New Paradigms for 21st Century Conflict

[Bill Moore]

In general I concur that insurgency is a strategy and that terrorism is a tactic, but as I think most of us agree our current lexicon and structural models describing insurgency and terrorism are entirely inadequate to accurately express what we're experiencing.

Although not new, I think the extent of using terrorism as a personal or group expression is much greater than it has been previously. I read an interesting study recently that explored some of the psychological and sociological factors that influence individuals to consider joining terrorist organizations, or simply conducting a terrorist attack without joining a terrorist group (and I'm confident that many of the same factors apply to why individuals join gangs, insurgencies, etc., with the exception of the economic status. I "think" most foot soldiers in gangs and insurgencies are from the lower economic class).

The greatest factor seemed to be identity. The majority of recruits into Muslim extremist groups were in their young 20's to 30's, lower to upper middle class, educated, and experienced a recent life change such as the loss of a loved one. This recent change served to alter their perception of the world fundamentally, so now they begin a new search for meaning. These searchers were easily identified in Mosques, Madrassas's, etc., and they would be befriended and gradually led down the path of becoming a devote Muslim to Extremist. Of course this happens in Christian organizations also, we have all seen the lost kids who have all the sudden seen the light, and are easily manipulated by their new mentors.

I can't help but think that terrorism for "many" of these individual terrorists is simply a form of expression of being dissatisfied and/or frustrated with the world. Perhaps this pushes many attacks into the criminally insane areana, but these criminals are frequently mobilized and given direction by savvy strategists in this case, so their criminal act ends up serving a larger strategy. Now that we're in the information age, jihadists (and other groups) can use the internet to radicalize lost souls globally, thus you have emergent lone wolfs and terrorist cells world wide that are home grown, and no longer a part of the Afghan/USSR war alumni.

The psychological factors that make people vulnerable to this type of manipulation is increasing at an alarming rate due to social and psychological disruption due to globalization, the Iraq war, etc. Globalism is upsetting social norms (isn't this the underlying reason that Al Qaeda exists? They want to free their holy lands from these emergent norms that are not in step with their views of how a muslim should live), which sets many people on a new path searching for meaning (we had drugs and free sex in the 60s during our social upheaval, the Muslims have jihad). Proliferating violence equals more casualties, which in turn equals more potential recruits. The world wide web and sattelite TV reaches out to a global audience, part of which consists of potentially frustrated individuals who are looking for a way to express themselves. The media has allowed terrorist attacks to become a new norm for the angry man to express himself, and to a lesser extent the angry woman. The frequency of the attacks has lessened the moral reluctance to engage in such an act, as indicated by a recent of poll of American Muslims where several thought terrorist attacks were an acceptable act. In other words, it is gaining momentum, much like rap music did in the recent past as a means of expression world wide (I'm attempting to show a parallel of where a paticular behavior initially considered undesirable by those in the fold, starts gaining acceptance by those outside the fold, and before you know it young kids from Lebanon, Peru, and Japan are into rap, ugly clothes, wearing pants that don't cover the crack in their butt, etc. as the means for their generation to express themselves, what is especially interesting is national/nationalism norms are becoming less important).

Obviously my arguments are not well thought out or intellectually supported at this point, but I wanted to throw them out to the council in rough form as food for thought. I think if we continue to wage this conflict as a war, rather than a social/cultural issue, we'll continue to feed the beast and create a problem set that will become unsolvable.