Effective Counterterrorism in a Globalized World:
Reclaiming the Edge of Legitimacy
Leveraging US Strength in an Uncertain World
Stanley Foundation Conference on National and Global Security
Washington, DC,
Thursday, December 7, 2006
Are all terrorists alike, or are there substantial differences in motivation and actions among them? Does US policy rely too heavily on military actions to counter terrorism? Are there political strategies that might be used more effectively to strip terrorists of their rhetorical power with certain disenfranchised populations.
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Post-Panel Summary
The following summary of the panel "Effective Counterterrorism in a Globalized World: Reclaiming the Edge of Legitimacy" was drafted by Sherif Hamdy. It has not been approved or reviewed by the panelists.
What is commonly referred to as Islamic terrorism is based on grievances in the Muslim world that stem from the perception that the United States is only continuing what the "West" has done historically: interfere with and invade Muslim countries. "It isn't McDonalds, it's not bikinis, or our form of government," noted one panelists. The United States needs to focus more on using soft power and repairing its reputation rather than hard military power.
It is important to distinguish among different types of terrorists and deal with each kind accordingly. The strategy used against one type might prove to be counterproductive or have the opposite effect on another group. Panelists agreed it is critical to differentiate between tactical/local terrorists and strategic/global ones.
Tactical terrorists use violence to achieve a specific political (usually local) goal and are willing to negotiate with their announced enemy. They usually have a political wing along with their military one, which signals that the group can be negotiated with and that it has the potential to transform into a more political and social force. Strategic terrorists in contrast are not too concerned with politics and are instead in a state of perpetual global war against perpetual enemies. They reject all other opinions and believe they have a monopoly on truth. Negotiation with such a group is impossible.
The goal of an effective counterterrorism strategy would be to fracture the alliances that global/strategic groups have with local/tactical ones. This could be done by deterring the local/tactical ones from aiding and operating with Al Qaeda types. Making sure the cost of cooperating with Al Qaeda might include the loss of a local group's political objective is one way to create that fracture.
The importance of multilateral institutions was highlighted in the session. Working multilaterally ensures that the United States' actions acquire a certain legitimacy, gets the level of cooperation and involvement from other countries, and facilitates operational factors (such as information sharing and the creation of internationally sanctioned standards).
Ultimately, there is no military solution to the terrorist threat as such movements do not constitute a state or have a localized army that can be destroyed. It is instead a war for "hearts and minds." When dealing with a globalized threat such as terrorism, which crosses all borders, we need to work globally in cooperation with others to address its root issues.
Panel Transcript
This text has been professionally transcribed; however, for timely distribution, it has not been edited or proofread against the tape.
Giandomenico Picco: Good morning. My name is Giandomenico. I will be chairing this meeting, and we will be speaking in the order you see on this table. So really, just scrolling down. We have with us today, to discuss the issue of counterterrorism, a number of great experts. You have with you, I believe, the bios of each of them.
So my introduction to each of them will come just before they speak, and will be very short. If that is an acceptable modus operandi, we shall proceed in that way. We'll just introduce briefly the subject, in a way which may or may not make sense to you. But there you are. You're stuck with me. So here we go.
(Laughter)
Let me just start first with a very upbeat comment. And the first comment is: have no fear. Terrorism was beaten out before. We won before. There's no reason why we should not win again. Coming from Europe as I do, I can tell you that the experience of the European government with terrorism over the last 30 years has been, all in all, a successful experience. The movements in Europe, to a large extent, are no more. And some others have actually converted. So I would like to start on a good note on a subject that usually is full of very great caution and pessimism. But that will come just after I finish speaking.
(Laughter)
The second point I'd like to bring up to you is actually three brief vignettes, if I may, to introduce a subject which is so difficult to introduce in a few words, in any case. The first is that many years ago, I had an interesting experience - actually one of many. And let me just go to the point. I sat in a situation which was not of my choice with two individuals who were masked. They use to wear, all the time, these ski masks, even though the climate was rather hot.
And when my mask was taken off, and my blindfold was taken off, my two hosts, shall we say, made a very incredible and unexpected statement to me. They said to me, "Do you think we don't know that taking hostages is a bad thing? Do you think we don't agree with you that taking innocent people from the street -as we have taken you just now - is a bad thing to do?" I said, "It's a good thing to know that you know that."
(Laughter)
I said, "Where do we go from here?" And the comment to me was: "We do this because we have on other means." Okay?
The second vignette. Not long ago, the BBC told us that in a conversation they had with important people, they were told that as far as the U.K. authorities were concerned, a network of cells was now operating within the U.K. - and this was a very few weeks ago - and that they had organized themselves in a way to become effective independently, and that indeed, they had completed a good part of what I would call infiltration of society. I mention this, because in Europe, it is an easy statement to say that the best tool to combat has been, in Europe, infiltration. Infiltration was the single most effective tool to win that battle.
The third point I'd like to put before you is that the conversation I referred to you earlier on, in my first vignette, could not have taken place if the two masked people in front of me had been Takfiri, which as far as I understand is a common trait of most of the Al Qaeda operatives. This is to say that you may have had the opportunity to meet up close with terrorists - with individuals. But they're not the same. They're not the same.
My last comment is to raise the point that perhaps - just perhaps - speaking of terrorism in the singular may not be the best way to understand it, let alone to combat it. I would like to leave it at that. My job, after our presenters have presented, is to make some comments which pull the things together, and then to open the floor for discussions.
And so without further ado, let me introduce Mr. Graham Fuller, who'll be our first presenter. Again as I said, you do have, in front of you, his bio. Let me just recall that he has a long career in the CIA, RAND Corporation, and also as an academic. And I think we will have much to learn from his multifaceted career and multifaceted experience. Professor Fuller.
Graham Fuller: Thank you Giandomenico. Good morning ladies and gentlemen. I'm delighted to be here. I don't hang out in Washington anymore. Although I have for a very many long years. But I have such great regard for The Stanley Foundation and its very cutting-edge work. In spite of being in Iowa, it seems to be often more cutting edge than most or many institutions in Washington. Maybe because it's in Iowa, as a matter of fact, that it's away from the curse of the inbox of Washington life.
In any case, I would like to present my own very concerned, worried view of where we stand today on the question of dealing with terrorism. Let me start with perhaps a more provocative question. Because I'd like to focus, in particular, on the politics, rather than necessarily the ideology of some of these movements. But both will come up. What if there was no such thing as Islam today? What if there was never such a thing as Islam? Would the United States find itself welcome and beloved in a Middle East that had been the recipient, nonetheless, of European colonization?
And Europeans didn't go there because they were Muslim. They went there because there was oil, and because they were part of a spanning global imperialist move. Would Middle Easterners have viewed with equanimity Western imperialism and conquest of most of the developing world at that point? Would they have welcomed the Western exploitations of the, I think, extraordinarily cheap prices of Western energy?
Would they have welcomed constant Western intervention into Middle Eastern politics? Would they have welcomed dictators who were supported by the United States or the British or the French in earlier periods to serve their own needs? Would they have been happy with the way that the region was divided up along certain borders - quite in keeping with what served Western interests, and not the realities and the cultures of the people of the area?
I would submit to you that there would be a great deal of unhappiness in that region with Western history and behavior. To add a strong cultural glue, such as Islam, to that mixture has perhaps strengthened those bonds and given a greater sense of unity to the people who live in this area. But the fundamental grievances are there, and do not basically stem, I will argue, out of Islamic culture, per se.
Now I know there's an entire cottage industry - indeed it's no longer cottage, it's a massive industrial industry that is going with a fine-toothed comb through the Koran to demonstrate - prove, I should say - that with particular selected cherry-picking text, that this is an area that's implacably hostile to the West, and cannot live, cannot coexist. Blah, blah, blah.
We can talk about some of those things. But I would like to suggest that the actual groundwork for massive discontent in the region, which I will argue is the primary source of growing anger and growing terrorism in the region, stems from these more political goals. Now why should the Islamist movements, in the first place, be dominating this part of the world? It's because they are offering a kind of leadership that is built on existing - pre-existing - grievances.
All leadership builds on grievances. It's leaders who say, "We can alleviate - we can solve - we can alleviate the problems that you, the public, face." And therefore Islamists, at this juncture - in the last 25, 30 years of their era of particular importance - have been very skilled at identifying and articulating the grievances of the public and gaining their support. And this is growing. Ladies and gentlemen, there is no other movement in the region that can begin to compete with the power of political Islam.
This is not - as Giandomenico earlier suggested, this is not a monolithic movement remotely. There are multiple movements, multiple visions, multiple approaches and styles. But they tend to focus on the cultural heritage as the roots for a possible solution from the area. The worse the conditions - these are simpleminded propositions that I'm offering you. The worse the conditions, the more radical the response is going to be. And today, Muslims feels that the conditions are appallingly bad.
And not surprisingly, responses are appallingly bad and dangerous. Just because some movements are engaging in truly horrific actions in their terrorist engagement, doesn't mean that everyone in the region loves all of these things that are going on and taking place. Most Muslims I know - and I've lived in the Muslim world in many different countries for 15 years. I go back and forth all the time. Most Muslims are very upset about the nature of the struggle taking place.
But also as Giandomenico suggested a little bit earlier, there is this feeling that they have very few other weapons either by which to get Western attention, or to begin to try to equalize the playing field. I would suggest that we not fall too heavily for statements such as the fact that they hate our values out there. I have not seen much of that phenomenon.
It isn't McDonald's. It isn't our values. It's not Madonna. It's not the fact that we elect our presidents here. Or it's not bikinis on Waikiki that are fundamentally driving most of these people. There are a number of fanatics who perhaps play on these things. But I would argue that this is not the heart of the Islamic problem, of the problems of the Muslim world.
But indeed, it is policies, and particularly U.S. policies. Now I know a quick response from many of you will be: that's right; blame America. That's at least what Fox would say to me if I was sitting on Fox Television right now. Blame America! I'm not blaming America.
But we've just heard from Strobe Talbott a few minutes ago, suggesting that we are the most powerful nation in the history of the world, with a huge footprint - and this is not my word, it's the Pentagon's own word - and think about the meanings of that word - footprint across the globe. Are we both able to delight in our "superpowerdomness" on the one hand, and on the other hand think, gee, events are taking place out there that are not very good?
And what's wrong with those people? And why are these things happening out there? And God forbid that it should have anything to do with what we're doing. I'm not blaming America. But I am suggesting that when you're the sole global superpower with this huge footprint, how could your actions, or absence of actions, not have huge impact on what is taking place in the region?
Yet I challenge most institutions in this town and elsewhere, who are examining issues of terrorism - or indeed even foreign policy in the Middle East - to devote any time whatsoever to the possible role, positive or negative, commission or omission, by the United States, as a key factor in all of the things that are going on.
So it's not blame America. But if you want to be the world's sole superpower, then you better recognize that you have massive impact on the lives of others around the globe. And there are reactions to those. Now very quickly, these are probably well known to you - if we do speak about political problems in the area and what Muslims want - I'll very quickly run through a quick list. It's well known, I'm sure, to most of you.
They're in no particular order. But first of all would be a settlement in Palestine that brings justice, dignity, and human living conditions to the people of the area, and especially the Palestinians, who are on the receiving end of the problems more than others.
Second would be an end to Western intervention in the area that's gone on for hundreds of years. But also, in the last few decades, increasingly great. An end to huge U.S. military presence in the area. An end to U.S. occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan. An end to Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories. An end, if you will, to U.S. ambitions to be the political hegemon and determinant of the Muslim world.
Muslims also want attainment of full sovereignty and genuine independence. They want to have governments in which they have had a voice over who runs them, who establishes the policies. I would argue today Muslims feel that they are totally impotent. They have no control over their own governments' domestic and foreign policies. And they have no ability to prevent Western intervention - military, economic, cultural, and otherwise.
And finally, yes, they do want to be strong enough so that they can keep would-be interveners from wherever - Russia, America, Europe, China - to make sure that they are strong enough to cause some hesitation on the part of those powers to move in, rather than feeling it's a place where you can move in with impunity and without results.
The frustration of the Muslim world at this point is such - and this is a very sad remark to make - the frustration is such that there is a craving for heroes who will stand up and declare their own strength, their own dignity, and who will face down, if you will, the United States or the West. Who have these heroes been? Sadly, Saddam Hussein, people like the Ayatollah Khomeini in the past or Osama bin Laden today - as people who are perceived at least to stand up and say these things.
The Iranian regime's strength today in the Muslim world is not because of potential nuclear weapons. But it's because they are saying in Iran - about questions of Western policy, whether they're right or wrong - they are saying the things that most Muslims feel about U.S. policies, but whose leaders don't dare say those things. So Iran is riding high now.
The minute you have a Sunni government in power that feels willing to say to the United States and others what their concerns are, you will see a shifting away of Sunni interest in what Shiite rhetoric is all about. Now there are - and I will not talk about them at great length, because we hear about these mostly in Western analysis - domestic causes and grievances. I mentioned that there are no voices. Muslims have no voice in what's taking place in their country, or the foreign policies, or even the environment now within which these developments take place.
There is terrible corruption. There is dictatorship, often very brutal, incompetence, poor education systems, unemployment. The West is not responsible for all of these things that are taking place. But it is in this environment that these multiple levels of frustration are building up to a very, very high level, which we now see expressed in growing terrorism. In short, Muslims feel under global siege. They feel it is not simply terrorism, but their own culture that is at stake.
Under these conditions, they are hunkered down. It is not a moment in the Muslim world for great deep self-examination about the characteristics of Muslim understanding of even their own religion, which must come, can come, but not under present conditions. Liberals do not speak up under these conditions. I would suggest - and these are theories of postulance, because my time is very short - that ultimately, there is no genuine military solution to the terrorist threat.
Probably as a result of recent American intervention - I say this after the fact. I wouldn't have been certain of this before we became involved so deeply in the area. But after the fact, I would be willing to say that the terrorist threat is perhaps greater in the region than it has ever been before. More people joining these organizations. I would hope that our domestic situation is possibly safer - and mainly due to much better intelligence, improved intelligence, and police work globally.
But in terms of lessening the number of people who are willing to go out and throw bombs and shoot, the numbers are rising. In the end, it is only Muslim societies, themselves, that are going to be able to get a handle on these kinds of actions and activities that are taking place. But as long as the conditions are perceived by everyone as desperate, these societies will not be in a position to deal boldly with those conditions.
When conditions are seen as improving, when the United States - to put it more bluntly - is out of the face of people in the region, I think tempers will cool. The supercharged character of the psychology and the politics of the region will begin to diminish. And at that point, I think we can have some control over these things. People in the region can have control over what local radicalism is taking place.
There is a huge spectrum of radicals. I think the most vicious forms are viewed by most Muslims as very undesirable. And I suspect that they will be able to be dealt with more effectively when the U.S. is out of the picture, and not seen as the excuse for all of this. Indeed even in Iraq. I don't think either Sunnis of Shia want to see Al Qaeda running around in Iraq, bringing these two communities into confrontation with each other. But as long as America is there, it provides the excuse. "Well we're here to fight the occupation."
And it's harder to argue against that. Let me then conclude, because my time is just about up. I would suggest that today the Muslim - and this is perhaps what frightens me the most - the Muslim world is the new center of an inchoate, unorganized, and unstructured opposition to U.S. power and it's current strategic hegemonic - in this administration - ambitions across the world. There is great sympathy around the world for many of these struggles. Not for Al Qaeda. Not for the terrible butchery that we see. But at least for an understanding of the reactions.
To make the point more vividly, when I was in New Zealand a year or two ago, giving a lecture at The University of Auckland, on the campus, I saw a very Anglo type kid walk by me with a big Osama bin Laden T-shirt on. And it said, "Osama bin Laden - the next Che Guevara." Here we have bin Laden transcending Islamic culture entirely, as a symbol of resistance.
And that is what scares me the most, is that we are finding this unstructured, inchoate, unorganized, but nonetheless rising sense of opposition to what is perceived as heavy handed and hegemonic moves by the United States in the region. My hope is that as these tensions go down, as the United States can pull back and share the burden of these problems with much of the rest of the world, that we will find Muslim societies less open to these kinds of movements.
When Palestinians - to put it in a specific case - feel that they have achieved the kind of statehood and dignity and justness of life - I don't think they want to be engaged in these types of movements further, either. And those ultra-radicals will be dealt with more effectively by societies themselves. But the problem is very real. It's very serious. And it's not getting better. We better think pretty deeply about the grand nature of this problem. Thank you.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you Graham.
(Applause)
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you Graham. Thank you for staying within your time. The next speaker is Professor Alistair Millar. Professor Millar is the director of The Center on Global Counter-Terrorism Cooperation. He is also a professor at George Washington University here in D.C. And he is the author of a number of articles both on nuclear proliferation and books, in fact, on counterterrorism. He will speak to us today about an effective multilateral approach to counterterrorism. Professor Millar.
Alistair Millar: Thank you Giandomenico. Thank you also to The Stanley Foundation for convening this conference. And I'm going to speak about three core issues here. First is that terrorism is a global problem, and it requires a global multilateral response. And following on from Graham's comments here. More emphasis needs to be put on non-military measures as part of that global response.
Second point. Looking at what is being done today at an international multilateral level, principally through the U.N - what has been the response since 9/11? How is the international community dealing with this problem from a non-military standpoint? And third and finally, how to strengthen that non-military multilateral response to make it better, in my view, than it is today.
First I'll start by making the point about it being a global problem requiring a global response. Even the Bush administration - who has not been well known since it took office for being supportive of multilateral measures, favoring more the unilateral measures that we have seen in several of their core policies throughout the years - came out with a new counterterrorism strategy in September, a revised one, that basically said to effectively address the threat, non-military international cooperation of multilateral institutions are indispensable.
And if we look at other issues that have been a threat, a real problem to the international community over the last 50 years, say nuclear, biological, chemical weapons, we've seen that there has been a multilateral response, the development of a body to deal with these issues in 1957. We saw the creation of the International Atomic Energy Agency 40 years later, for example. We saw the creation of the OPCW to monitor and strengthen the Chemical Weapons Convention.
Yet terrorism - which grabs all the headlines, is the subject of so much discussion, and really has been at the center of U.S. and many other countries' foreign policy since 9/11 - does not have a dedicated international body. Since 9/11, at the regional level, there's been a lot done. It's been a growth industry. There have been action plans and coordination efforts developed at the Organization of American States, the EU, the OSCE, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, ASEAN. And these range from pretty serious efforts that have really helped to coordinate efforts on a regional and sub-regional level, to what most people, including me, think is just a talk shop - saying they're gonna do more, having summits, having meetings, making the right points, but not following up.
And then there are specialized agencies that have been doing this for quite a long time and have adapted to dealing with terrorism. That would be the UNODC. The office on crime and drugs at the U.N. They've developed a terrorism prevention branch that does a lot of work on providing technical assistance, training, legal training, and what have you to member states around the world.
We have the financial action task force, which does a lot to prevent the financing of terrorism. Of course we have IKO and others who work on civil aviation. So there's a sort of web out there of organizations that do work in conjunction with the regional organizations to do some work.
But there are still huge gaps, particularly in the Middle East, in North Africa, in Central Asia, in other parts of Africa, where really the root of this problem that Graham discussed can be seen. So having these gaps is an alarming problem. So more needs to be done sort of at an overarching global level to coordinate all of these efforts, and to bring more resources to bear, and more focus from major states like the United States to deal with this.
At the moment, really the only game in town in dealing with all of these international issues from a multilateral level from 191 states is The United Nations. And at the General Assembly, there's usually been a real reluctance to formulate and implement an effective response. They've been debating, with increased intensity, the issue of what the definition of terrorism is.
And they don't seem to be coming to any conclusions, with many, many different views. One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. Those kind of arguments. But the General Assembly has also made some very, very important contributions, particularly in creating a legal foundation for the rest of the world to prosecute a more effective response to terrorism.
Since 1963, they've developed specific conventions and protocols that address specific terrorist behavior. Whether that be hijacking of airplanes, smuggling of nuclear materials - there's a long list.
So this provides, in my view, a strong legal basis. And in my view, also helps to get past this ongoing discussion of what the definition is. The definition can be a legal definition based on behaviors that are outlined in those 13 conventions. More recently, the General Assembly has adopted a strategy on counterterrorism. This was first presented after the Madrid bombings by the secretary general, Kofi Annan. It's been watered down, as you would expect, in discussion in the General Assembly.
But it has created, in my view, a very, very strong framework for the rest of the world to deal with this problem of terrorism on a global basis. It deals with four core issues. First of all, it attacks this issue of underlying causes. It's not just a military cloak and dagger affair in dealing with terrorism. There are underlying causes that are related to development issues, related to the millennium goals, related to providing people with opportunities for better governance. That's the first one.
The second one are those pure sort of counterterrorism measures that are being undertaken, as I will explain, by the Security Council. The third is capacity-building measures to help prevent terrorism. And the fourth is very, very important. But it's sort of been overlooked since 9/11 in the U.S. response, as we've seen with Guantanamo Bay and others. And that is the issue of human rights.
So having this overarching framework, I think, is excellent. The trouble is - as we've seen with the history of the General Assembly - it's the biggest bureaucracy you can have. It's all of these countries with their bureaucracies coming together as another bureaucracy. They can't implement this strategy themselves. And that's a further reason, in my view, why there needs to be a dedicated body to deal with that problem.
Really, the responsibility for dealing with terrorism after 9/11 was in the Security Council. The United States put together a resolution, a sweeping resolution, that is really unprecedented in the history of the United Nations. And that is to call on all member states - it was unanimously adopted - to adopt and implement those conventions that I mentioned earlier.
But also, there was a monitoring function put in place, with a counterterrorism committee dedicated to monitoring, helping to facilitate capacity building, and really trying to encourage states to do something about non-state actors. We're dealing with a new actor on the international stage that hasn't traditionally been dealt with by the U.N. This all sounds good.
But the responsibility by the U.N. Security Council has been very, very reactive in nature. First of all, as I mentioned, the counterterrorism committee was developed in the aftermath of 9/11. Since then, there have been a proliferation of committees in response to other terrorist acts. After the AQCON network was caught smuggling and directing nuclear materials to third countries, there was a response - with the creation of the 1540 Committee in the Security Council to deal with nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons issues, even those are already mentioned in the prior resolution after 9/11.
And then after the hostage taking at Beslan in Russia, you had a response with the creation of a workshop to deal with listing terrorists. After the train bombings in London, you had another response with the creation of Resolution 1624 to deal with the incitement of terrorism.
So you've got this web, a proliferation of committees on a bureaucratic level to make them look like they're doing something in the Security Council. But really, there's a lot of overlapping mandates. And a lot of people, including the U.S. government, are scratching their head, wondering really how effective all of these new committees can be in dealing with the problem.
And to add to that, an executive directorate was created with 20 new experts by the counterterrorism committee, that now goes on site visits all over the world. So they have two components to dealing with terrorism. It's really more focused on capacity building, helping states to get the wherewithal, the means to deal with terrorism, than there is any of these compliance issues, reporting them to the Security Council.
And this new executive directorate has come up with a program of doing site visits around the world, that are really a burden on states who don't have much capacity to deal with the problem. And it just sort of seems to be a very piecemeal approach. And outside of New York, outside of the U.N., a lot of states are wondering whether this so-called coordinated attempt to deal with terrorism really matches their own perception of the threat, and their own fundamental problems in dealing with terrorism in a manner that isn't just enacting laws, going through a checklist and saying: "We've approved this convention."
We need to get to the root of the problem and deal with countries that don't even have core competencies, minimal institutional capacity to enact these laws, before we can ask them to do so. So five, six years - five-and-a-half years after 9/11, it has become apparent that there is definitely a need for a better-coordinated approach for dealing with terrorism. And this would help to increase international cooperation in counterterrorism technical assistance and capacity building efforts, which are vital to countries that don't have the ability to deal with these problems on their own.
It would help to assess vulnerabilities and set clear priorities for that assistance. You have countries around the world that are dealing with other problems. They're dealing with HIV/AIDS. They're dealing with intense and violent street crime in places like the Horn of Africa.
But they're also dealing with the terrorist threat. There have been two terrorist attacks in recent years in Kenya. And there needs to be more done in the international community to let the people in Kenya and in the Horn of Africa know that this scourge of terrorism also affects their tourism industry, affects the bottom line, economically, to them. And it isn't just something that the U.S. is telling them to do to protect U.S. security on its own.
It's everybody's problem. But the way we've been presenting that message - that is the U.S, the U.K., and others - has not been favorable and not been clear. The new body would also help to facilitate information sharing. I'm not talking about highly classified intelligence. I'm just talking about basic information sharing, about what programs of assistance one country might have to offer to another, best practices, and things like that.
Many countries do not - not only do they not have the capability to deal with these problems, they don't know that there are fairly simple solutions to deal with them that other countries, other regions, have been doing and putting in place for a while, that they could easily learn from through best practices. This would also help to share the financial burden of capacity building with other donors.
At the moment, you have a situation where the U.S. is trying to take on a particular - the lion's share of this burden, or thinks they are, when there are a lot of other countries around the world who are capable of providing assistance if they're just told what that assistance would be. And there are a lot of countries that operate in spheres of influence around the world that aren't part of the U.S. sphere of influence.
And we could help with a coordinated international body to deal with this problem, a better-coordinated effort in getting donors to provide resources as well. And then finally - I think this is one issue that would be most appealing for the United States in being involved in a new multilateral counterterrorism body is that - it could help to deal with the issue of compliance.
Yes, as I mentioned, there are a lot of states out there that don't have the wherewithal, the capacity to deal with this problem. But there are other states - and I think some of them are obvious, particularly in the Middle East - who have a lot of money, have a lot of resources, natural resources and what have you. But they don't seem to have the will to deal with this problem, for whatever reason.
And I think to have an effective system, a fair system of judging whether states are complying with this, and then reporting them to the Security Council - like the IAEA does with its board of governors - would be an effective way of dealing with this problem, not only from a capacity building standpoint, but also from a compliance standpoint as well.
But all of this isn't going to happen until the United States and other key countries - particularly the United States - come on board and realize the importance of a multilateral approach to this policy. They've said it, as I mentioned, with increasing frequency in their counterterrorism strategy in the U.S., in various pronouncements about the global nature of the so-called War on Terrorism.
But really this isn't a war in traditional terms. And the amount of resources that are being put forward at the moment by the Defense Department to deal with this so-called war, compared to what is being done in terms of diplomatic efforts through U.S. aid, through development, is really quite meager. So the way to draw the United States, I think, into this, is to show them that there is a compliance component as well, that we are gonna get tough with states that don't comply.
But until we do this, and until we fashion a multilateral response to this problem, a lot of the issues that Graham has mentioned - and I'm sure the others will mention to - are not gonna be dealt with in a holistic way that is more complicated and requires far more attention at a multidisciplinary level from lots of different organizations and agencies - we are gonna be in serious trouble. And this is not gonna get any better before it gets worse. I will conclude there. Thank you.
(Applause)
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Professor Robert Trager from UCLA. Professor Trager has been focusing his research on how actors in international systems form beliefs about their intentions. And therefore, he is also focused on the role of diplomacy. Professor Trager has basically been in all the major universities which one can think about - from Oxford to Harvard to The London School of Economics - and to Columbia. I'm sorry. But he also began his career in a different world, the world of finance. Today he will talk to us about deterrents in U.S. counterterrorism policy. Professor Trager, the floor is yours.
Robert Trager: Well thank you very much. And let me first say that I'm very honored to be here among this group, and that I have a great deal of agreement with what my co-panelists have said. The second thing I want to say is that we actually worked together and agreed that I would speak second, and my friend and colleague, Dessi Zagorcheva would speak first. I will just, if it's alright with you, introduce her very briefly.
Giandomenico Picco: Okay.
Robert Trager: She has had a distinguished career at Columbia University, working at The Institute of War and Peace Studies, and on numerous projects working for the Council on Foreign Relations, and a great career as an academic and a policymaker in studying coercion, counterterrorism, and civil military relations. Dessi, the floor is yours.
Dessi Zagorcheva: Thank you. I have entitled this: Towards a More Effective Counterterrorist Strategy, not necessarily because we have the answers, but just in order to start the discussion, and to see - having in mind the current strategy documents of the Bush administration, what more can we do? Great strategy is ultimately about two things: how to unite our friends and keep them united.
And the second thing, how to divide our enemies, and to keep them divided. And the goal of this presentation is to see whether we are trying and whether we are achieving this in the current War on Terrorism. Arguably, and a lot of people would agree with this, the main goal of the United States should be to fracture the global terrorist network, and to prevent terrorist groups from cooperating with each other.
While the Bush administration strategy documents recognize that the terrorist enemy is not monolithic, and they correctly say that groups like Al Qaeda pose the main threat to the United States' interest, the new strategy document does not sufficiently take into account various differences in the objectives of terrorist groups. And they do not provide effective ways for fracturing the global terrorist network. This was not supposed to be the slide they are looking at. I will tell you when to change the slides. Or maybe I could just do this.
(Background Talk)
Giandomenico Picco: I think some terrorist changed the order here.
Dessi Zagorcheva: I'm sure. I'm sure that's the case.
Robert Trager: Yes.
Dessi Zagorcheva: That's still the first one. Thank you. By calling the antiterrorist campaign a War on Terrorism, the Bush administration has inevitably overemphasized the use of force. And as Mark Twain would say: if the only tool you have is a hammer, everything around you will look like a nail, which certainly doesn't help us in the War on Terrorism.
And part of our argument is that we should not have the same strategy against all the terrorist groups - and in order to deemphasize the use of military force and to have a more balanced counterterrorist strategy. Next slide. This one. I will focus mainly on the differences, and how policymakers should think more about the differences in the objectives of the terrorist groups, and how knowing the different objectives of groups, we could design strategies that are tailored specifically towards groups, and towards their behavior and vulnerabilities.
Usually each of the terrorist groups have specific objectives, some of which are local. Others are global. And the terrorist groups have preferences over their objectives. Most of the groups that are currently on the United States foreign terrorist organization list have mainly regional or local concerns. Such local groups are, for example, organizations like the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. They're mainly interested in resolving their longstanding conflict with the Philippine government.
Other local organizations, primarily local, or groups like the IRA - these groups have to be differentiated very significantly from organizations like Al Qaeda and a few of Al Qaeda's main affiliates. Organizations like Al Qaeda - they target directly the U.S. and its allies. They also show a very strong will in acquiring weapons of mass destruction. They have enormous amounts of resources.
And perhaps most importantly for our discussion is that groups like Al Qaeda have non-negotiable goals. Non-negotiable goals could be something like establishing a pure Islamic state like a caliphate all over the world. Some of the local organizations, on the other hand - they may be tempted to advance the global agenda of such global groups like Al Qaeda, just in order to be able to get some resources that they could use in their local struggle.
So in order for the United States to be able to achieve a more balanced and variegated strategy, we need to first distinguish clearly between those different kinds of groups, and second, to make sure that our strategy targets the specific vulnerabilities of each group. This was actually from the 2003 national strategy on counterterrorism.
It is interesting that this graph does not appear in the most recent document of the Bush administration. This is a very good explanation of the differences among groups, and how the different groups are linked. And how having those links, each of the groups can increase their capacity. And the main goal, obviously, would be to cut these links.
And as the administration says, "We have to leave the groups isolated and vulnerable to defeat." How could this be accomplished? This would be the desired end state for the administration. After all of the links have been cut at the end, we will be left with some groups that are localized. And they're not sponsored. They're disorganized. And they don't cooperate with each other. So their capabilities are localized. And they do not pose as severe a threat as they do currently.
In order to be able to see the potentials for deterrent strategies, we could focus on some of the groups with local goals, and some of the goals that countries like the United States - or even the local states - could accommodate. When there is a partial overlap in the preferences of the United States and the groups for their local agenda, some of those objectives could be accommodated. And then we could have an implicit bargain.
The United States implicitly promised, for example, not to intervene in a local conflict, or to intervene to support the local group. And then the local group, in return, would promise not to assist the more dangerous groups like Al Qaeda, Jamaa Islamia, and some others. This strategy actually has been tried in practice with some very positive results.
Here. This is the fighters from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. These are old pictures, unfortunately - or maybe fortunately. Because now what you will see from the current web page of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front would be pictures of fighters - but again, they would not be wearing their military uniforms. They'll be with civilian clothing most of the time, and they will be shaking hands with the representatives of the Philippine government. They are much more focused now on their negotiations with - the ongoing negotiations with the Philippine government and how this change was actually achieved.
After 9/11, the U.S. and the Philippine government together - they tried coercive strategies against the MLIF and not direct use of force. This is very important. Because when force was used against the Abu Sayyef group actually, our objectives were not achieved, and there were many more negative consequences than positive. While here, deterrent strategies were used. And I will tell you what happened. The deterrent strategies that were used were based on the threat of including the MLIF on the United States FTO list, the list of the foreign terrorist organizations.
Another threat was that the U.S. was going to withhold money earmarked by the U.S. Congress for development projects in the areas of the organizations. Also, the Philippine government implicitly threatened the organization as well. And there was some promises of rewards. As a result of which, the organization has totally changed its tactics.
And something that is even more important for the United States, because this was the main goal in this local struggle: the Moro Islamic Liberation Front no longer actively cooperates with organizations like Al Qaeda and Jamaa Islamia. More importantly, now the MLIF is in cooperation with the Philippine government and the United States government, exchanges intelligence, and provides information on operatives of Al Qaeda and other organizations that operate within the territories that are controlled by the MLIF.
So by using coercive strategies and not the use of force, we have achieved these positive developments. We don't really have time. But the case of the United States using force in 2002 against the Abu Sayyef group actually summarizes the drawbacks of the use of force. Some of them I have listed on this slide. And some of them our previous presenters also mentioned - that in most cases, use of force against terrorist groups lead to radicalization of the movement or the splinter faction. Because we almost never are able to eradicate the whole group.
Also, the collateral damage galvanizes support for the terrorist cause, which we do not want to happen. By using force against several groups at the same time, we create common interest among them, and we actually lead them to perceive us as the common threat, against which they have to unite.
And again, it was already mentioned that controversial cases of the use of force recently have led to deteriorating U.S. relations with its allies. And also, obviously, the direct cost in lives and resources. And I will leave the rest of the time for my coauthor to disagree with me.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you.
(Applause)
Robert Trager: Thank you. So what I have to say follows on, really, from what Dessi was saying. And I guess the key point that we wanted - we wanted to think about how you - since they're these - some of them global social movements, and I think well thought of as social movements, like Al Qaeda and linked groups. And then there are some other groups that are really local movements and local groups, and they're really to be thought of very, very differently.
But nevertheless, as Dessi was pointing out with the strategy document, they can provide these links - or this aid to each other, all sorts of synergies that can be achieved through cooperation. And the global reach of the groups that really threaten the United States is dependent upon the achievement of these synergies. So we wanted to think about - well how do you create a process by which these groups are de-linked, and by which the social movement - maybe not immediately, but over time - comes to an end?
And so we think that since they're so highly motivated, in many cases, it's not life and liberty which should be held at risk from a coercive point of view. It's rather the political goals of the movements, precisely because they're so what motivation means, in a sense. When we say that a group is a fanatical, what we mean is that they are so highly motivated in pursuit of their goals.
So the fact that these goals are so very important to them, means that a country like the United States, with the ability to tip the scales in local conflicts, has a great deal of leverage over many of these groups. and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front is just a great example of a case where the Philippine government and the United States came in and managed to create this process which led not only to a different strategy, as Dessi was saying, on behalf of the group, but even has led the group to provide very significant local intelligence within its region of operation.
This is a group that is 10,000 members plus. It's a large group. It has provided local intelligence, the kind of which there's absolutely no way to get in the southern islands of the Philippines otherwise. So we think that that's very important, and it's a model that can be used other places.
So we think that certain groups, in particular, are amenable to this type of coercive approach, in particular groups that have goals that can be partially accommodated, and which accommodations can be held at risk. But not all groups maybe fit that profile. So one of the things that I wanted to address, sort of as an addendum to this, is the question of WMD terrorism. This is obviously something that everybody worries about, at least a little bit.
When you start to look at the technological challenges involved, you realize that's very comforting. Because then you realize that it's very, very hard to do. Especially really mass casualty attacks are very, very difficult to do. So that's good. But nevertheless, if it did happen, obviously it'd be horrible. So it's something that is really worth taking very seriously.
Now the main thing we have to say about this is: well it takes a lot of resources to address this problem. So rather than spending your resources on a group like the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, just because you think maybe it's achieving synergy with these other groups that are targeting you, you have coercive approaches. And the nice thing about a coercive approach is that if it works, then you don't actually have to spend that much, in terms of resource, to deal with it. So you can save your resources for other things. And you don't use force, and don't - you know Dessi just had a time to go through some of the most important drawbacks.
But there are an awful lot of drawbacks, in terms of the new terrorists that are created, the fracturing of the absolutely necessary network of allies that are necessary for intelligence purposes and other purposes, in order to deal with the global threat. So if we can avoid the use of force, we really ought to do that. And the coercive approach is a way that says, "Not only are we gonna try to win hearts and minds - not only are we gonna do that, but we realize that there's a real immediate problem, and we have some strategies to deal with the immediacy of it while we try to implement strategies to so-called win hearts and minds."
So that's the main thing we want to say. But some others have started to contemplate some other sorts of strategies to deal with a nuclear threat. And so I guess the first point to make is that it's true - if it did happen, there's a sense in which all bets are off. A lot of the things that we think about, the restraints that we currently think about - if you can just put yourself in what the country would be like, and what sort of responses would be called for.
I don't know if any of you were in New York, as I was, on 9/11. But you know being with people at the time whose family members were in the area, the emotional response was obviously quite extraordinary. And you can only imagine if there were a truly gigantic scale attack, what the calls would be for. So in a sense, all bets are off. And the U.S. would probably be willing to do all sorts of nasty things that we don't like to contemplate.
So the question, though, for our purposes here, in terms of how we think about coercion and coercing groups, and creating a process by which they're brought to an end, or don't do the things we don't want them to do, is: well are there threats that can be made now, in order to prevent that. And there I want to be a bit skeptical. Some people have suggested all sorts of things - the targeting of families, the targeting of religious communities.
The question that has arisen in the literature is how immediate the responsibility should be. So how broad the circle, if you will, around the direct perpetrators should be targeted, in order to hurt, in order to get at the direct perpetrators? And can threats be made now that are somehow effective?
Well it seems pretty clear that these threats, if they're gonna be made now - and they're not gonna make the U.S. position immeasurably worse in the eyes of the communities whose hearts and minds we're trying to win - these threats have to be made in private. So if they're made I private, there's a real question: getting into maybe the too academic, but nevertheless literature on how signaling works.
The question is: how are you gonna convince people of something that they didn't already believe? And why should talk just not be cheap in this case? So if it's made in private, they may believe you. But they're not gonna believe you because you said it. They believe you, because they think that's what you'll do. So that, in turn, means that it's not much of a strategy. It's not something that needs to be contemplated. It is being contemplated. I'll guarantee you that. But it's probably not particularly useful, or something we shouldn't put that much hope in.
Two other quick points, just to finish up. I think there's an interesting signaling tradeoff, which maybe should be borne in mind. Normally when we think about coercion, we think about insurgencies or terrorist movements as sort of wars of attrition between the terrorists and the state.
And the idea is that the terrorist group is really trying to create a cost that the state ultimately is not willing to bear, and therefore gives up. And that has been quite successful. Insurgencies have been particularly successful in doing that. And some terrorist movements have been successful at least in sort of achieving moderate level goals with their techniques.
So in response to a war of attrition, generally you want to demonstrate resolve. You want to show that you're wiling to see this thing through. And therefore if the other side knows that you're willing to see it through, then there's no incentive for them. There's less incentive for them to continue to prosecute the struggle.
But there's another aspect to this, which is since in this case, it's precisely about creating cost, you also want to show that what you're doing - in addition to showing that you're willing to do a lot, to incur cost yourself, you want to show that what you're doing isn't too costly for you. And that creates a very difficult to deal with signaling tradeoff.
And so I would just suggest to you - and here I have the invasion of Iraq in mind - but I would just suggest to you that measures which ultimately are not that effective, in terms of what they get for you, but which maybe demonstrate that you're willing to spend huge cost, and maybe that domestic reactions are such that you have to spend those costs, that that actually provides a mechanism whereby the coercive strategy of a terrorist group could actually be effective, and encourages a terrorist group.
So the strategies that we adopt can't just be about creating resolve. We also have to be worried about showing that we're not spending too much. Because then what we're doing - this resolve - will in fact, be credible. And finally, last very quick point about leadership targeting. Because a number of people have made the point recently that leadership targeting is not effective.
And an enormous amount of resource has been put towards finding leaders. Leadership targeting is thought to be not effective because groups are so decentralized, that everybody agrees - not everybody, but a lot of people agree that groups will survive their leaders. And I think that's true. But nevertheless, leaders should be targeted.
And it should be a focus of resource. Why is that? Well if you think about the strategic dilemma of somebody who's considering terrorist activity, on the one hand, they're considering - they may even be willing to die for the cause. But they're considering the cost and the benefits of doing this. On the one hand, they're thinking, "Well if I do it, what are the benefits? What are the chances that I get what I want, that it's actually effective?"
Because they do think about that, and they do think about how to be effective. And on the other hand, they're thinking, "What are the chances that I'm caught, that I try to do this, and I'm caught before I can achieve anything? Even if I'm willing to die for the cause, what's the point if I die before I've achieved anything?" Right?
So that's the calculation that everybody has to go through in a decentralized way, who's thinking about this sort of activity. And they're in a low information environment. There are no good statistics on this. So how are they gonna figure it out? Well I would just posit that the one thing - and by the way, they can't believe anybody. Their leaders are gonna tell them, "Oh yeah. This is successful." Other states are gonna say it's not successful. How are they gonna figure it out?
So the one thing that they know, that every single individual around the world that's thinking about this is gonna know is: Osama bin Laden is out there and has not been caught. So he's a symbol in all sorts of ways. But if you think about it, if you think about, I think, the information problem of people who are considering this sort of activity, I think leadership targeting is still worth it, even though the groups are decentralized. Thanks very much.
(Applause)
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you all. We have in front of us, I believe, 30 minutes. I made some comments to put together some of what was said, and then we'll have a discussion. Let me just start by saying that clearly if you had read the papers which were prepared for this conversation by the panelists - I even had the courage of sending a paper myself - you will find that there is a common thread.
And the common thread is exactly what has emerged. In different ways, we've all come to underline the fact that we're speaking about terrorism in the plural, that there are different kinds of groups with different kinds of characteristics. That is a common thread that I see, that you may wish to pick up - in favor of, or against. Let me just underline how this, in practical life, has manifested itself over the last 30 years.
And I will again try to give you an unprofessional and non-very scientific statistic which I've done over the last three decades. If you look at the issue of hostage-taking, which I've looked at continually, just because of my personal experiences, it's fascinating that the two major strengths of hostage-taking - and I'm specifically referring to the Islamic world; I don't consider the commercial operations in Colombia - the two major strengths that have come, in my mind, to the surface, are those who are called the tactical terrorists, and those who are called the strategic terrorists. Roughly said, a tactical terrorist would have been the IRA in the West, or possibly - judgment is still out - Hezbollah and Hamas.
And the strategic ones are the Al Qaeda groups and the rest, for the reason that Professor Trager and his colleague just outlined very clearly. The global objectives and all the rest. Now in hostage taking, something dramatic has happened in the last 30 years, the hostages taken by what are called - and we've given it a different definition. I call it tactical terrorists. They've been called the local groups or whatever.
The large majority of hostages have been released - over 90%. Some of them unfortunately after seven years. But nevertheless. The other kind of terrorists have - and this, of course, the numbers are very, very flimsy, because we don't know actually who's who in some parts of the world - I would suggest that, in fact, 65% to 75% have been murdered.
So it is not just an academic division. It is a very operative division of what they do. And if you look further into this particular division of how these groups are so different, you would also discover easily that with what are called strategic terrorists, there never has been a real negotiation about these matters. Because negotiations are not really an issue. They're not really pursued. Whereas on the other side, negotiations are the name of the game, even with their enemies.
We could spend time here, and I could entertain you about the number of negotiations I know about between Hezbollah and Islam. But that's another story. The other element which emerges, in my view, in this conversation, is that it's fascinating to go up for a moment - and also practical - and to speak about the leaders of these groups. Because I do agree with Professor Trager. It does matter very much.
At a practical level, where the leader is killed or not, I would agree with him. It makes a hell of a difference for the operatives on the ground and for the individuals who actually sympathize with us or not. And here this brings me to the third point of the division of this world of so-called terrorists. In some cases, as I said, I call it tactical, in some places, strategic. We may have to, at a practical level, accept that there are those who will be forever unreachable. We can dance it in all kind of music. They're just beyond reach. And therefore, we kind of had to accept that they're just not to be converted, no matter what we do.
And then there are those who actually are on the other side of the non-convertible, so to speak. And they are the sympathizers, those who have yet to decide whether they will become militants in some groups or not. and I think as far as practicality's concerned, and the battle of ideas which has been mentioned by all of my colleagues here, I think the battle of ideas matters very much, in my view, mostly for those who have yet to decide whether to become or not militant in the terrorist sense.
And how do we reach that group? That becomes, in my view, the most practical objective of what has been called the battle of ideas, and - I would submit to you - a battle which has never started. Because we've had neither strategy nor a coherent approach by different parts of the world on it.
Last but not least, and then I'll give the floor to the audience, is that it seems to me that whether we want to decide a bit before it happens whether a group is, in fact, a group which could evolve in the IRA fashion or the ETA fashion or something of this sort, I think it's very useful, on a practical level, to ask ourselves a very simple question about their leadership.
And if you ask a question about their leadership, you have to answer also the question about what is really the core of the leaders. And the question which I found practical for me when I was surviving in that world was: are these leaders able to remain leaders or to lead even without an enemy? It seems to be a poetic question. But it's a very practical one.
Are they leaders that can lead without an enemy? And if you find a group in the terrorist world where the leader plans to survive, even without the enemy, then sooner or later, the group will evolve. But if that leader cannot actually lead without an enemy, then you can just give it up. He and the group will not change as long as he's alive. And I found this a very practical way to look at this. I'm fascinated by Professor Trager's analysis - of what he's written in his short paper. I'm sure we should read much more about what he's written about the psychology.
I'm no academic. Well you know pretty much that by now. My experience in talking directly to - from Nasrallah down - to these individuals, has given me some curious hints, of course, of some of the psychology of these individuals, both from Afghanistan, all the way to Lebanon.
And the most fascinating story - to me in my life, and remains - is that like anybody else, if you throw them a ball from leftfield, they don't know how to catch it, which is to say that each of us, no matter what we do, when we sit in front of somebody else, we have done our homework, and we try to know what the moves will be, and what will be the response, and so forth.
But if you come up with something out of the box, you change completely the dynamic of the conversation. And you may even change where they go. I'll give you an example. I'll go all the way backward. You might know there were many conversations which I did when I was clearly not in my strong suit, since I was not actually in command of my future, nor of my situation. I would actually be fascinated by the fact that if you say something really unexpected, which has to do not with politics - pretty much like when dealing with the Soviets during the Cold War - I mean a conversation about ideology was totally irrelevant, as you all probably know by now. That was not an issue.
My most significant recollection was that one day this individual who was in intelligence would tell me he was so in so. We all guessed who it could have been. But we don't know, of course, because he'd never been seen by any Westerner alive, so far. And this man said to me - if he was the one - said to me, "Why are you asking me this question?" The question was: have you got children? Now the setup was a little bit peculiar.
Because in a civil war in Lebanon, when somebody's taken a hostage, you don't really come and talk about the children of your kidnappers. Right? And he was absolutely taken aback. The people behind me, whom I could not see, were clearly agitated. And he said, "What has that got to do with anything?" And I said, "Thank you for answering my question. Clearly you have children, so we have something in common. We are parents. You know? We are fathers."
He said, "Stop that. What is this? What is this?" And he began to go completely off the track which he clearly had prepared for himself in this conversation. And the conversation continuing that way - at some point he said to me, "Where do you come from?" I said, "From the same place you come from, from the moon." And he went berserk.
(Laughter)
He said, "You know this is getting really out of hand. What is this?" And then he said to me - the most revealing statement he made to me. He said, "You don't come from the West, do you?" I said, "You would be surprised in how many shapes we come."
(Laughter)
By the time the saga of the Western hostage, he had tried - never succeeding - to reach me to give me a present.
(Laughter)
I never knew what it was. Probably it's better. The fact was that in a natural conversation, where he was in command - I mean he was holding all the cards - by talking things out of the box, he went every which way. And then I began taking a little bit of a different role. I was no longer somebody who had no cause. I began to have cause.
And by the end, we finished the operation, as you may or not remember. In December, 1991, every last American hostage, including Terry Anderson, came home with me. And it was a fascinating - not the word to use - it was a quick learn in psychology. And I think that the lesson I drew was that thinking out of the box is always very useful. If you don't die, you survive.
(Laughter)
And I think, in a way, it gives a sense to the fact that you have to bring down the issue from the institution and the structure to the individuals. That was my personal conclusion, which may be wrong. But I think that's what it was. And therefore, I tend to agree with much of what has been said here.
But at the end of the day, there is a lot about human psychology and human aspiration which is fundamentally very common. And that's why we can at some point, some level, perhaps even communicate. With the caveat I mentioned to you before. I do not believe you could ever - if you would find him this morning - negotiate with bin Laden. I don't believe it's possible.
But that goes back to the whole - my belief. Perhaps wrong, and my colleagues here will disagree with me. But the whole concept of the Takfiri component of their religious beliefs, and the [audio unclear] ideology, which they in some way have tried to carry out, makes it impossible - in fact, unnecessary. You see, going back to the hostage - and I conclude. The hostages, for some of the so-called Al Qaeda groups, is not an exercise to scare us, or to convince us. It is a message to their own potential supporters.
In Lebanon, the story was to send a communication to us, so they would put them on television, and to send message of all kinds. It was a different dynamic. Frankly speaking, somebody who's a convinced believer of a Takfiri sect couldn't care less about what I or Professor Fuller thinks about them. It doesn't make any difference. So why should they communicate with us? He has no interest in communicating with us.
He wants to increase his lot. And that means to speak to the potential supporters, or the new militants, or whatever. So make no mistake. Yes, there can be different - I was not involved with any, for obvious reasons - it's a different game with the Iraq hostage situations. Only once, somebody a couple of years ago called me - in government. And it was a very unusual kidnapping.
And I said, "This doesn't smell like the usual ones." But I didn't know anything about the previous ones, because my contacts with the Sunnis are very bad. Let's put it this way. And I thought that this was a different kind. And sure enough, they asked me to do something. I said, "I don't believe this works." But you never know. It actually did work within 24 hours.
But it was a very different kind of kidnapping. It was a very different kind of group. And it worked. Again, to underline to define who these individuals are in the singular would lead us really nowhere. Thank you for your attention. Let me just take this now to the floor and open a conversation. Yes. If I may start, the gentleman on the - yes please, sir. Will you please identify yourself, and then ask the question? It works. Try. Have faith.
Ved Nanda: It doesn't work.
Giandomenico Picco: Yeah. Yeah. Something. Something works.
Ved Nanda: It doesn't work here. It's working.
Giandomenico Picco: Let's see. Let's see.
(Laughter)
Ved Nanda: Alright. Ved Nanda. I am at the University of Denver. And I do international law. Three very quick points. One, I hope I didn't hear that the use of force is totally impermissible or unwarranted about terrorism.
Giandomenico Picco: No you did not.
Ved Nanda: Alright.
(Laughter)
Ved Nanda: Because the Security Council resolution simply said very clearly that it can be a threat to international peace and security. And after 9/11, as Professor Millar said, in an unprecedented way, the Security Council gave a blessing that in certain circumstances, use of force would be permissible as a tactic to international peace and security.
Giandomenico Picco: That's correct.
Ved Nanda: Second, I think I did not quite understand Professor Trager's comment about coercion. Because coercion I usually associate with the use of force. And when the government, or people who are responding terrorism - you were talking about coercive strategy. Did I misunderstand that? I did not quite understand that. If you could kindly explain it.
And the third point, very, very briefly is that as you talk about response to terrorism, and as we talked about not having any definition of terrorism, and therefore no international response multilaterally or unilaterally that can be considered to be legitimate in that sense, I think there is at least today an understanding and appreciation, and probably a consensus, to some extent, that terrorism can be simply defined, as the high-level panel of the secretary general did, that the non-combatants - people who are not involved - and use of force indiscriminately to terror violence against civilians is impermissible.
And therefore those who indulge in those activities ought to be responded - and as the panel has rightly said, multilateral response is the only one. And I think at the present time, all these difficulties in the Islamic world - or others - cannot be an excuse for all those actions that take place. And we can't justify them just simply saying - because the United States policies are wrong, that what they are doing is appropriate. That's not being said here. But that is something that ought not to be considered appropriate.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you, Professor.
(Applause)
Giandomenico Picco: Should I give to Professor Trager first the floor to answer, then to Professor Millar?
Robert Trager: Ah yes. Thank you for your question. We get so steeped in academic jargon, that we always use that and think that it's transparent, when perhaps it isn't - as in this case. There's a distinction between brute force and coercion that's made. And most clearly probably in shelling. And the idea which was very salient during the Cold War is that there's a difference between threatening to fire a nuclear weapon, and actually firing a nuclear weapon. And one threatening to fire that weapon is coercion. Firing it is the use of force.
So similarly in this case, we're thinking in terms of a threat to use force. Or if not force, some other strategy which also implies the power to hurt the group or individual that you're trying to coerce. Now that said, it may well be that a successful strategy of coercion also requires a sort of replenishing of the credibility of the willingness to use force. And in this case, not just the willingness, but even more importantly, the ability to do so, to find - if the strategy requires that - individuals that are dispersed in larger populations. So there is some overlap between the concepts. That's true.
Alistair Millar: And then on the issue of definition, as I had mentioned, there are 13 - some say 16 - conventions and protocols that do provide a legal framework. And I agree with you absolutely that the definition that was offered by Kofi Annan in Madrid is a very good common definition.
But unfortunately, what you see in the Sixth Committee of the United Nations and other places - not in capitals necessarily, but at the U.N. - is an opportunity to score points on other issues, and use this definitional debate to bring other less relevant - in some cases - issues to fore.
And we'll never get to a definition that way. So why not go with the legal one, for those who are dealing with legal issues, and then adopt Kofi Annan's very, very good framing of the issue as a definition elsewhere?
Graham Fuller: First of all, a quick response to the gentleman's last remark. First of all, I'm not attempting to justify any of this violence. I'm attempting to explain what its sources are. If we don't understand the sources, we're not going to arrive at any solutions. Political violence particularly emerges when other alternatives are not present.
This is the essence of democratic society, is that in theory, there are other vehicles for expression of grievances and redress of grievances. When those methods are not available, then political violence naturally emerges. And when it comes to a question of political violence, I question really whether bombing, killing innocent civilians from 50,000 feet, is particularly more moral than killing innocent civilians from 50 or 5 feet.
David Birenbaum: Sir. Yes. I'm David Birenbaum. I'm at The Wilson Center. Let me ask you the question that I'm sure is on the minds of everyone here, and indeed throughout the country. You alluded to it, Graham. But you didn't get into it any detail. How is it that we have not experienced a significant - indeed any terrorist attack - since 9/11? Everyone has been expecting it. We still live in a very free country with access readily available to all kinds of very inviting targets. How does it happen that we have not been hit? Is it all a matter of intelligence? Or are they waiting for some opportunity to arise which hasn't yet materialized?
Giandomenico Picco: You can answer him.
Graham Fuller: Yeah. This very quick, because I know my colleagues will have some things. I mean this is a very interesting area of consideration. First, I think the improvement in intelligence and police work has been very considerable. Not enough, but it's coming a long way. It's been internationalized - police efforts and this kind of thing. I think the use of instruments to track economic - the passage of finances from one group to another has been quite effective, particularly as if affects this country inside.
Secondly, I think if it comes to domestic perpetrators - in other words, residents in the United States as perpetrators of these acts - there probably are precious few who are going to actually want to go that route. But thirdly, I would say while we have been very successful domestically - thank God - in being able to preempt or keep track of these activities, overseas that has not been the case.
And I would argue that anti-American is on the rise in venues such as Afghanistan or Iraq or elsewhere around the world. And even if we don't - thank God, if we don't have another 9/11, we will see a continuation of constant lower-level terrorism, which can, in the end, be equally damaging. That it should stay away, domestically, is wonderful news.
Alistair Millar: My response would be: how would we know? But the answer that I might offer as a guess is threefold. One is that there has been damage to networks as a result of the work that the U.S. and other people have been doing. We can't deny that.
The second is that there has been a new front opened up, which has become a cost-efficient recruiting poster for the work that they're doing - that is of less cost to them than attacking the United States.
But the third is that: why do we try to impose some sort of sense of a timetable on what they're doing? They're very patient. And they may wait years and years before they attack again. And I think in measuring whether they've attacked us or not in the scheme of a political campaign, as has been done in two presidential campaigns since 9/11 - it really sort of falls in the Western/U.S. view of the perspective of what they're doing, rather than their own.
Dessi Zagorcheva: Just a quick addition on this. Maybe one can also think about that right now the United States is involved in Afghanistan and in Iraq. And it is much easier for them to attack American targets there. And they're doing this much more successfully. So they do not have to do anything here. They can just deal with the Americans and the American bases that are abroad. Also, there are some particularities about organizations like Al Qaeda, that want to do something bigger and better than they did on 9/11. And this simply takes time, as we all explained.
Robert Trager: Just one quick thing to add to, I think, the exactly right comments of my colleagues. I think there's also been a strategic choice on the part of global terrorist movements to try to peel off U.S. allies. That is, allies in the War on Terror. So if you look at the countries that have been hit, they're all the ones that were the most cooperative - Britain, Spain, Morocco, other places that did - Saudi Arabia.
And if you actually look at what Al Qaeda's saying, if you look at the list of countries that are being targeted, since 9/11, almost all of those countries that they're specifically listing have, in fact, been targeted. And there's a very good Op-Ed I would just point you to on this from a few years ago, from Robert Pape, a political scientist at The University of Chicago - The New York Times.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you. Because of time, what I would recommend - we'll now take the remaining questions. And then I will divide the questions with our panelists. Because we have exactly eight minutes left. So I would recommend the questions be fairly short, if you are so kind. Please sir.
Rajit Das: Rajit Das. Americans for Informed Democracy. Taking into the fact that South Asia has been a victim to terrorism, particularly India, and with the terrorist groups, Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, and with the fact that India has the second most Muslim population with also having a Muslim as a president, how should the U.S. handle the situation between India and Pakistan? And furthermore, should Pakistan be the next country on the U.S. War on Terror?
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you. Next question please.
Rona Fields: Rona Fields. I'm a psychologist and sociologist. And I've been doing research in terrorism for quite a few years. And my research is as a psychologist. I've examined, using psychological tests, members of paramilitary, also known as terrorist organizations all over the world. And there are a couple of points that I'd like to enter into the discussion here.
Number one, the Palestinian suicide bombers who I knew quite well and wrote about, did not conduct the suicide bombings during a time of hopelessness and feelings of overwhelming defeat. They started conducting these bombings during the period of the Oslo Accords. And I think that's a very significant issue, in terms of strategy and how the particular tactic evolved.
But at the same time, what I'd like to point out is that out of all of these hundreds - thousands now - of test protocols, there are several points that I've gotten on personality that fit very well with the conversations you had. Number one, and that is that the psychological profile of the person who actually commits the act, as a little bit distinct from the member of the organization, is somebody who is angry, but does not feel guilty about his angry behaviors.
He has guilt feelings. He's not a sociopath - he or she. But they are not feeling guilty about the angry behaviors. And that's a very important point. The other point is these are people who are very innovative, and likely not just to be risk takers, but they're innovative, and you might even say creative. It's a very, very significant issue. And usually when you engage in an innovative discussion, they'll pick up on it. And that is probably why they could get carried away from your initiatives.
The third characteristic - and this is very, very important. And this is why terrorism is more likely to be a strategy in certain parts of the world, and why inter-communal violence perpetuates itself - the person who is a ready recruit for terrorist organizations is someone who is truncated at what Piaget calls the second level of moral development, which is vendetta. And in many parts of the world, it is vendetta that inspires the organization, the leadership, as well as the recruitment. There's more about this in some of my books. But those are just the comments.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you. Very kind. Next question, please. We have really two minutes of questions.
Raphael Perl: I'm Raphael Perl with the Congressional Research Service. I want to ask you about state sponsorship of terrorism. As we look ahead, is this an issue, or will it be an issue? And what sort of portfolio of tools might we want to use to deal with it?
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you. Sir.
Steve Monblatt: I'm Steve Monblatt, with The British-American Security Information Council. One very specific question for Alistair. I know that you've talked and written about the notion of a new body, a new international body to coordinate counterterrorism efforts. Over the years, both donors and recipients of aid of various sorts have proven extremely resistant to sharing their information on an international basis.
How would you see a new organization avoiding - and normally, it's on political grounds. How would you see a new organization being able to tackle that issue? And then a second, more general question for the panel. I am struck by how little you've discussed the whole issue of recruitment and the recruitment cycle into terrorism. I'd be interested in your views as to how that cycle develops under the different circumstances you've described.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you sir. Madame. Please.
Diane Perlman: Thank you. I'm Diane Perlman. I'm a clinical and political psychologist. Also like Rona, I write about the psychology of terrorism and nuclear proliferation. And actually my chapter on terrorism is very similar - almost identical - with Graham Fuller's presentation. Also some of yours about needs theory, and how people would rather get their needs met by decent means.
And when those are blocked - and the dynamic, not just the intra-psychic, but the political dynamics that magnify extremism. I disagree with some of the contents of - well one thing. I think we need to make a differentiation between what I call terror reduction and counterterrorism, which is - one is dealing with the symptoms. And the other one is dealing with the causes and the forces.
And in the years of counterterrorism, terrorism has tripled. And there are more reasons - which I don't have time for now - of why we haven't been attacked here.
So it's impossible to defeat. I mean we need to do surveillance and a lot of the symptom things. But you can't defeat terrorism. You can totally reduce it drastically by dealing with just grievances and some of the forces. And the other thing is that it was said that Al Qaeda doesn't have negotiable goals. And I think ending the war on a military basis, occupation in Muslim countries - I think there are many things that we should do - like if it weren't their goals. But I think it's extremely possible to drastically reduce terrorism.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you Diane. Okay.
Princeton Lyman: Princeton Lyman. The Council on Foreign Relations. Just a question to Professor Fuller - perhaps others - on this dilemma between working with the various governments that are perhaps part of the cause of the unhappiness, but the ones who will give you the cooperation on intelligence. And just a quick example from the Sudan, where we are now getting cooperation on intelligence from the leaders of the Sudan, the very people who are also targeted by the international criminal court for crimes against humanity in Darfur. How do we balance those?
Giandomenico Picco: Last question please. Please ma'am.
Michelle Gourdeau: Yes. Michelle Gordeau. Department of Political Science at Laval University. I was just wondering. Most of the panelists talk about terrorism against the United States and between nations. But internal terrorism within the United States and other nations - I just wanted to know the implications with U.S. policy on deterring that sort of terrorism.
Giandomenico Picco: Okay. Thank you. Due to the implacable shortness of time, what I would suggest - I will give two minutes each to comment on whatever question they want to pick up. Would you please start?
Dessi Zagorcheva: Okay. Since most of the questions were directly directed to some of the panelists, I think I will just pick up on the state sponsorship question. Again, very interesting. The current trend is that state sponsorship is declining. And this is good news. However in terms of strategy, again, we have to think about a balanced approach. And we have to use both carrots and sticks.
And again, try to use all of the tools of statecraft that are available to us, meaning use diplomacy, economic sanctions, threats of force, everything that is available. Still, the example of Libya is very interesting.
But we have not - at least in the academic community - there is no agreement what exactly brought Libya from the list of state sponsorships to this very much improved behavior. So now Libya's taken off of the state sponsors. And this will be, again, a combination of strategies that we use, both diplomatic, and threats of force, and economic sanctions that somehow work. So we still have to study the case of Libya to know more.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you. Professor Trager. Please.
Robert Trager: Just very quickly. Pakistan. Should Pakistan be the next target? No. No. A thousand times, no.
(Laughter)
Let me see. Can I be more clear on that? I think that was clear prior to Iraq. But I mean now I don't even know how it could be any more clear. You have a country which is a gigantic country, which has a very sizable military. It would not be easy to defeat. It would require, itself, tremendous resource that could be better spent other places. You wouldn't want to defeat the military. Because you'd much prefer to work with the government. And this gets also to state sponsorship.
Oh. The last thing I would say on that is of course if a nuclear weapon were exploded, and the material were shown to have come from Pakistan, that would change the calculation perhaps. But anyway. On state sponsorship, carrots and sticks. I think everybody sort of agrees that that is a more conventional sort of problem. And that your conventional tools of trying to deter - as the administration, which is low on diplomacy, coercion, and deterrence, in particular in general is high on it when it comes to state sponsors of terrorism. So everybody agrees on that. And carrots need to be used as well.
Besides that, I would just say that I think some of the other comments were exactly right. And although we may be seen to, we do not actually disagree with some of the more psychological approaches. Those are important and need to be further studied. And I think the discussion here was at a really incredibly high level. And I wish it were always so. So thank you.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you. Professor Millar?
Alistair Millar: I will address Steven's question and then Ambassador Lyman's question. To Steven, the question of creating a fund - you're absolutely right. A multilateral fund where money is mixed and matched has not been popular. But the G8 can practice what it preaches, in terms of donor coordination. They can work carefully to earmark funds within one fund. This has been done in the Pacific Islands. It has been done in Asia through the Asia Development Bank. You just put money in, and you earmark it for a specific fund, and you coordinate with other donors to insure that they're not all spending money on the same thing, or nobody's spending money on one specific problem.
So I think it can be tackled. And it would help the counterterrorism community at the U.N. a great deal if it had more to offer than just telling people what to do about capacity building, and had some money to give them to help them do as well, as we've seen with the UNODC in Vienna. And then Ambassador Lyman's question. I think this is a very, very difficult problem, obviously.
But what I discussed earlier, in terms of the overarching point of view and framework that has been established by the United Nations General Assembly on Terrorism, which takes many factors into account, rather than just raw security issues, and intelligence, and other things - but looks at other subjects, such as underlying causes, human rights, and looks at the problem of terrorism in a more holistic fashion, is the way that states should be looking at this as well.
And they need to have an equation. They need to look at whether working with the Sudan, as you suggested, to get some information on terrorism, outweighs allowing these atrocities to continue on a fundamental human rights basis, and what that does to the region, as well as neighboring states such as Kenya and others who are severely affected by this because of terrorism. And they're just taking a very compartmentalized view. And I think that's very damaging.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you. Professor Fuller?
Graham Fuller: Yeah. Just again, very quick remarks and one or two points. I think the lady that mentioned the issue of terror reduction is a very important point. the major thrust of everything I had to say really came down to the point that it's not concerned only with specific terrorists, but the environment which creates them, produces them - or as Mao Tse-Tung said, "The sea within which gorillas or terrorists can operate."
The sea is rising. The amount of space in which terrorists can operate is growing. So our concern has to be - to use another cliché - drain the swamp, lower the levels of water. In which case, the terrorists function far less capably. One woman mentioned that the terrorism had risen during the Oslo Accords. I'm rather uncertain about those statistics. And I'd like to examine them more.
But what is certain is that Hamas - the popularity of Hamas within Palestine was at a low point, and has been traditionally at a low point when there has been genuine progress on the peace front. And as that progress has gone away, the settlements have increased, and the popularity of Hamas has risen.
So I think there is a direct corollary between hopefulness, and the means to which you turn to fight these. Finally, on the Indian case - that's a very complex question. We've already had one very important response on that. I think it's very striking that India has the second biggest group of Muslims in the world, and yet there have been remarkably few Indian Muslims engaged in terrorism globally, even though they're uncomfortable with their particular circumstances.
I attribute this to a government in India which is attempting to deal with the communal issues via all sorts of democratic alternatives that are not available in Egypt, or in Somalia, or in Saudi Arabia, or any number of other cases where there are few, if any other, means.
Terrorism must be dealt with, just as my colleague said here, in the full political context. You can't say, "Let's stop terrorism, and then we'll talk politics." No. That's essentially asking people to take away the only arm they do have, and then you'll talk about politics. I'm not justifying it. But I'm saying it has to be a holistic approach. Thank you.
Giandomenico Picco: Thank you all. Thank you for participating in this conversation.
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