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New link: http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pubs/display.cfm?pubID=207 Old Link: http://carlisle-www.army.mil/ssi/pubs/2003/bounding/bounding.pdf
Also, it might be useful to link directly to our terrorism studies, which are, like the above, free to the public. Strategic Studies Institute Global War on Terrorism Studies 144.99.8.10 19:06, 5 June 2007 (UTC)JUstin
Currently, at least when I view the page, it doesn't seem to render properly. This is with Firefox 2.0.0.3 on Mac OS X, and it doesn't seem to happen with other WP pages. I think the problem is in the ((terrorism)) template, because it looks fine if that's removed. I'm not sure how to fix it, but right now the page is terrifically ugly. --Kadin2048 05:18, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
Not sure how to start this list but there are people who have admitted they are terrorists, as for example United States General William Yarborough. This info is found in Noam Chomsky's book, Hegemony or Survival, p192n9
Here's another, for what it's worth. http://www.noobomg.com/83 Cheezmeister (talk) 17:27, 1 January 2008 (UTC)
It is surprising that terrorism in Kashmir does not find enough mention.--Darrendeng 09:25, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
I have a question, why does the article not talk about terrorist groups in the USA, or how the United States government has backed terrorist in the past?? --Margrave1206 01:37, 17 December 2006 (UTC)
An excellent point Margave. I think this article does not do enough to define terrorism carried out by nation states. If terrorism can be defined as the use of violence to achieve political ends (one of the most common definitions), then it is critical to discuss the role of nation states in sponsoring and engaging in terrorism as they are the best equipped to carry out terrorism as well as being the worst perpetrators. Clearly the United States tops this list, but almost every nation state has perpetrated one or more forms of terrorism, either against its own people or those of other nation states. 203.11.72.4 04:40, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
-Clearly your a dumbass, how could the US top a list containing Iran, Saddam's Iraq, and Nazi Germany???
69.23.124.142 (talk) 17:37, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
COMMENT: TERRORISM is a METHOD not a goal, nor an actor. A government or underground group can engage in legitimate warfare, such as attacks upon the enemy's military assets or government in a declared war by combatants wearing insignia or uniforms to distinguish them from civilians -- to protect the civilians.
I guess I agree that the enire process here suffers from lack of consensus on what terrorism is.
The goals being pursued are not relevant to whether something is terrorism or not.
Intentional attacks on innocent civilians (not combatants disguised as civilians, nor accidental collateral damage) for the purpose of terrorizing the population is terrorism.
This article cannot rationally be combined with "freedom fighter" because the goal is irrelevant. Whether terrorism is pursued for a noble or evil purpose is completely irrelevant. It is the method of targeting innocent civilians intentionally and commiting random, wanton violence that is the hallmark of terrorism. The most noble cause in the world is still terrorism if it is carried out by methods of targeting civilian populations. The most EVIL cause in the world is *NOT* terrorism if it is carried out by attacking the opponent's military and/or government command structure in a declared conflict wearing insignia to protect the civilian population by identifying (even if only by wearing an insignia patch) combatants from non-combatants.
For a country, government, or small group to engage in open warfare, even if devious or secretive, is not terrorism. A freedom fighter who does not target civilian targets is not a terrorist. A freedom fighter who does target civilians is a terrorist, regardless of his goals, whehter good or bad.
QUITE SIMPLY, THE LABEL "TERRORISM" IS NOT A COMMENTARY ON WHETHER THE GOAL IS GOOD OR BAD. Terrorism is a label concerning the methods used.
-- Jack Rogers
I agree with Jack - this article should, in true encyclopedic fashion, try to state factually and comprehensively information about the topic in an academic way. I suspect the problem we are facing is the misuse of the term 'terrorism' by political leaders in their rhetoric, and the hence skewed meaning it has imparted on those who do not seek dictionary definitions for fun. --Growly 01:08, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
I mean, wouldn't it be much more relevant and helpful if we had a map of say, worldwide terrorist incidents for a year more recent than 2001? I'm sure such a map exists, and would probably give people a better idea of the current worldwide situation, right? 67.165.87.42 08:47, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
When most people look up 'terrorist' they want to read about the damn hindus. I mean jihadists'. People already know about U.S. terrorists'. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.121.74.210 (talk) 00:04, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Jack above said: "It is the method of targeting innocent civilians intentionally and commiting random, wanton violence that is the hallmark of terrorism".
Jack you seem to affirm that the demarcation between terrorism and freedom fighters is the targeting of innocent civilians. What about a group that attacks government or military people or buildings etc? This cannot strictly be deemed wanton killing if the target is of srategic military importance, in the same way that the execution of a busload of civilians can. The point is, who decides who is a terrorist? Many governments around the world use the label terrorist to apply to what other people may deem freedom fighters, because of the emotive connotations of the word, and the fact that it automatically implies guilt, wrongdoing and illegitimacy on the part of their enemy. Hence the old adage 'one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter'. Ultimately, a comprehensive definition that applies to all circumstances is impossible. I do however agree that generally speaking what distinguishes a terrorist act from an act of insurgency is the targeting of innocent civilians, but this view is not universally applied, and groups deemed as 'freedom fighters' often stray into 'terrorist' actions, so the waters are far too murky for clear criteria. The term is used so loosely, a consensus may never be possible, but as mentioned above, it is a method of war rather than a tangible subject. A 'war on terror' is akin to a 'war on guerrila fighting' or a 'war on hand to hand combat'. (M Bennett)
The simple truth is terrorism is the direct result of a disparity in forces, particularly heavy technological equipment, though numbers of troops is also important. Given that any freedom fighter that fights head on against a vastly superior opponent will be crushed, terrorism must be considered a valid means for small weak groups to oppose the superpowers of their region. That is assuming forceful opposition from the weak is considered legitimate given they have no democratic mandate.
The freedom fighter versus military targets only is a practical method only where the opposing forces are not that much stronger at any given point of attack. Sneaking off into the unpopulated back country is an increasingly difficult trick given thermal imaging and aerial surveillance.
Now if only we could convince the superpowers and the small terrorist of today to lay down those unequal weapons then send individuals and small teams to battle on some isolated island or desert area for resolution of issues. Maybe some world media combination of NBC, BBC, and Al-Jazzeri televising and flying Drones to prevent cheating as they enter the arena and some sort of olympic warfare rules and primitive weapons? 69.23.124.142 (talk) 17:37, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
69.23.124.142 (talk) 17:37, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
As previously recommended, I've split "Tactics of terrorism" off into its own article. The main article is down to 34K, which is reasonable for now. -- Beland 00:42, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
I have removed the "NPOV" and "Globalize/USA" tags from the top of this article, as it has made significant progress from previous versions, I have just re-written the introduction, and nothing jumps out at me as particularly USA-centric anymore. However, perhaps some of you do see room for improvement. If so, could you please tag a specific section or statement that needs attention, or make a specific suggestion on the talk page? Hopefully that will help stabilize the article and focus efforts on improvement.
I removed two rather vague tasks from the todo list:
If anyone has any specific complaints in these areas, elucidating those would be helpful for further improvement. -- Beland 01:24, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
The statement, under Major Acts of Terrorism, "-The killing of Nicaraguan civilians by the United States in the 1980's," represents bias and certainly not general consensus and should therefore be omitted. At any rate, its only correct in an extremely lose sense anyway, as whatever killings occurred were generally done by proxy. Its always annoying when people with strong political agendas try to edit wiki :(. -- Anonymous
The current article says
What is a non-combatant? --Philip Baird Shearer 15:07, 21 January 2007 (UTC)
Is an off duty soldier a combatant or a non-combatant? Are civil servants who work in a ministry of defence combatants or non-combatants? Are civilian police officers combatants or non-combatants?
If a soldier is constructing a sangar he is a combatant. But what if a civilian contractor is employed to construct the sangar? What about the person who fixes the digger that the civilian or soldier uses to build the sangar? What about the person in a machine shop who make the part that is needed by the person who fixes the digger, that is used by the civilian contractor build a sangar? The trouble with this simple definition is that the difference between a combatant and a non-combatant is not clear cut given the amount of civilian support which modern combat requires. --Philip Baird Shearer 14:26, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
Any such definition is going to suffer from the "argument of the beard" -- at what point does a five o'clock shadow become a beard? Drawing a precise line will never be exactly possible.
But I think the common sense understanding of most people is that terrorism is attacking the civlian population who have nothing at all to do with theh enemy goverment's acivities. Blowing up a pizza parlor where teenagers are out on dates on Friday night is terrorism. Blowing up a bus carrying the general public is terrorism. The question of how close to the government one can get without becoming a combatant I think misses the point.
However, I think it is fair to say that ANYONE who is part of the military effort is a reasonable proxy for a combatant. I don't think anyone is going to object to calling an attack on part of the military efforts of the opposing country a legitimate form of warfare. (Except the military beig attacked perhaps.)
THAT SAID, I do believe that the goal of legitimate warfare on an enemy government is to cripple and defeat the enemy mlitary, not to maximize the loss of life. Entering the army's typing pool and slaughtering secretaries would probably be a reasonable candidate for terrorism. The standard is legitimate warfare. Legitimate warfare aims to defeat an enemy, not to kill janitors, cooks, or secretaries. -- Jack Robers
From a purely functional perspective, warfare comprises any action to destroy a threat. In the case of the sangar, the civilian contractors would be considered non-combatants, in that individually, they pose no threat. Collectively, however, they are producing a threat (the sangar), which becomes a legitimate target for military action. A ball-bearing plant, a command and communication installation, an infrastructure target, all collectively produce a threat during war and are legitimate strategic targets. The non-combatants that staff (or just happen to be near) these strategic targets are not themselves specifically targeted, hence the concept of collateral damage. -- Ian Campbell
The citation is weak. It cites a study (Jeffrey Record, "Bounding the Global War on Terrorism") that cites a book (Bruce Hoffman “Defining Terrorism,” ) that cites a book (Alex Schmid, et al. "Political Terrorism: A New Guide to Actors, Authors, Concepts, Data Bases, Theories, and Literature") that cites either the study or a book that cites the study (it is unclear at the moment). I left off with the [schmidt] citation if someone can track from there. I suspect its a political statement that biases original information. What is apparent from the secondary or tertiary source I tracked down is that it was survey work among experts and that the author was able to construct a defiintion that "81% of [expert] respondents found fully or partially acceptable". Mrdthree 18:22, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
I believe the photograph of the WTC used in this article invokes doctrined points of view without proof or cause. Although the 9/11 acts can very easily be described as "Acts Of Terrorism", that is an assumption with no solid references. Perhaps a separate article, or subsection, could be dedicated to that particular event. It is possible I am in the minority with this point of view, debate is welcomed. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 217.42.209.103 (talk) 03:25, 4 February 2007 (UTC).
A small comment: I believe that terrorism is too general a term to describe the different types of terrorism. Modern day terrorism and pre-9/11 terrorism are two very different things. Today, terrorism mainly is derived from islamist extremism ideology, with its goal being to destroy democracy and human rights of the west and to destroy Israel. I suggest the article be refined so that it reflect the fact that modern day terrorism and pre-9/11 terrorism are completely different things. This site here gives a little more information about modern-day terrorism in the middle east: linkBen339 05:42, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
....If terrorism is the attacking of civilians for political or ideological gain then can anyone explain why George W.Bush and every single American President before him is not a terrorist? answer- he is. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.184.9.155 (talk) 02:17, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
Should add a link to Economic terrorism —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Philogik (talk • contribs) 07:43, 8 February 2007 (UTC).
Politicians and linguists/political activists are not researchers in the field of terrorism, and are therefore not reliable sources when it comes to terrorism. Polemics and political speeches are fine for propaganda tracts, but not for Wikipedia. Jayjg (talk) 14:00, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
Chomsky is a linguist and political activist, and is not any sort of expert in Terrorism. Galloway is a radical politician. Phrases like "Dont show your extremism" are violations of WP:CIVIL. If you continue I will take this to the admin noticeboard. Jayjg (talk) 14:03, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
I think after watching This video, you should simply put Galloway in the list of trashed people, because you will surely not like him. VirtualEye 16:46, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
I think that this is becoming a sterile argument. Not all acts labeled terrorism have the same level of opprobrium for a third party observer. Just as in the case of "military necessity", one has to consider "distinction" and "proportionality". As an example there was widespread outrage in the Republic of Ireland over the second of the Warrington bomb attacks (1993) by the IRA, -- The bomb was in a bin close to a McDonald's and people thought that the IRA should have considered that children could be casualties, and not planted it there. The negative reaction to the much larger London Bishopsgate bomb (1993) was much more muted as the IRA argument that it was a legitimate economic target could not be totally discounted -- The damage was so large that it forced the British government to underwrite some of the cost of the damage, something they resisted because it made a political statement that this was war damage not criminal damage. --Philip Baird Shearer 11:27, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Please merge any relevant content from Political terrorism per Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Political terrorism. (If there is nothing to merge, just leave it as a redirect.) Thanks. —Quarl (talk) 2007-03-02 07:42Z
Please add an interwiki link for Croatian. I cannot, because the article is protected.
Code:
[[hr:Terorizam]]
Thanks. --89.172.63.165 22:22, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
Colombia is poorly mentioned (see the very red spot in the map of terrorist acts?)--((F3rn4nd0 ))(BLA BLA BLA) 23:42, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
Please add Latin language interwiki:
[[la:Tromocratia]]
Thanks 71.208.225.146 18:04, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
Under the section "Types of Terrorism" there is nothing listed about the violent religous fanatical terrorism which was experienced on 9/11 for example. I believe that should be listed. WacoJacko 10:18, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
Also, there was nothing listed about terrorism against civilians which is what happened on 9/11, what happened in Britain, and what happens in Israel. This to me would seem very important. This terrorism based on religous extremism seems to be the most prominent form of terrorism that encountered today.WacoJacko 10:22, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
The activities of the mafia and other organised crime, particularly involved in "protection" rackets and suppressing informants involves the use of terror, even if it only involves horse's heads in the bed, but the only thing which distinguishes it from "terrorism" is its lack of political focus, but for financial gain. Even so there is an overlap because the mafia has often controlled politicians and unions and has its origins in the Italian Risorgimento as a "resistance group" along with the Neapolitan Camorra.In Ireland the terrorist groups have funded themselves througfh criminal enterprise and in the case of several protestant para military groups have become indistinguishable from financially motivated criminal gangs. I would use the definition in a Chinese saying- "Kill one- frighten ten thousand" Workersdreadnought 12:34, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
'Terrorism' is a term used to describe violence or the perception or threat of imminent violence.
Really? Is that the best possible way we can word the lead sentence? That terrorism is a synonym for violence, or even perceived, or threatened imminent violence?
If so, I used to occasionally terrorise my younger brother, I was terrorised in school, and every single boxing or Mixed Martial Arts match is a showcase for terrorism. Also, one of the things that some people look forward to most in ice hockey is the terrorism.
Surely there has to be a better way to word that sentence? --Dreaded Walrus t c 07:06, 1 July 2007 (UTC)
The key questions for labeling an action as terrorist are :
-The goals are political -The one who does is not a regular army (then would be a "war crime") -The action is criminal -The action is not done for the advantage that gives for itself but for the sake of propaganda.
So any reasonable wording must say this.
There is a shortcut which is increasingly used by academics and is to say that "Terrorism is war crimes commited without a regular war (or by non-soldiers)". --Igor21 11:46, 5 July 2007 (UTC)
Terrorism is a term used to describe violence or other harmful acts committed (or threatened) against civilians by groups or persons for political or other ideological goals.
It sounds good to me, much better than before.WacoJacko 20:25, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
Am I the only one who sees a clear distinction between the word terrorism, violence and/or the mention of personal goal?
A terrorist is someone who instills terror, it does not imply means or reasons.
For peaceful ways of terrorizing people, one can watch the classic John Cleese movie on "How to irritate people"
Hi,
The problem of the definitions that imply the need of a will of certain nature (e.g. the will to "cause terror" ) is that it is possible to say that the intention of the terrorist is not to cause any "sensation" but to achieve a certain political goal. It has a point because if a terrorist wants the independence of a certain region, and does something and the independence is achieved without having caused terror, he has achieved his goal so it is slippery to say that they want "to cause terror" because they want to cause terror at the same title that they want to cause destruction or death i.e. as a tool to achieve their true or final objective.
This is the reason why in academic circles, everybody is more and more willing to accept the loose in the definition of the nuances "will of causing terror" and "will of propaganda" -that tradicionally have been used to key concepts- for the sake of having a unified definition. In this regard, if we divide political violence in four sections we have a complete taxonomy. These are
-War : done by armies following the Geneva Convention (or Law of People in Wartimes of whatever)
-War crime : done by armies and not following the Geneva Convention
-Civilian uprising : done by non-soliders who follow Geneva Convention
-Terrorism : done by civilians who do not follow Geneva Convention
This criteria are free of any need for judging the will of the perpetrator. To adopt this taxonomy would be very good for wikipedia since it saves no ending discussions about intentions and legitimacy that are really evanescent concepts.
One more remark : terrorism can be done against soldiers as the case of the two English NCOs killed by Irgun in 1946 using means not allowed by Geneva Convention; or the linching of the solider in the palestinian police station some years ago just to name two.
Unfortunately it seems that terrorism will be on front pages for the whole century so it is important for wikipedia to have an agile procedure to deal with the articles speaking aobut it. Let me know what you think and I can bring references from recognized academic world experts so backup the above way of handling. --Igor21 10:24, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
Hi Philip Baird Shearer : Let me kindly suggest to you reading what I wrote above. With your new change, definition is longer but without being univocal.
Answering your questions under my definition :
-The murder of Willy Wright is clearly terrorism since was commited by non-soliders against someone who was not a soldier. Because we do not need to judge about proportionality or about the doings of Mr. Wright we do not entangle is evanescent subjects.
-Attacks on a police force are terrorism since police force by definition do not carry weapons to cause the maximum destruction but weapons to limit the colateral damage. Its true that if police is armed with military weapons and acts as an occupation army there is a problem but the problem is caused by this fact not by the definition. A police by definition is there to protect all the civilians and if does not so, this is the problem.
-The Brighton bombing was clearly terrorism since was an attack of civilians against civilians.
-To attack a patrol of Red Barrets armed with FAL is not terrorism but civilian uprising since those soldiers had the means to self defend.
-To attack pubs because there are off-duty soldiers inside is terrorism. It would not if the attacked pub were inside a military compound.
-Hyde Park and Regents Park bombings are terrorist acts since the soldiers were not acting as such but doing a parade for tourists and in fact many tourist were wounded.
-Animal Rights Militia actions have the shape of terrorist acts but if they are so mild, they can be considered out of the cathegory because are not criminal enough. This is a different discusion because if an occupation army do such things we cannot say if are crimes of war or not.
This thing of the "hundred definitions" is absurd. There are not hundred but thousand wordings but definitions as such there are very few. In one hand we have the definitions based on who is the one who does("any civilian act of political violence is terrorism"). After we have the definitions based on legitimacy and proporcionality which normally lead to no ending discusions about each conflict. Then we have two definitions based on aim ("acts of political violence with the will of causing terror" and "acts of political violence were violence is used for propaganda). This two have the variants of including military personnel or not. And then there is the one, I am proposing that is to ask "if this would have been done by soldiers, would it be a war crime?". If yes then is terrorism. --Igor21 14:29, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
I think some people are getting way off course here, terrorism still doesn't imply a political goal nor violence, even though western media often uses the word that way.
1. a person, usually a member of a group, who uses or advocates terrorism.
2. a person who terrorizes or frightens others.
(http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/terrorist)
2. the state of fear and submission produced by terrorism or terrorization.
3. a terroristic method of governing or of resisting a government.
(http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/terrorism)
Many of the American dictionaries have changed/added the definition after 9/11, however, most of us still remember the original meaning of the word.
A policeman trying to scare someone is terrorism, and so is a government showing it's muscle to the less fortunate. However, most of the time, terrorism is the word used to describe actions done by the "other" side. --213.114.213.212 03:55, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
Alteration to
I think the removal of the word unlawful is not helpful as I wrote above: I have added the word unlawful to the first sentence because the threat of violence in a war by enemy armed forces is not terrorism, nor is the lawful threat of violence by the police terrorism, even though in both cases they are preformed for political or other ideological goals. So I am going to reinsert it and I hope we can discuss it further before it is removed again. --Philip Baird Shearer 08:41, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
Without the term unlawful it means that terrorism encompasses the lawful use of violence, this is clearly a nonsense. If you want to go this way then I suggest that we go back to the opening paragraph as used in the Definition of terrorism:
--Philip Baird Shearer 16:12, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
You have not addressed the issue of lawful violence. Not all violence or other harmful acts committed (or threatened) against civilians by groups or persons for political or other ideological goals. is terrorism. Lawful Coercion by a state is not terrorism. --Philip Baird Shearer 07:58, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
Certain acts that are popularly labeled "terrorist" are legal within commonly accepted interpretations of international law. An example would be the capture of an Israeli soldier within the West Bank or Gaza, or operations against settlements, which are illegal encroachments by an aggressor nation within mainstream interpretations of international law.
It is also highly inaccurate to label terrorist acts "criminal." This presupposes the legitimacy of the repression of the armed group responsible, which should be determined by the particular details of each case as it is considered. Therefore, the references to acts of terror being "criminal" should be removed, simply because it misconstrues and distorts our perception of the reality of terrorism. Terrorism is not committed by irrational actors, it is highly considered deliberate violence, and should not be viewed as inherently criminal or deviant. Because violence exists in all levels of social relations throughout most societies, the use of violence by "terrorists" cannot be considered inherently socially deviant, social deviancy being the primary definition of criminal behavior, if violence also exists in relationships and actions traditionally accepted not being socially deviant, like the police. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.209.226.182 (talk) 15:09, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
I would point out that if the word "unlawful" is inserted to define an act as an act of terrorism, which, if lawfully justified would not be, then suspected terrorists would have to be treated as accused criminals rather than enemy combatants, because their status could be ascertained only after the question of their legal justification is litigated. Should it not be a matter of consensus that violence perpetrated upon another, not in order to neutralize them as a military threat, but in order to provoke a reaction by others, e.g., political leaders, commanders of armed forces, or the morale of an enemy population, is always unlawful whether or not the actor carries any government authority? And is this not the most useful and neutral definition to give to "terrorism"? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.167.178.99 (talk) 02:53, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
I propose that we remove this list. It is next to impossible to create such a list that does not contain a bias by the editors who edit this page and even with good faith edits, it will still tend to have the Wikipedia systemic bias. The list is also in breach of WP:OR and WP:V (not just the individual entries) but also the collation of such information into a list of "major" incidents. --Philip Baird Shearer 14:27, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
I wanna edit. byurbyur 00:39, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
It should be part of the definition that terrorists fight in disguise and pretend to be non-combatants. We all know many examples of terrible things done by uniformed soldiers, but this word is not used for such acts. Apart from bumper stickers, I have never heard this word used for the acts of uniformed soldiers. There are strong and obvious reasons why we look with special horror on those who fight in disguise. No doubt there are pacifists who want to expand the definition of terrorism to condemn all wars. But that is not what the word means. Alrees 18:54, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
"almost invariably" pretend to be non-combatants, hide among non-combatants, fight from in the midst of non-combatants, and when they can, strive to mislead and provoke the government soldiers into attacking the wrong people, that the government may be blamed for it." Impartial? (Neilarmius 20:56, 15 October 2007 (UTC))
"When an enemy is identifiable as a combatant, the word terrorism is rarely used?" Is it? (Neilarmius 20:56, 15 October 2007 (UTC))
Fighting in disguise is not a key criteria for defining terrorist. Covert special forces, for example, are often required to wear disguises and are not considered terrorists. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.100.203.37 (talk) 14:03, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
The assassination of Reinhard Heydrich by covert SOE agents was not terrorism as it was to eliminate a specific threat but it was not done in uniform and involved bomb-throwing and shooting. The Nazi reply was to massacre the village of Lidice in order to terrorise the Czech population in general, but this was done by uniformed troops yet it was terrorism.Workersdreadnought 11:55, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
The key criteria are that 1)is done for propaganda purposes 2)is done by a non-governement group and 3)it involves actions that would be considered crimes of war if done by armies in a war. Philip Baird Shearer keeps concentrating attention in border cases and moral enigmas but as I have said many times, the fact that it is dificult to say if an ornitorrincus is a mammal does not makes "mammal" and ambigous word. Frontiers of terrorism are blur but there is core which is clearly caracterized by academics and non-political organizations.--Igor21 19:13, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
Hi again,
-Rainbow Warrior for me is not terrorism since was done by a secret service. Violent actions by states need a diferent category to be called "state ponsored terrorism" or whatever (we can discuss this at another moment).
Just for the sake of reciprocity -and aknowledging your knowledge about RAF and Red Brigades- can you kinldy tell me what name other that terrorism can be given to the main activity of these two groups?
--Igor21 (talk) 11:51, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
I think that in this definition the ones who speak are not the facts but the members of RAF. It is completely incorrect to present the German governement as the only who thinks that they were terrorists. Everybody except the members of that group think so. They are an academic example of terrorist group. But this is wikipedia, so here rules the law of the most stubborn. And the winner is Philip Baird Shearer. Enjoy--Igor21 16:46, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
Captured Pakistani soldiers are being tortured on video, and the footage is being propagated back to the Pakistanis. Surely, this is terrorism—not for the torture, of course, but for the use of the footage. I don't mean to assert my personal opinion here—rather, I mean that, surely, the vast majority of people would identify this as terrorism, in the ordinary usage, as exactly the same tactic as (say) murdering soldiers' wives. So—combatant status is irrelevant to terrorism, no? The attack is not against combatant qua combatant, but against combatant qua example. The soldier is captured; the torture serves only and exactly the military purpose of terror. —Jemmytc 15:37, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
I totally agree. The Black & Tans used to leave bodies of IRA men by the roadside with every bone in their bodies broken. Later the Free Staters used to castrate captured IRA men in order to deter their comrades from continuing their campaign. Equally the existence of Guantanamo Bay and the pretty much general knowledge of allegedly secret "rendition" may be calculated to deter other Jihadists. Workersdreadnought 11:50, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
There are lots of links to the wiki violence page here. However, as you can see at Talk:Violence, the problem is that a non-registered editor over last couple years keeps trying to promote a narrow, left wing (black bloc oriented) theory of violence. I.E. that smashing physical things is NOT violent, and harming people UNintentionally while smashing things is NOT violent. He tries to use abstruse left wing theorists as his references while rejecting using a wider definition of violence with various dictionary references.
No one else is chiming in and I don't feel like getting in a revert/edit war with this guy. So if some level headed wiki editors committed to NON-POV want to get in there and opine, feel free.
The last definition he deleted wasn't perfect and was put in before I listed the dictionary definitions on the talk page. So feel free to put a good one together using those or other more neutral sources. Otherwise I'll do so myself and, if necessary, appeal to whomsoever one appeals to in such situations where only two editors opine and they disagree. Thanks! (Also, note the whole article itself is pretty messy, but who has time to clean up everything one wants to on wikipedia?) Carol Moore 15:19, 27 October 2007 (UTC)User:Carolmooredc User talk:Carolmooredc
I moved the reference to pig lard as a deterrent to the Counter-terrorism page.Not home (talk) 17:42, 9 December 2007 (UTC)