The Ongoing Fight of Terrorism

Sixteen years ago, marked the deadliest terrorist attack registered in the history of the United States, the 9/11 attacks. This was a series of aircraft hijackings where two airplanes flew into the Twin Towers at the World Trade Center in New York City, killing approximately three thousand people. Although this was the deadliest attack, it was certainly not the first.  In the article, “Sixteen Years After 9/11, How Does Terrorism End?”, the author Robin Wright explores how terrorism ends or rather how do these groups evolve.

Audrey Kurth Cronin, the author of “How Terrorism Ends”, and “who has studied more than four hundred fifty terrorist groups, found that the average life span of an extremist movement is about eight years.” (Wright) Wright sat down with eight experts in the field terrorism who were able to able to list six ways in which terrorism dies or fades away and which succeed. This article is a factual recount and long study of many terrorist attacks that were successful in achieving what they wanted, some who failed and some who had an unexpected turn out.

Terrorist groups are most likely to succeed when their objectives are reasonable. For example, wars fought for independence, rights in government or the seizure of land are reasonable and attainable goals set forth by extremist groups. Some extremist groups negotiate to achieve their goal. “They are the groups that hang on the longest. They often take years, and some lower level of violence continues, but they rarely fail outright.” said Cronin. Another way is the reorientation of tactics used by these extremist groups. Although it is rare, we have seen that some groups shift their tactics and even end up in the political realm such as the case of the Hezbollah, a Shi'a Islamist militant group and now very strong political party in Lebanon. The fourth way, and the most instinctive, is repression. (Wright) The fifth is the lack of cohesiveness said Bruce Hoffman, the author of “Inside Terrorism”. Some terrorist groups have no real central objective, they just make “a lot of noise”. And lastly, the capture or death of the group leaders. This is help “deflate or finish off movements”. (Wright)

Will terrorism ever end? Is there an easy way out? I don’t think so. Throughout history, we have seen these examples play out, some have been successful and some are an ongoing struggle. The reality is that “we’re dealing with adversaries who, tactically, organizationally, and strategically, have given the same amount of thought to terrorism as we have” said Brian Jenkins, the author of “Will Terrorist Go Nuclear? Radical groups are unpredictable and will never cease just as governments are an on-going fight for power.

Work Cited

Wright, Robin. “Sixteen Years After 9/11, How Does Terrorism End?”. The New Yorker. September 10, 2017. Web. September 15, 2017.