Revised Terrorism Essay

Grace Picariello
April 26, 2017

Revised Terrorism Essay

Back in January when the terrorism class began, I thought that terrorism had to mean the use of violence against non-combatant targets, by non-state actors, in order to achieve a political goal of some sort. Today, I believe that same exact thing. The case studies that we talked about this semester have reinforced my belief that the United States State Department has created the definition of terrorism that ought to be universally accepted. In order to prove this I will cite two different case studies that we have looked at over the course of the semester. The first is the Earth Liberation Front, and the second is Al Qaeda. By looking at the actions of these groups separately, and eventually drawing connections between the two, it will be determined that both of these groups were subnational, both groups targeted civilians, and both groups were politically motivated. 

The Earth Liberation Front, or the ELF, is a domestic environmental terrorist group that has committed violent acts against logging businesses. The group of fourteen members banned together, passionate about saving the environment, to burn down several logging buildings and headquarters. Although they did not kill any civilians in the crusades, they did destroy the livelihoods of several people by destroying their source of income both temporarily and, in some cases, permanently. Furthermore, the ELF was motivated by politics completely. The environment is at the forefront of political debate and they took a strong stance in favor of protecting the climate. No matter how noble of a cause this might be, the way that the ELF went about making change or asserting their opinions was illegal and qualifies as terrorism. 

Al Qaeda is one of the most known terrorist groups in the world, especially to the United States. They are based in Afghanistan and other countries in the Middle East. Al Qaeda is a confirmed subnational group. They are completely separate from the state's official government. Al Qaeda primarily targets civilians by using violence and instilling fear and terror in them. Al Qaeda's political goal is to create a global jihad. They do not have an interest in gaining and ruling over land as a government, such as ISIS does. However, they do want their ideas to spread across the world, thus destroying Western ideologies that the United States and much of Europe values so much. All of these factors together qualify them as a terrorist group in the eyes of the United States and much of the world.

Researching different terrorist groups throughout the course of the semester has reinforced my belief in what the definition of terrorism is. I still do not believe that state actors can be classified as terrorists. I also do not think that combatants targeting combatants counts as a terrorist act. Lastly, if someone is not politically or ideologically motivated, they cannot be labeled a terrorist. The Earth Liberation Front, Al Qaeda, and several other groups understood to be terrorist organizations fit all of these characteristics laid out by the U.S. State Department. With this definition in place, the amount of things able to be tried as terrorism decreases which is helpful when it comes to counter-terror policies. Although the word "terror" has many different proposed definitions, the most useful and widely accepted is the one described here.