Grand Strategy in the War Against Terrorism

229 Pages·2004·2.93 MB·English

by  Thomas R. Mockaitis

GRAND STRATEGY IN THE WAR AGAINST
TERRORISM
Also in this series
Non-State Threats and Future Wars
edited by Robert J.Bunker
Deterrence in the 21st Century
edited by Max E.Manwaring
Peace Operations Between War and Peace
edited by Erwin A.Schmidl
Towards Responsibility in the New World Disorder: Challenges and Lessons of
Peace Operations
edited by Max G.Manwaring and John T.Fishel
Warriors in Peacetime:The Military and Democracy in Latin America
edited by Gabriel Marcella
Defence and the Media in Time of Limited War
edited by Peter R.Young
GRAND STRATEGY IN THE
WAR AGAINST
TERRORISM
Editors
THOMAS R.MOCKAITIS
De Paul University, Chicago
PAUL B.RICH
University of Cambridge
FRANK CASS
LONDON • PORTLAND, OR
First published in 2003 in Great Britain by
FRANK CASS AND COMPANY LIMITED
Crown House, 47 Chase Side
Southgate, London N14 5BP
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.
“To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection
of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.”
and in the United States of America by
FRANK CASS
c/o ISBS, 920 NE 58th Avenue, Suite 300,
Portland, Oregon 97213–3786
Website: www.frankcass.com
Copyright © 2003 Frank Cass & Co. Ltd
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Grand strategy in the war against terrorism
1. War on Terrorism, 2001–2. Strategy 3. Special operations (Military science) 4. Islam
and terrorism 5. World politics, 1995–2005 I. Mockaitis, Thomas R., 1955–II. Rich, Paul
B., 1950–III. Small wars and insurgencies 363.3’2’0973
ISBN 0-203-48908-X Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-203-58276-4 (Adobe eReader Format)
ISBN 0-7146-5313-6 (cloth)
ISBN 0-7146-8268-3 (paper)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Grand strategy in the war against terrorism/editors, Thomas R.Mockaitis,
Paul B.Rich —1st ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-7146-5313-6 (Hardback)–ISBN 0-7146-8268-3 (Paperback)
1. War on Terrorism, 2001–2. Strategy. I. Mockaitis, Thomas R., 1955–II. Rich, Paul
B., 1950–III. Title. HV6431.G728 2003 973.931–dc22 2003016417
This group of studies first appeared in a Special Issue on ‘Grand Strategy in the West
Against Terrorism’ of Small Wars & Insurgencies (ISSN 0959–2318) 14/1 (Spring 2003)
published by Frank Cass
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced
into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior written permission of the publishers
of this book.
Contents
Preface vii
Introduction 1
Paul B.Rich
Winning Hearts and Minds in the ‘War on Terrorism’ 21
Thomas R.Mockaitis
Al Qaeda and the Radical Islamic Challenge to Western Strategy 39
Paul B.Rich
Operation ‘Enduring Freedom’: A Victory for a Conventional 55
Force Fighting an Unconventional War
Warren Chin
United States Special Operations Forces and the War on Terrorism 75
Anna Simons and David Tucker
Warfare by Other Means: Special Forces, Terrorism and Grand 89
Strategy
Alastair Finlan
Muslims, Islamists and the Cold War 105
Ghada Hashem Talhami
An Ambivalent War: Russia’s War on Terrorism 123
Stephen Blank
11 September 2001 and the Media 147
Philip Towle
Bringing it All Back Home: Hollywood Returns to War 163
Susan L.Carruthers
Information Age Terrorism and Warfare 177
Kevin A.O’Brien
Conclusion: The Future of Terrorism Studies 201
Thomas R.Mockaitis
vi
Abstracts 207
About the Contributors 211
Index 213
Preface
The title of this volume names a fervent hope rather than an actual reality. Nothing
like a ‘grand strategy’ currently directs the war on terrorism. Since 11 September
2001, Washington has crafted some ad hoc responses to perceived terrorist threats,
focusing in particular on state sponsorship. Following the successful campaign in
Afghanistan, the US has moved on to Iraq with a handful of reluctant allies trailing
in its wake. Meanwhile a sultry covert war grinds inexorably on, scoring small
victories along the way—an arrest here, an assassination there, an occasional
interdiction somewhere else. All of these moves target Al Qaeda, affiliated
organizations or individuals. Not a single policy initiative addresses the root causes
of terrorism.
Each of the following essays addresses an aspect of what should be a
comprehensive strategy for the current war. All the authors share some key
assumptions. They see terrorism as a weapon, not an end in itself. Al Qaeda and
its affiliates operate in a host of countries with the tacit if not active support of at
least some segment of the larger population. Each writer recognizes that while
military force must be applied, it is neither the only nor even the primary means
of confronting the threat.
Special forces have figured prominently in the struggle and will continue to do
so because they are best equipped to do civic action and to use force in a highly
focused manner. American special forces, however, have concentrated too much
on their military task and not enough on their civic action role. Civic action is, in
fact, ‘winning hearts and minds’ by a different name.
‘Hearts and minds’ has been trivialized without being understood. Stripped of
sentiment and ideology it means nothing more than addressing the causes of unrest
upon which an insurgency feeds. By addressing these causes threatened states can
hope to wean moderates away from extremists and perhaps elicit cooperation that
produces sound intelligence upon which military forces can act.
None of these ideas is new. Many of us have been presenting them over the past
decade or longer. We have watched counterinsurgency become low-intensity
conflict and then morph into operations other than war and now become ‘counter-
terrorism’. A rose by any other name has just as many thorns. The shape of the
threat keeps changing but not its essential nature. The context in which these
shadow wars must be fought has, however, changed dramatically. To use a cliché,
viii
the world has grown smaller and much more interconnected. Satellites, mobile
phones, and the Internet allow for rapid communication to all parts of the globe.
They have extended the reach of information and ideas and unavoidably magnified
the scope and range of terror. Several of the essays in this issue deal with the
crucial aspect of information warfare.
No scholarly work can ever claim to be definitive, least of all one compiled in
just over a year since the event it analyzes. Research and publication are, however,
part of a dialogue, an on-going conversation in which one work stimulates further
study and generates new ideas. With that end in mind we offer this collection of
essays in the hope that it will start or at least be part of an exchange that some day
leads to a grand strategy in this war that seems likely to be with us for a long time
to come.
THOMAS MOCKAITIS, Chicago, 111.
PAUL RICH, London, June 2003
Introduction
PAUL B.RICH
The terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001and subsequent activities of Al Qaeda
and its allies have given vent to considerable debate over the nature and role of
international terrorism in the post-Cold War global order. Al Qaeda is one of
several of examples of what some analysts see as a new form of ‘new’ or
‘postmodern’ international terrorist organisation which is neither securely linked
to any one particular state patron nor especially constrained by any limits on the
use of violence.1
Al Qaeda has proved to be a remarkable and highly adaptive international
network of terrorist organisations which, since 11 September 2001, have been
capable of regrouping into a series of looser organisations that have launched a
series of smaller bomb attacks, of which the most spectacular to date has been the
bombing in the island of Bali in October 2002.2 Al Qaeda has shifted its focus to
smaller scale operations using a large number of new recruits and has shown itself
capable of responding to the US-led campaign that overthrew the Taliban regime
in Afghanistan, depriving it of its major base of operations.
The surprise and ferocity of the attacks have ensured that Al Qaeda and its
supposed ‘leader’ Osama bin Laden a status verging on the mythological in
contemporary media portrayals of terrorism. Perhaps much of this is due to a
general combination in many Western journalistic circles of fear and fascination.
In reality it is likely, as the interior minister of Saudi Arabia, Prince Nayef, has
suggested, that bin Laden is really the instrument of a much wider organisation
and is only at the ‘top’ of Al Qaeda from the mass media’s point of view.3 A
similar view has been expressed by some Western writers, including the novelist
Gore Vidal who has suggested that the figure of a lone crazy man bin Laden has
been chosen by a ‘Bush junta’ in Washington to help persuade the US public to
support a war in Afghanistan.4
There are certainly some Scarlet Pimpernel qualities to bin Laden who appears
to have the capacity to disappear and then miraculously resurface in some new
region of the world. Even if bin Laden is eventually killed and Al Qaeda defeated,
the organisation will in all likelihood continue to have the capacity to reproduce
itself—like a magic broom—and create a whole new series of terrorist
organisational networks in the Middle East and| Islamic world that will continue
to threaten Western interests and security.