HSEP 301 (POLI/CRJS 367)

Fall 2020

Review 1

 

 

This looks big, but don't worry.  If you have come to class, or viewed the lectures, and done all the reading, nothing here should be new to you.

            Also, though there are a lot of terms, obviously, not each one of them is the subject of an essay. These terms, in order, are an outline of everything we've done so far. A group of them might be the subject of an essay, or maybe a comparison between one president's foreign policy and another. Usually, you can't explain a single term without referring to the terms next to it. So, really, if you can say one or two things about each term and how it relates to the terms around it and fits into the larger scheme of US foreign policy you're doing fine. Some terms, however, are filled with enough significance to be short answers/identifications on the test (four or five sentences), but you'll be able to figure out which ones.

 

Remember that you have the PPT slides. They are a version of this review sheet.

Terms with (*) in front of them may not have been included in the lectures, but were discussed, at length, in the readings.

 

This a take home exam. The following instructions are the same as on the syllabus.

 

You have roughly two days to complete the exam.  

It will consist of two parts:

·         Part 1: Short Answers: Choose 2 of 8 (or more): (20 points each; roughly one half of a page): I’ll have a list of terms taken directly from the review sheet. Define the term and tell me why it’s important in the context of US foreign policy.

·         Part 2: Essay: Choose 1 of 2 (maybe 3): (60 points; roughly 3-4 pages).  Each essay has several parts to it.  Make sure to do all parts of the essay. There are choices even within the essay, so make sure you read the directions. A part of an essay may say “choose 3 of 5.”  Don’t do all five.

 

 

You have roughly two days to complete the exam.  

It will consist of two parts:

·         Part 1: Short Answers: Choose 2 of 8 (or more): (20 points each; roughly one half of a page): I’ll have a list of terms taken directly from the review sheet. Define the term and tell me why it’s important in the context of US foreign policy.

·         Part 2: Essay: Choose 1 of 2 (maybe 3): (60 points; roughly 3-4 pages).  Each essay has several parts to it.  Make sure to do all parts of the essay. There are choices even within the essay, so make sure you read the directions. A part of an essay may say “choose 3 of 5.”  Don’t do all five.

 

How does a take home exam work?

·         The midterm will be placed in the Course Documents folder on October 7 at about 9:00 AM.  Due by midnight on October 8 (as October 8 becomes October 9, but that deadline is a soft one; don't sweat an extra hour or so). 

·         Type or write the exam. 

·         Either way, email me a file or pdf or even jpeg of the written answers by the deadline

·         11- or 12-point font

·         One-inch margins

·         Double-spaced

·         Please use your name is the name of the file you send me.  I’d be happiest if you named the file like this: Your name Exam 1 HSEP 301 or POLI 367 (so if it was my exam, it would be Newmann Exam 1 HSEP 301)

·         The exam is open notes (so you can use your notes, the book, the review sheet, and the PPT slides

·         I do not expect any outside research on this at all

·         Each question has a specific page number target.  You can go over the limit, not a problem, but don’t go too far over the limit. You don’t need to.

·         I think two to three hours will be enough time for you to write the exam and do well. You can take more time of course, as much as you need. The point here is that I don't think you end to spend hours and hours.

·         It might be helpful to read the questions, then review your notes, and the review sheet.  Maybe make an outline of the essay. And then start to write.

·         As always, the review sheets should be very helpful. You can use the review sheets while you take the exam. It might be a good organizational tool. 

·         Feel free to email me questions if you have them, but as usual, there are limits to how I can help you.

 

And, important:

·         Sharing this exam with anyone outside the class is a violation of the VCU Honor Code

·         Working with another student in the class or anyone else while you take this exam is a violation of the VCU Honor Code

·          As with any take home, the plagiarism rules that exist for research papers apply here.  Your exams must be your written work. I will run this through the standard plagiarism programs as I do with all research papers

 

 

List of Terms

 

Defining Terrorism

*The French Revolution definition

*Narodnaya Volya (People’s Will activities and purpose)

*Skirmishers

*The range of official definitions

*Hoffman’s definition

*Terrorists reject the rules of war

 

Modern Definition

1.    *Political Agenda

*Terrorism is agenda setting

Success of Palestinian terrorism in agenda setting

2.    Violence as the method

*Terrorism as a weapon of the weak

*Asymmetric warfare

*Attacking the enemy by causing it pain and creating fear

Al-Qaeda’s hope: US will feel the pain/fear and withdraw from the Middle East or US will overreact and incite greater resistance to US in the region and globally

The Terrorist Logic (from PPT slide)

Madrid Bombing 2004

3.    *Civilians as targets

*Civilian as audience and civilian as target

4.    *Publicity

*choice of targets (Hoffman)

5.    *Non-State Actors?

 

Key Issues

Terrorism as crime vs. terrorism as warfare

 

Categories/Typologies for terrorist groups

Ideological

Ethno-national

Narco-terrorism

Religious nationalism

Differences between the different types

Why a typology is useful for counterterrorism

 

Current trends

Religious nationalism

Development of weapons of mass destruction capability

Globalization’s role

            impact of global travel

            impact of global finance

            impact of global communication

Independence of terrorist groups

            state-sponsored vs. independent groups

Terrorist network structures

 

Does terrorism work? Arguments for and against

On not confusing ends (political goals) with means (methods of achieving those goals)

 

History of Terrorism

Terrorism is not new

Zealots, assassins, thugs

 

*First Wave of modern terrorism

*assassinations

*as revolutionary (up until WW I)

 

Second Wave

*anti-colonial

Ethnonationalism

*Palestine
*Menachem Begin

*Irgun

*Goals? Success?

 

*Algeria

*FLN

*Urban Trrorism

*Goals? Success?

 

Third Wave

*State-sponsored terrorism (Hoffman)

*Leftist groups in Europe and Japan

*RAF (Baader-Meinhof Group)

*PLO as tutor

Soviet role

*PLO goals and strategy

*internationalization strategy

*Black September Organization and 1972 Munich Olympics

*Publicity equals success?

 

Fourth Wave

Global and religious

*The range of religious terrorist attacks in the 1990s (Hoffman)

*Characteristics of religious terrorism

*believing it is self-defense in the terrorist’s narrative

desire for mass casualties

*Jewish extremism: Kach and Meir Kahane

*Aum Shinrikyo

*White Supremacists Christians in US (Timothy McVeigh, see below)

 

*Salafist Radical Terrorism

*Wahhabi ideas

*Qutb

*AQ vs. Muslim Brotherhood

*The religious roots: Saudi Arabia and Qutb’s role

Iranian revolution

*Afghan war vs. Soviets

*“Jihadis” or non-Afghans who came to Afghanistan

*alliance against the USSR and backing for mujahadin

*role of US, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan

*role of Madrassas (Saudi funded religious schools)

*Soviet defeat: all the vets of the Afghan war go home and launch local “jihad” against their governments

*Taliban

Have a strong knowledge of the PPT Figure on the Origins of Fourth Wave Terrorism

*Radical Islamic Ideology

Where transnationalists and nationalists share ideas

Where Transnationalists and nationalists disagree

Example of each type

 

 

Fifth Wave

Lone Wolves

Characteristics

*and the internet

 

 

Al-Qaeda

Origins, Objectives, Doctrines

*In Afghanistan

*The anti-Soviet alliance

*mujahedin

*The foreign fighters or “Jihadis”

*The jihadi recruitment organization run by bin-Laden

*Abdullah Azzam

*AQ’s founding

The 1990 Gulf War and Bin-Laden’s offer to Saudi Arabia

Saudi King turns him down, throws him out

*in Sudan

*Goals in Middle East

*Global goal: recreation of the caliphate

*1998 fatwa

*Ideological influence of Sayyid Qutb

*Influence of Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt

*AQ and the Taliban

 

Leadership and leadership structure

*Osama bin-Laden’s background

*Ayman al-Zawahiri background

*Decentralization, regional nodes, cells

*Central leadership

*Cells

*Regional nodes and entrepreneurship

Corporate/Hierarchical vs. network model

Types of networks

*Links to regional groups

            *global reach of Al-Qaeda

*Khalid Sheikh Mohammed

*different level of affiliations with AQ

 

Support for Al-Qaeda

*Training of recruits

*method of recruiting

*where does AQ recruit?

*use of civil wars as training ground: Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria

Ethnic makeup of membership

*Funding

            Hawala

            *infiltration of Islamic charities

 

*cost of operations (expensive or cheap?) (Hoffman)

*In Sudan

*In alliance with Taliban

 

Strategy and Tactics

*The Debate: Near or Far Enemy

*Why attack the US?

*AQ strategies (Byman)

*attrition

*undermine morale

*Naji: The Management of Savagery

Tactics

*and suicide bombing

*and lone wolves

*Operations: Hit the US

*Create global network to match US global reach

*Maximize casualty level

            *Lessons of Beirut 1983 and Somalia 1993

*1993 Trade Center attack

*Embassy attacks 1998

*Khalid Sheikh Mohammad (KSM) and 9/11

 

AQ Evolution

*The Iraq War

*AQI

*Saudi citizens and AQ vs. Saudi government and AQ

*AQ Affiliates

*AQAP

*AQIM

*AQ “franchise” concept

*Evolution of AQAM since 2001 in terms of style of organization and strategy (the very colorful PPT slide)

 

*ISIS/ISIL/Daesh

*al-Baghdadi

*Zarqawi

*ISIS vs. AQ

*Jabhat al-Nusra (al-Nusra Front, AQ affiliate in Syria)

*ISIS goals

 

Who and Why Lecture

 

Why do some organizations and individuals Choose terrorism as a strategy?

1. Strategic or Instrumental Model

(Rational Choice)

cost-benefit analysis

when is violence a “rational” choice?

as a response to repression of minority group: LTTE or Hezbollah

Asymmetric warfare

Palestinian terrorism after 1967

Impact of Six Day War on Islamic radical ideologues

 

2. Realist Model

Power matters

Demonstrating your power

 

3. Democracy as a factor

Debate on whether Democracies produce terrorists

as targets

authoritarian states as the breeding ground for terrorists

negotiating an end to terrorism with democracies

 

4. Ethno-nationalism

 

5. Expectation-Frustration-Aggression

Davies J-Curve

 

6.Resource Mobilization Theory

 

Who joins a terrorist group and why?

Leaders vs. Members

1. *Poverty and Lack of Education thesis

terrorists: above average education and income for their nations

Demographic profile of a terrorist

2. Ideology

3. Economic Factors

underemployment/over-education

4. Transitions

5. Alienation, humiliation, identity

grievance

Significance Quest Theory

6. Social networks

socialization

7. Prison, torture, revenge

8. *money

 

Suicide attacks

Attacks vs. Deaths

Reasons why suicide attacks are used (discussed in class)

*Rivalry between terrorist groups

*LTTE innovations

 

WMD/CBRNE

Worst-case scenarios considered; Why?

Terrorist groups interested in WMD

Some groups want mass casualties

Religious-based terrorist groups

Groups must want mass casualties (why some will and some won’t)

Acquiring materials

Weaponization

Delivery

Not getting caught

Chemical weapons

Aum and Sarin 1995

 

Biological Weapons

Types of biological weapons

Key factors:

            Legality and legitimacy of research

            Transmission of disease

Recent Use

            Aum Shinrikyo

Al-Qaeda

            Anthrax 2001

 

Nuclear Weapons

Who has them; who wants them

How terrorists might get a bomb

Pakistan as a source and a worst case scenario

 

Why nations would or would not give WMD to a terrorist organization (Know the PPT slide on this)

 

Cyber terrorism

Definition

Vulnerability of infrastructure

Cyberspace

Estonia 1997

Hypothetical cyber attacks

Methods

            DDOS

The range of threats

            Hacktivism

            Cyber crime

            Cyber espionage

            Cyber War

            Cyber terrorism

AQ’s program

Two Key questions

1.       Can you do significant damage with a cyber attack?

            Significant damage?

            But example of 2010 Volcano on Europe

2.       What benefit would a terrorist group get out of it?

            Is a cyber attack better than a bomb?

Cyber attacks as an adjunct to conventional attacks