this thread, this does not discount the Islamic, or otherwise, populations the suicide act is performed for. These populations may not entirely support the means but they support the ends, a scenario seen in Palestine.

If you don't want to buy his book, which is a good book, or you don't want to download the paper, you can watch or listen (via iPod if you want) his JHU APL Rethinking War series seminar.