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Misjudging Islamic Terrorism: The Academic Community's Failure to Predict 9/11

2006; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 29; Issue: 7 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/10576100600702014

1521-0731

Monica Czwarno,

Terrorism, Counterterrorism, and Political Violence

Abstract Most academic experts within the International Relations (IR) community and other, more specialized disciplines, failed to predict or warn government policymakers and the public of the possibility that events of 9/11 magnitude could take place on the U.S. homeland. Given that long-term investigation of trends in world affairs is one of the sources that has always informed policy analysis, this represents an interesting question to examine. The analysis contained in this assessment suggests that the ontological, methodological, and conceptual problems within and between the disciplines, combined with a skewed absorption with the prospect of developments in Asia, created a gap in the knowledge about Islamic terrorism and groups like Al Qaeda, which in turn caught most of the academic community unaware on 9/11. This article performs a quantitative study to determine the nature and scope of this apparent analytical failure on the part of academics in IR and other specialized disciplines to predict 9/11 and aims to address why this failure took place. Acknowledgments The author sincerely thanks Dr. Michael L. R. Smith for his support, guidance, and the initial conceptualization of this project. Notes 1. Medd, Roger, and Frank Goldstein. "International Terrorism on the Eve of a New Millennium," Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 20, no. 3 (Jul.–Sep. 1997), pp. 281–316. 2. Edward Ingram. "The Wonderland of the Political Scientist," International Security, 22(1), (Summer 1997), p. 53. 3. This is a simplified version of Gaddis's definition, which could be found in John Lewis Gaddis. "International Relations Theory and the End of the Cold War," International Security, 17(3) (Winter 1992/1993), pp. 5–58. 4. Bruce W. Jentleson. "The Need for Praxis: Bringing Policy Relevance Back In." International Security, 26(4) (2002), p. 170. 5. Ariel Merari. 'Academic Research and Government Policy on Terrorism," Terrorism and Political Violence, 3(1) (Spring 1991), p. 88. 6. A. P. Schmid and A. J. Jongman. Political Terrorism: A New Guide to Actors, Authors, Concepts, Databases, Theories and Literature (Amsterdam: North-Holland Publishing Company, 1988), p. 179. 7. Silke, A. Devil You Know: Continuing Problems with Research on Terrorism, Terrorism and Political Violence 13(4) (2001), p. 1. 8. Jentleson, 2002, cites Feaver, "Theory-Policy Debate in Political Science and Nuclear Proliferation," p. 70. 9. Jentleson, "The Need for Praxis." p. 178. 10. Ibid. 11. James Bill. "The Study of Middle East Politics, 1946–1996: A Stocktaking," Middle East Journal 50(4) (Autumn 1996), pp. 23–33. 12. Martin Kramer. Ivory Towers on Sand: The Failure of Middle Eastern Studies in America (Washington, DC: Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 2001), p. 2. 13. F. Gregory Gause III. "Who Lost Middle Eastern Studies?" Foreign Affairs, 81(2) (March/April 2002), p. 165. 14. David Martin Jones, Michael L. R. Smith, and Mark Weeding. "Looking for the Pattern: Al Qaeda in Southeast Asia—The Genealogy of a Terror Network," Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, No. 26 (2003), pp. 443. The authors are referring to the Bali nightclub bombing in 2002. 15. See Bernard Lewis. "License to Kill," Foreign Affairs, 77(6) (1998), pp. 14–19. 16. For instance, Steven Simon and Daniel Benjamin, who discussed many of the trends before 11 September, served on the U.S. National Security Council. 17. Jentleson, "The Need for Praxis," p. 173. 18. These categories were: Russia, CIS, global economy, trade, United Nations, women's rights, Islamic movement, Middle East, Middle East peace process, Africa, Latin America, North America, terrorism, Europe, Balkans, deterrence and WMD, NATO, Cold War and previous wars, war technology (R&D), post-Cold War issues and policy, humanitarian issues, environment, AIDS, sanctions, defense/state/war and intelligence issues, oil and energy, research methods in international relations, and international theory. 19. These categories were: suicide terrorism, psychology of terror, counterterrorism, terrorism trends, root causes, theory and research, agricultural terrorism, terrorist financing, IRA, WMD, technology and terrorism, terror in the middle east, Islam, Al Qaeda, Intifada, war on terrorism (international perspective), 11 September, religious terrorism, other Islamic terrorism, mass casualty terrorism/catastrophic, state terror, south-east Asia, Latin America, Russia, terrorism and social issues, right wing/left wing terrorism. It must be noted that categories differed between journals within the specialized journals category. For instance the Journal of Strategic Studies had approximately 32 categories whereas Terrorism and Political Violence had 26 categories. This is normal and is due to the different scope and mission of each journal. 20. Daniel Philpott. "The Challenge of September 11th to Secularism in International Relations," World Politics, 55 (October 2002), p. 66. 21. Gwyn Prins. "The four-stroke cycle in security studies," International Affairs, 74(4) (1998), p. 781. 22. Stephen Walt. "The Renaissance of Security Studies," International Studies Quarterly, 35 (1991), p. 212. 23. Many of these sub-disciplines, however, have a foundation based on these dichotomies, most notably that of the realist camp. 24. Ibid., p. 300. 25. Ibid., p. 297. 26. Ibid., p. 289. 27. Thomas Copeland. "Is the 'New Terrorism' Really New?" Journal of Conflict Studies, 21(2) (2001), p. 9. 28. John Lewis Gaddis. "History, Theory, and Common Ground," International Security, 22(1) (1997), p. 75. Also see Paul Schroeder. "History and International Relations Theory: Not use or Abuse, but Fit or Misfit," International Security, 22(1) (Summer 1997), pp. 64–74. 29. Daniel Byman. "Al-Qaeda As An Adversary: Do We Understand Our Enemy," World Politics (2003), p. 149. 30. Audrey Cronin. "Behind the Curve: Globalization and International Terrorism," International Security, 27 (Winter 2002–2003), p. 57. 31. Jentleson, "The Need for Praxis," p. 179. 32. Stephen Walt. "The Renaissance of Security Studies," International Studies Quarterly, 35 (1991), p. 212. 33. Andrew Silke. "The Devil You Know: Continuing Problems with Research in Terrorism," Terrorism and Political Violence, 13(4) (Winter 2001), p. 2. 34. Ariel Merari. "Academic Research and Government Policy on Terrorism," Terrorism and Political Violence, 3(1) (Spring 1991), p. 89. 35. John Horgan. "Issues in Terrorism Research," The Police Journal, 70 (1997), pp. 193–202. 36. Even then, it could be argued that the community had conducted such interviews. Bin Laden gave two interviews that gave insight into his group's ideology, and many court trials of former associates also gave such information. Bin Laden's Fatwa proclamations also could have been analyzed. 37. Brian Jenkins. "The Likelihood of Nuclear Terror" (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, P-7119, 1985) p. 6. 38. Silke, "The Devil You Know." 39. Frank Cilluffo & Jack Tomarchio. "Responding to New Terrorist Threats," Orbis, 42(3), p. 439. and Ashton Carter, John Deutch, & Philip Zelikow "Catastrophic Terrorism: Tackling the Danger," Foreign Affairs, 77(6) (1998), p. 80. 40. Gavin Cameron. "Multi-track Microproliferation: Lessons from Aum Shinrikyo and Al Qaida," Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, 22 (1999), p. 277. 41. See study by John Parachini. "Comparing Motives and Outcomes of Mass Casualty Terrorism Involving Conventional and Unconventional Weapons," Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, 24 (2001), p. 402. 42. Bruce Hoffman. 'America and the New Terrorism: An Exchange," Survival, 42(2) (Summer 2000), p. 164. 43. See Bruce Hoffman. "Change and Continuity in Terrorism," Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, 24 (2001), pp. 417–428. 44. See Peter Chalk, "Political Terrorism in South-East Asia," Terrorism and Political Violence, 10(2) (Summer 1998), pp. 119-134; Andrew Tan, "Armed Muslim Separatist Rebellion in Southeast Asia: Persistence, Prospects, and Implications," Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, 23 (2000), pp. 267–288; David Martin Jones and Mike L Smith, "The Changing Security Agenda in Southeast Asia: Globalization, New Terror, and the delusions of Regionalism," Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 24 (2001), pp. 271–288 and Peter Chalk, "Separatism and Southeast Asia: The Islamic Factor in Southern Thailand, Mindanao, and Aceh," Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, 24 (2001) pp. 241–269. 45. See John L. Esposito, The Islamic Threat (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992). 46. David Kibble, "The Threat of Militant Islam: A Fundamental Reappraisal," Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 19 (1996), p. 353. 47. Magnus Ranstrop, "Interpreting the Broader Context and Meaning of bin-Laden's Fatwa," Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, 21 (1996), p. 324. 48. Leon Hader, "What Green Peril?," Foreign Affairs, 72(2) (Spring 1993), p. 1. 49. Clarence J. Bouchat, "A Fundamentalist Islamic Threat to the West," Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 19 (1996), pp. 341, 344. 50. Steven Simon and Daniel Benjamin, "America and the New Terrorism," Survival, 42(1) (Spring 2000), pp. 69, 73. 51. Stern (2000), pp. 115–126. 52. Rohan Gunaratna, Jane's Intelligence Review (24 September 2001), "Terror from the Sky," downloaded from (www.janes.com) on 3 June 2004, 3 p. 53. Ariel Merari, "Attacks on Civil Aviation: Trends and Lessons," Terrorism and Political Violence, 10(3) (Autumn 1998), p. 24. 54. Marvin Schaffer, "The Missile Threat to Civil Aviation," Special Issue on Aviation Terrorism and Security in Terrorism & Political Violence, 10(3) (1998), pp. 70–82. 55. Gaddis (1992), p. 5. 56. Merari (1991), p. 89. 57. By looking at some of the articles written by terrorism experts, one gets the sense that they are analyzing trends linearly. In relation to Al Qaeda, analysts looked at the bombing trends of Al Qaeda but did not analyze what the escalation and advancement of their tactics meant in relation to their future capabilities. 58. John Lewis Gaddis, "International Relations Theory and the end of the Cold War," International Security, 17(3) (Winter 1992/1993), p. 5. 59. Audrey Cronin, "Behind the Curve: Globalization and International Terrorism," International Security, 27 (Winter 2002–2003), p. 31. 60. See Kathy Gannon, "Afghanistan Unbound," Foreign Affairs, 83(3) and Princeton Lyman, "The Terrorist Threat in Africa," Foreign Affairs, 83(1) (2004), pp. 75–86.