TERRORISM

Literature from the 1990s

R - Z

Reeve, Simon. The New Jackals: Ramzi Yousef, Osama bin Laden and the Future of Terrorism. London: Deutsch, 1999. New York: Northeastern University Press, 2002. [pb]

Seale, Sunday Times (London), 26 Sep. 1999, calls this a "scaremongering book," and adds that the "apocalyptic vision [presented] is wrong on several counts." The author's "references show that he had ample access to western intelligence sources, but there is no evidence that he ever met an Afghan Arab or attempted to penetrate the mind of a Muslim activist, except through the filter of a police investigation."

Reich, Walter, ed. Origins of Terrorism: Psychologies, Ideologies, Theologies, States of Mind. Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1998.

Roberts, Brad, ed. Terrorism with Chemical and Biological Weapons: Calibrating Risks and Responses. Alexandria, VA: Chemical and Biological Arms Control Institute, 1997.

Seale, Patrick. Abu Nidal: A Gun for Hire. New York: Random House, 1992.

Dana Priest, "Abu Nidal, Once-Feared Terrorist, Reported Dead," Washington Post, 20 Aug. 2002, A1: Palestinian officials reported on 19 Aug. 2002 that Abu Nidal had died in Baghdad of multiple gunshot wounds. Abu Nidal, whose real name was Sabri Banna, headed his own terrorist organization, the Fatah Revolutionary Council, but had been inactive for years.

Shubik, Martin. "Terrorism, Technology and the Socioeconomics of Death." Comparative Strategy 16, no. 4 (Oct.-Dec. 1997): 399-414.

Simon, Jeffrey D. The Terrorist Trap -- America's Experience with Terrorism. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1994.

https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/intellit/index.html: "A history of America's experience with terrorism and a useful description of the role and importance of intelligence in combatting it."

Smith, R. Jeffrey. "U.S. Presses Greece for Action against Leftist Terror Group." Washington Post, 3 Nov. 1999, A30. [http://www.washingtonpost.com]

There have been at least five terrorist attacks carried out in Athens this year by a group known as November 17. The United States has been pressing the Greek police to bring the members of the group to justice since the assassination of CIA station chief Richard Welch in November 1975. "U.S. officials say they suspect that arrests of group members have been blocked by both a lack of official interest and active opposition within the Athens government. Senior Greek security officials have rejected the accusation."

Stern, Jessica Eve.

1. The Ultimate Terrorists. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999.

Turner, IJI&C 15.1, calls Stern's book "an important contribution to the literature of contemporary terrorism and weapons of mass destruction." The author's central message "is that terrorists today are more likely to consider the threat to use weapons of mass destruction (WMD) as being a more potent tactical tool than their actual use."

2. "Will Terrorists Turn to Poison." Orbis 37, no. 3 (Summer 1993): 393-410.

Turner, Stansfield. Terrorism and Democracy. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1991.

Charters, I&NS 9.3, sees this book as a "combination of insider memoir, policy critique, and policy prescription." However, it is "not a comprehensive attempt to explore the fundamental issues arising from the challenge of political terrorism." Of the book's 28 chapters, 17 are devoted to the Iran hostage crisis. "The portrait of the president is hardly flattering: an indecisive man given to procrastination.... The chapters covering the Reagan era, nine in all, are by far the weaker components of the book.... Scholars of intelligence and terrorism ... will find no new insights in this book."

Rosenfeld, WPNWE, 10-16 Jun.1991, sees Turner's work differently, calling it "a tersely written, personally unsparing and otherwise exceptionally valuable study of how the United States has handled and should handle incidents of international terrorism."

U.S. Congress. Senate. Committee on Governmental Affairs. Terrorism: Interagency Conflicts in Combating International Terrorism. Washington, DC: GPO, 1992.

U.S. Department of State. Patterns of Global Terrorism, [year]. Washington, DC: yearly.

Volmer, Louis. "East Europe's Espionage and Terrorism Maze." International Freedom Review 4, no. 1 (1990): 5-28. [Petersen]

Walker, Clive. "Constitutional Governance and Special Powers against Terrorism: Lessons from the United Kingdom's Prevention of Terrorism Acts." Columbia Journal of Transnational Law 35 (1997): 1-47. [Calder]

Wannall, W. Raymond. "Counterintelligence and Terrorism." Periscope 18, no. 6 (1993): 2.

"In the aborted bombing of U.N. Headquarters, New York City's Federal Building, and the Lincoln and Holland Tunnels, Hollywood could not have scripted a more perfect scenario to illustrate the importance to our lives and economy of counterintelligence operations."

Weiner, Tim. "The Man Who Protects America From Terrorism." New York Times, 1 Feb. 1999. [http://www.nytimes.com]

Richard Clarke was recently named by the President as the nation's counterterrorism coordinator. "Clarke has a reserved seat when Cabinet officers gather at the White House on national security issues.... He helped drive the decision to fire cruise missiles at Afghanistan and Sudan in August,... overpowering dissenters at the State Department and the CIA."

Weiner, Tim. "Out of the Spotlight, Intelligence Services Weigh an Alliance Against Terrorism." New York Times, 13 Mar. 1996, A8 (N).

The DCI will accompany President Clinton to the anti-terrorism summit beginning in Egypt on 14 March. Deutch will remain after the meeting to talk with defense and intelligence chiefs from some of the countries attending. The goal is ultimately a "carefully controlled pooling of intelligence" about terrorists. Yasir Arafat's Palestinian Authority has also requested "money, expertise, and ... equipment."

Wilkinson, Paul, ed. Technology and Terrorism. London: Frank Cass, 1993.

Robertson, I&NS 10.1, notes that this material originally appeared as an issue of the journal Terrorism and Political Violence, Vol. 5, no. 2 (Summer 1993). "Some of the essays are of very specialized interest being concerned with the physical aspects of airport security.... It is perhaps ironic that ... the most thoughtful of the essays is the one which concludes that terrorists have not made great changes in technology." Choice, May 1995, adds that the "essays ... are authored by ... experts in security measures, chemistry, and the military and government. All are well written. A few involve technical language but are still most readable."

Willan, Philip. Puppet Masters: The Political Use of Terrorism in Italy. London: Constable, 1991.

In an excess of obeisance to conspiracy hype, Bull, I&NS 7.4, finds this book to be "an excellent analysis of the state and security services' role in terrorism." Willan's thesis is that "the American and Italian secret services ... colluded with right-wing terrorism and manipulated left-wing terrorism as a means of ... keeping out of power the largest communist party in the west." However, the author "does ... not prove this thesis unequivocally but he offers sufficient evidence for its possible validity."

Woodward, Bob. "CIA Paid Afghans To Track Bin Laden: Team of 15 Recruits Operated Since 1998." Washington Post, 23 Dec. 2001, A1. [http://www.washingtonpost.com]

"For four years prior to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the CIA paid a team of about 15 recruited Afghan agents to regularly track Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan, according to well-placed sources. The team had mixed results, ranging from excellent to total failure. Once every month or so, the team pinpointed bin Laden's presence in a specific building, compound or training camp, and that location was then confirmed by the CIA through communications intelligence or satellite overhead photography.... The creation of the tracking team was part of a covert CIA operation to capture or kill bin Laden launched first by the Clinton administration and continued under President Bush."

Yallop, David. Tracking the Jackal: The Search for Carlos, the World's Most Wanted Man. New York: Random House, 1993. [Chambers]

Zuckerman, Mortimer B. "[Editorial:] It's Time to Fight Back." U.S. News and World Report, 7 Sep. 1998, 92.

The United States "will need to become even more energetic in intelligence gathering so that we can mount pre-emptive action when the threshold of evidence is compelling.... Given the transnational character of terrorist groups," ensuring the confidentiality of intelligence sources "may well require scrapping the legal barrier that now exists between foreign and domestic operations."

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