The Root Causes of Terrorism

Common arguments for the root cause of terrorism:
1) Poverty, Illiteracy (disproved by majority of terrorists being educated and coming from middle class families)
2) Foreign Occupation (mainly US occupation of Iran)
3) Religious cause
4) Desire for totalitarian doctrine

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3WcAsclND8

"Foreign occupation is the leading risk factor in producing suicide terrorism" - Robert Pape, Professor in Political Science, University of Chicago, USA.

Probability of having suicide bombers among people increases over 15 times if a country experiences foreign occupation.

1980-2003 : 315 completed suicide attacks by 462 suicide terrorists belonging to the Tamil Tigers, over half of the suicide terrorists are secular, which means that terrorists are not necessarily motivated by religion.

http://www.martinfrost.ws/htmlfiles/terrorism_root.html

This source argues that the root cause of terrorism is religion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7Jw3o-gifI (Speech made by a Muslim professor)

2:35-5:24

The speaker argues that terrorism is caused by US occupation of Iran and that counter-terrorism attacks etc. are seen as acts of oppression onto the Muslim community, thus causing more acts of terrorism.

http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/opinion/the-root-cause-of-terrorism-its-not-poverty-or-lack-of-education/331847(Article from Indonesian press)

This article argues that terrorism is caused by the lack of civil liberty, causing pent-up feelings and increasing vulnerability to psychological enforcement (brainwashing) by radical ideas.

http://www.aish.com/ci/s/48898622.html (article from Jewish website)
The author of this article believes that terrorism arises from a desire to create a totalitarian doctrine.

Profiling Osama Bin Laden

      1. Osama Bin Laden was a narcissist, and it was exactly his narcissism that allowed him to “dominate” the world and achieve personal glory. It was also his insanity that caused him to be so “well-known”.

      2. Osama was only interested in fame and glory, and he used religion to justify the terrorist acts he organised in order to brainwash the recruits.

      3. Osama manipulated the Islam religion into serving his own agenda.

      4. Osama would resort to anything in order to gain power, followers and eventually achieve his goal of hurting American civilians, which means that he did not mind how many people got hurt in the process. He just wanted to obtain the desired result.

      5. Osama praised people for self-sacrifice as he understood that for a massive terrorist act to be carried out, there must be more self-sacrifice than self-fulfillment. Therefore, he brainwashed his Al-Qaeda followers into thinking that they died for the better cause.

6. Osama had a medical history of suffering from mental disorder at a point of time.

The Psychology of a Terrorist

These are some traits associated with terrorists.

1. Terrorists feel a sense of “revolutionary heroism” and self-importance which was once lacking when they were ostracized in society.
2. Some of the terrorists treat the terrorist organisation as a provider of information and security as they normally sever ties with their family members, thus they lack their support.

      3. Terrorists often have a mindset of an extremist as they are brainwashed upon joining the terrorist group.

      4. Terrorists may see themselves as saviors of a constituency threatened by a great evil and the only way for them to leave a legacy is to take part in terrorist acts.

      5. Some of the terrorists believe that their ethnic or religious group is on the verge of extinction  

      and they lack the power to reverse the situation without violence.

      6. Terrorists believe that they had no choice but to do what they did under the circumstances they were in.

      7. Terrorists view the world within the narrow lens of their own ideology.

      8. Some terrorists are just psychopathic (Nezar Hindawi).

            

 

 

      However, the detailed, well-planned and well-timed execution of many terrorist operations has led to differing opinions on whether terrorists are psychopathic.

 

 

Terrorists	Psychopaths
Profit from experience	Does not profit from experience
Interests of a group or organization	Personal interest

 

 

 

      Some terrorists are suicidal fanatics.

      - Terrorists as cool, logical planning individuals whose rewards are ideological and political, rather than financial.

      - Terrorists are often well educated and capable of sophisticated, albeit highly biased, rhetoric and political analysis.

      - Terrorists like to engage in terrorist acts, leading to self-destruction which would indirectly imply a certain degree of mental illness.

 

      An example of a suicidal terrorist group is the LTTE.

      - Members of the LTTE are willing to self-destruct in order to bring about a catastrophic outcome which they deem perfectly justifiable.         

      - Most of them carry a vengeful mindset as they were discriminated by the Sinhalese government in Sri Lanka.