Terrorism isn't just an act of
violence -- it's a political statement, the politically motivated killing of
innocents, writes Philip Mudd. So, random attacks by disturbed people shouldn't
be falsely labeled terrorism, he says.
Philip Mudd comments on
counterterrorism and security policy for CNN. He was the deputy director of the
CIA's Counterterrorist Center and the senior intelligence adviser at the FBI.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are his.
(CNN) Terrorism isn't just an
act of violence -- it's a political statement, the politically motivated
killing of innocents. In the early years after the 9/11 attacks, declaring al
Qaeda attacks incidents of terror seemed straightforward: Al Qaeda leadership
selected targets and trained or inspired followers who took direction or
guidance. And responsibility was clear since they generally claimed the attacks
they conducted and rarely claimed attacks they did not.
Today, individuals or small
groups trying to validate their attacks by claiming allegiance to ISIS seem
like the next terror phase, with ISIS advocating attacks but neither directing
nor even contacting attackers: In France and other European countries, and the
United States, from a national day of celebration in Nice to a gay club in
Orlando to an office party in San Bernardino.
Slow down. What appears to be
an evolution in terror, from centralized operations directed by a core group of
terrorists to a far-flung, loosely knit ideological movement inspired by ISIS
from afar, masks a bigger question: Is what we are seeing even terrorism at
all?
Al Qaeda's approach
Those original architects of
9/11, from al Qaeda operational chief Khalid Sheikh Mohammed through what was
then a clearly defined organization, with defined goals, clearly understood
their motivations, and they articulated them during public statements in the
1990s.
They opposed America's presence
overseas, and they detested American culture. The political motivation of their
strikes was clear: Intimidate America to leave Muslim lands and al Qaeda's
latitude to undermine local governments would increase. In their view, America
was the foundation that helped corrupt leaders maintain power. Remove America
and accelerate the removal of the corrupt locals.
Further, the most senior al
Qaeda players were clear in their commitment. Their single-minded focus on a
decades- or centuries-long struggle against Western power informed their
choices.
Fast forward through the 2000s,
as groups affiliated with al Qaeda undertook attacks across the world, from
Africa through South Asia and farther east, into Indonesia and beyond.
How to fight terrorism and win
Like their al Qaeda partners,
their goals were similarly clear, and their targets and leadership similarly
single-minded. They were the next al Qaeda generation of terrorists, with
different names, different areas of operation, and different recruiting bases,
from Al-Shabaab in Somalia to al Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula, now in Yemen.
They blended al Qaeda-inspired ideology and targets with an interest in local
attacks, occasionally resulting in differences over strategy with al Qaeda's
original core.
Homegrown terror
Homegrown terror hit America
more prominently as the decade progressed, through youth joining groups such as
Al-Shabaab in the Horn of Africa and al Qaeda in Yemen. Social media
accelerated this radicalization, by giving widely dispersed individuals access
to ideology that was far less accessible even as recently as 9/11.
The individuals who motivated
them shared the al Qaedist way of thinking, starting with a focused ideology of
cleansing Muslim areas, ousting regional leaders, and preparing populations in
those areas for the dawn of what al Qaeda saw as a golden era. But these
mislabeled "homegrown" terrorists were never homegrown: They might
have been inspired in isolated locations without access to al Qaeda or its
affiliates, but they were linked to a global movement that was led by committed
jihadists who used terror for clear political ends.
This al Qaeda of the past
practiced controlled violence. By contrast, the ISIS of the present is more violent,
less controlled, less selective about recruits, and less interested in whether
the attacker adheres to its ideology.
Al Qaeda had a stricter
leadership structure and logic -- and tied the attacks they committed to a
longer term strategy. Targets could be justified, even if by their own
interpretation of Islam, and they had to adhere to a certain code of terrorist
conduct. ISIS has no such limitation and no such code. ALL violence conducted
by it, in its name, or against a common enemy is acceptable, welcome. Embraced.
The murderers of ISIS?
Now, years into the ISIS
onslaught, we have yet another generation of murderers seen as the next
iteration of this threat. A Muslim who may have some affiliation with ISIS
Ideas without ever having met an ISIS member, and who appears also to have a
personal grievance -- a marital problem, a psychological struggle -- murders
dozens at a location that is not always readily identifiable as a political
target. Is a gay nightclub a jihadi protest against homosexuality or an
individual's response to some personal demon?
There are two reasons we should
move away from this blurring of the line between today's terror -- seemingly
random attacks with debatable motivations -- and yesterday's terrorism,
perpetrated by politically motivated Islamist revolutionaries, starting with
Osama bin Laden.
First, it's incorrect. ISIS has
become, for some murderers, an excuse, a validation, a justification for
carrying out acts of violence that are motivated by an individual's hate but
sometimes not by what we have come to know as terrorism, the use of violence
against innocents for a political purpose.
Some of these perpetrators
appear to claim ISIS was their inspiration because the true inspiration is less
ideological. Some were emotionally unhinged. They may have had some sort of
interest in ISIS; they also clearly had other psychological demons that led
them to kill.
Second, for those inspired or
directed by ISIS -- and for its core leadership -- there is an honor in
terrorism, the use of these attacks to counter vastly superior adversaries in
Europe, the Middle East, North America and elsewhere. There is, however, no
excuse for random murder among true terrorists. By granting ISIS a claim over
these attackers, we elevate murder to what they want: a sign that their message
of a new caliphate age, driven by ISIS, is gaining traction.
This immediate characterization
of this new phase of attackers as "terrorists," despite their clearly
muddled motivations, vaults a mass murderer who cannot validate killing into
the realm of a politically motivated jihadist who is embraced by a fringe group
that sees his act as justified.
Terrorist label doesn't fit
When we don't know the
motivations of these new killers who simply cover their actions with an ISIS
veneer, why do we give them the validation they seek? At the very least, we are
looking at a new category of terror for which we have no label.
When an apparently emotionally
disturbed attacker murders in Nice, Orlando, Germany, or any of the other
locations that have become so common today, commentators shift immediately to
the bias of placing these attacks in an understandable narrative, to make sense
of acts of violence.
"Another act of
terrorism," they might say, an evolution in what we've witnessed for two
decades. Using the al-Qaeda past as a frame to understand the present, we are
falling prey to a human bias to create clean narratives that follow a clearly
understandable storyline answering the questions of why, and puts individual
incidents in a broader context.
In reality, it is not an
evolution, it's a different phenomenon. Disturbed individuals who couldn't find
a group to validate their actions in the past today have that validation, and
it's ISIS. Regardless of whether they either believe or understand the ISIS
message, they will claim ISIS inspiration because the alternative -- mass
murder without a clear rationale -- is indefensible. Yet would these attacks
have occurred without ISIS? Maybe so.
In cases of mass murder,
Americans have evolved to understand the first question about the perpetrator
isn't what he did, or who he killed. It's what his mental state was, whether he
had the mental capacity to be tried in a US court as a murderer. As time goes
on, we might simply apply the same standard to murderers who claim to be
terrorists. Before we look at what they did, or who they killed, start with a
simpler question: Were they actually motivated by some warped political
ideology, or were they looking for validation from ISIS as cover for whatever
psychological problem or emotional disturbance they suffered from?
It's still not clear what the
Orlando killer was thinking when he entered that club. We call him a terrorist
even as we accept the diametrically opposed proposition that we don't exactly
know why he did what he did. A mass murderer isn't necessarily a terrorist. And
a self-proclaimed ISIS adherent attacking in the streets of America or Europe
isn't necessarily terrorism.
By By Philip Mudd
Culled from: CNN
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