Developing the Concept of Cumulative Extremism Via Politics, Policies and Publicity in the War Against Islamic Terrorism

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Beyond 9/11: Developing the concept of cumulative extremism via politics, policies and publicity in the war against Islamic terrorism

David Colin Sadler

A thesis in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy

School of Social Sciences

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

January 2019

THE UNIVERSITY OF NEW SOUTH WALES Thesis/Dissertation Sheet Surname or Family name: Sadler

First name: David Other name/s: Colin

Abbreviation for degree as given in the University calendar: PhD

School: School of Social Sciences Faculty: Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Title:

Beyond 9/11: Developing the concept of cumulative extremism via politics, policies and publicity in the war against Islamic terrorism

Abstract 360 words

This thesis develops the concept of “cumulative extremism” to inform political and academic debates on apportioning responsibility for post-9/11 Islamic terrorism. Since 2006 cumulative extremism has been used to refer to how one form of extremism feeds off and magnifies other forms. The original concept is expanded via interdisciplinary analyses of post-9/11 US counterterrorism policies and the discourse framing social and media responses to those policies, which this thesis argues become performative themselves in influencing the numbers and extent of perceived terror threats. An examination of US political rhetoric, counterterrorism policy-making, and popular media coverage of terrorist incidents indicates how Western state behaviour on counterterrorism is often at odds with international law, human rights, and moral norms. Since 9/11 the US and supporting Western states have been drawn into an open-ended conflict against Islamic terrorism where the question of what might constitute a resolution has become impossible to answer. As well as suspending a previously held moral authority, the resort by the US to policies of so-called enhanced interrogation and targeted assassination programs designed to counter post-9/11 trends in Islamic terrorism risks other dangerous impacts, notably the “blowback” of radicalisation to extremist positions, seeding further terrorist recruitment. Also at issue is the resignation of society to a state of eternal vigilance at the expense of community and personal freedoms. A more complex view of cumulative extremism facilitates increased recognition of how US political rhetoric plays into narratives of terrorism. This thesis proposes that perceptions of insecurity from post-9/11 Islamic terrorism should be reassessed so as to reduce or prevent radicalisation and increase efficiency in addressing terrorism. Case studies assist analyses of debates on how international law and our understandings of what constitutes moral state behaviour adapt to a changing security environment. Through engaging with questions on wilful abnegations of morality, this thesis draws together interdisciplinary research to become part of a global narrative that seeks to represent our human rights and security positions in the 21st century. The distinctive contribution of this thesis is its development of the concept of cumulative extremism to account for wider cultural, social and political factors as shaping the nature and outcomes of extremist interactions.

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iii

Statement of Originality

I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and to the best of my knowledge it contains no materials previously published or written by another person, or substantial proportions of material which have been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma at UNSW or any other educational institution, except where due acknowledgement is made in the thesis. Any contribution made to the research by others, with whom I have worked at UNSW or elsewhere, is explicitly acknowledged in the thesis. I also declare that the intellectual content of this thesis is the product of my own work, except to the extent that assistance from others in the project's design and conception or in style, presentation and linguistic expression is acknowledged.

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v Abstract

Preface

“A desk is a dangerous place from which to watch the world”

The Honourable Schoolboy (Le Carré 1977, 84).

What leads me to research and write about international security, post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and US counterterrorism policy is a long-standing interest in politics and world affairs, specifically the security studies aspects of international relations. Since my childhood these interests have been nurtured by political and strategic thrillers both fact and fiction, from the beginning of the 20th century through the Cold War to the post-9/11 war against terrorism. Throughout my studies, interests in real-world terrorism, along with the fictional works of authors such as John Le Carré, Robert Ludlum and Len Deighton, have led me to question the morality of many counterterrorism policies beyond conventional debates and interpretations of international law. My research areas of interrogational torture, targeted assassinations via drone programs, and the media weighting of associated politics, policies and events, are more than separate but loosely related fields, and are brought together here in terms of timely critical analysis. I hope that throughout this thesis the reader will share in addressing the questions it engages.

Please note that as this thesis refers to a variety of international sources, as well as needing to cite names and terms in English from their original language (most notably Arabic), I have tried to keep to a minimum the use of spelling in context [sic] markers. For variations in translation (such as Al Qaeda/al-Qa’ida) and for Americanised spellings etc. where the meaning is clear, I have mostly left the original quotation unmarked. I have endeavoured only to use “[sic]” where the meaning is very unclear or confusing, or where the error is egregious.

vii Acknowledgements

Thank you to my PhD supervisor and mentor Helen Pringle for her guidance and infectious enthusiasm in conducting this project. I feel extremely privileged to have been able to work with Helen throughout my academic adventure to date. I have benefitted from her professional expertise, and her support for improving my at times clumsy ideas has been invaluable.

I would also like to extend my gratitude to many of the lecturers, tutors and students at the University of New South Wales in Sydney Australia, who have made my research consistently interesting. The challenges I encountered here have helped me to get to where I am today.

Thanks also go to the many practitioners of international law and political science whom I have encountered at conferences throughout my research, and have helped and inspired me to grow academically.

To you the reader I also extend my appreciation for your shared interest and consideration of my work in this field.

My deep gratitude goes to my partner Sabine Merz for her often tested patience, support, and flexibility in looking after our two young daughters when I had reading or writing to navigate.

Finally, to those inspiring and growing daughters, the beautiful Rosa Eve, my original writing buddy, and her new sidekick, the ever-smiling Clara Marie.

Thank you all.

viii Table of Contents

UNSW Thesis/Dissertation Sheet ii Copyright and Authenticity Statements iii Statement of Originality iv Inclusion of Publications Statement v Abstract vi Preface vii Acknowledgements viii INTRODUCTION 1 Thesis methodology and approach 9

CHAPTER 1 REVIEW OF LITERATURE AND DEFINITIONS 13 1.1 Cumulative extremism: Developing the concept 14 1.2 War: A clarification, particularly of the term ‘war on terror’ 17 1.3 Terrorism: What it is and what it is not 20 1.4 Blowback: The repercussive costs of US foreign policy decisions 25 1.5 Radicalisation in a post-9/11 context 28

1.6 CONCLUSION 34

CHAPTER 2 THE IMPACT OF POST-9/11 ISLAMIC TERRORISM 35

PART 1 THE EXTENDED REACH OF ISLAMIC TERRORISM 36 2.1 The morning of 12 September 2001: A new world dawn 38 2.2 Empires of jihad 1: The Taliban, bin Laden and al-Qa’ida 39 2.3 “We have some planes” 41 2.4 Empires of jihad 2: Al-Qa’ida in Iraq to the Islamic State/Daesh 43 2.5 Operation Neptune Spear: Geronimo EKIA 54 2.6 Empires of jihad 3: Islamic State version 2.0 56 2.7 New jihadis, terrorists and foreign terrorist fighters 57 2.8 New Islamic radicalisation in plain view 61 2.9 Cumulative extremism: Feeding and extending the fear 62

PART 2 A SECURITY VERSUS LIBERTY CONUNDRUM 65 2.10 Developing a human rights culture 66 2.11 Life, liberty and security of the person: Fundamental rights 69

2.12 CONCLUSION 71

CHAPTER 3 SUSPENDING MORALITY 1: INTERROGATIONAL TORTURE 73 3.1 Outlawing torture 74 3.2 Torture debates: Defences, justifications and excuses 79 3.3 The ticking bomb scenario defence of torture 87 3.4 Torture despite international law: Post-9/11 enhanced interrogation 91 3.5 Abu Zubaydah: A case study in interrogational torture 92 3.6 Waterboarding 95

3.7 CONCLUSION 98

CHAPTER 4 SUSPENDING MORALITY 2: DRONES 100 4.1 Beyond 9/11: The amorality of drones in the so-called ‘war on terror’ 102 4.2 US drone strikes and targeted killings 107 4.3 Anwar al-Awlaki: A ‘personality strike’ case study 114 4.4 Lifestyle choices: The ‘signature strike’ drone policy 116 4.5 A new US assassination legacy: Obama, Trump and beyond 118

4.6 CONCLUSION 120

CHAPTER 5 THE MEDIA AS OXYGEN FOR ISLAMIC TERRORISM 122

PART 1 TERRORISM ACCORDING TO MAINSTREAM MEDIA 124 5.1 Man Haron Monis: Terrorist or deranged criminal? 126 5.2 Terrorism sells: Issues of evil versus mental health 129 5.3 Selling Fear: Are you scared yet? 130 5.4 Terrorism in TV and cinema 138 5.5 The example of Zero Dark Thirty 141

PART 2 WHAT TERRORISM DOES TO SOCIETY 143 5.6 More than violence: This is the news 144 5.7 An aftermath to terrorism: Fear and loathing 150

5.8 CONCLUSION 153

CHAPTER 6 ISLAMIC TERRORISM AND THE INTERNET 154 6.1 The power of the Internet: “Don’t hear about us, hear from us” 157 6.2 Jihadi John: Executioner, content creator and radicaliser 160 6.3 Roshonara Choudry: A case study of a radicalised woman 164 6.4 Your caliphate needs you: The pull to violent extremism 165 6.5 Rumiyah and the call to violent jihad 169 6.6 John Cantlie, a curious case study: Don’t shoot the messenger 172 6.7 The problem with the Internet 173

6.8 CONCLUSION 182

CONCLUSION 184

REFERENCES 188

x Introduction

This thesis develops and expands the concept of cumulative extremism in order to better understand terrorism in the contemporary world, and to inform political and academic debates on apportioning responsibility for post-9/11 Islamic terrorism. It does this in a series of interdisciplinary critical and reflexive discussions on both violent and non-violent reactions to the 11 September 2001 (9/11) attacks by al-Qa’ida, as well as to evolving global trends in Islamic terrorism. Two major post-9/11 US counterterrorism policies are investigated using interpretive critical analyses: enhanced interrogation of terror suspects by US military and intelligence agencies, and targeted assassinations of Islamic terrorists and terror suspects by armed drones. The thesis then qualitatively analyses discourse framing of popular media and social responses to post-9/11 terrorist and counterterrorist events.

A focus throughout this thesis is US-led rhetoric on the so-called ‘war on terror’ (WoT), which is critically analysed with particular regard to how this is received by popular media and social perceptions of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and perceived fears of such events, and of the two major US counterterrorism measures isolated here. These analyses of rhetoric and policy expand Roger Eatwell’s original 2006 formulation of cumulative extremism (CE). A developed and expanded CE concept does more than acknowledge spirals of violence begetting violence stemming from political, cultural and religious animosities. The interactions between movement and countermovement are investigated by expanding Eatwell’s term to account for a wider range of phenomena. By drawing together the relevant politics, policies and popular media representations in this thesis and analysing them alongside existing literature on cumulative extremism and the so-called ‘war on terror’, a developed view of CE can inform future academic and political debates on assigning responsibility for post-9/11 Islamic terrorism.

This thesis does not itself seek to apportion responsibility or blame for post-9/11 Islamic terrorism; however, through expansion of the concept the argument is developed that it is not only violent reactions to 9/11 and subsequent Islamic terrorist acts that are causes for concern. Non-violent consequences in the form of wider cultural, social and political factors can be considered to act performatively and thereby shape the nature and

1 outcomes of extremist interactions. These cultural, social and political performances risk contributing directly to future trends and growths in terrorism. Terrorism is not only enacted within the violence itself, but also “performed as one re-lives the act either through an immersion in its representation in the media or, even more precisely, through a critical response to the media and the discourses that have accumulated around the event”. That is, the performance of terror and the way we react to terror “is built through the accretion of these responses, and not through the act of terror itself, such as the actual demolition of the Twin Towers in Manhattan” (Bharucha 2016, 27).

The data, timeframe and geographical focus for research of this thesis concerns globally- situated Islamic terrorism against the US and its allies as perceived by extremist groups such as al-Qa’ida and Islamic State/Daesh, and US-led counterterrorism responses since 9/11 through to mid-2018. Following 9/11, the amount of material available in the study of international relations, particularly in areas of policy and international security concerned with countering Islamic terrorism, has expanded rapidly. Eatwell coined the term ‘cumulative extremism’ initially as part of a 2006 article on community cohesion and ethnic extremism in contemporary Britain, as referring to “the way in which one form of extremism can feed off and magnify other forms” (Eatwell 2006, 205). Riots in Bradford in the United Kingdom (UK) in 2001 provided practical examples of the original CE concept at work in clarification. In his 2010 book, these examples were further discussed to show the potential for spirals of violence “when young Muslims were not motivated largely by Islamism. Rather they reacted to long-running grievances centred on socio-economic matters and policing, and especially to incursion and provocation by the extreme right”. Although the political face of the UK’s extreme right sought to distance itself from street violence, it is clear that local activists were involved (Eatwell and Goodwin 2010, 243).

Eatwell’s concept can be applied to conflicts beyond the UK domestic level. States that sanction and engage in kidnapping, torture and targeted assassinations across sovereign borders violate human rights norms and accepted principles governing just war. This jeopardises moral authority. In an example of ‘classic’ cumulative extremism, the US contributes through political rhetoric and hard-power counterterrorism policies to growths in franchised and intrastate terrorism in communities that may see themselves as victims of illegal aggression by a world superpower.

Further to any political motivation for the US to fight a so-called ‘war’ against terrorism, this thesis discusses how Islamic extremism and US policies to address it have been framed by a variety of different media post-9/11. The thesis examines sensationalist reporting on post-9/11 terrorism. In some cases strictly criminal violence has been reported as an act of terrorism. Terrorism does not only involve the killing of the enemies of terrorist ideologies; it also aims at instilling fear in societies that stand in the way of political objectives. This latter aim of promoting fear can be assisted by the reactions of politically cynical and sensation-seeking forces in media and society. This point suggests the need to develop and expand the concept of cumulative extremism, widening its reach to include the role of the media in particular. This thesis illustrates how cumulative extremism has aided the work of organisations like al-Qa’ida and Daesh (or Islamic State [IS, ISIS, ISIL]). The effects have led some disenfranchised elements of Muslim communities worldwide to act with extreme violence on behalf of these terrorist groups.

It is argued here that the apparent preoccupation of many popular and mainstream media outlets with Islamic terrorism is driven by commercial imperatives (selling news) more than by an imperative to report the truth. This thesis recognises, as many commentators argue, that “news is a commodity… and a product shaped by forces of supply and demand” (Hamilton 2004, 7; Nacos et al. 2011, 9). An example of the propagation of falsehood by the media is New York mayor Rudy Giuliani asserting without question on US ABC TV’s Good Morning America in 2009 that “We had no domestic attacks under Bush, we’ve had one under Obama”, in discussing a failed bomb plot (Nacos et al. 2011, 182). Unreliable and overstated accounts of the real dangers to society posed by post-9/11 Islamic terrorism can serve to reinforce and offer wider community support to certain US-led reactions, leading on in turn to programs of torture and to drone strikes in violation of international law, contributing to the phenomenon of cumulative extremism. In this context, Nacos et al. note that although “the Bush administration’s well-calibrated spin machine could not maintain indefinitely public support for the president and his counterterrorism policies… the administration’s public relations campaign worked effectively for a long time during which major policy decisions were made” (Nacos et al. 2011, 183).

3 A development of Eatwell’s work can illustrate how reactive stances adopted to address terrorism by some elements of Western society and media can help shape whether or not further terrorism is unleashed. The kind of reactions to terrorism addressed in this thesis includes rhetoric concerning political responses, counterterrorism policies and the way in which terrorism and counterterrorism measures are publicised – which all should be considered the context of a reformulation and expansion of the CE concept. Once Eatwell’s original formulation has been respectfully expanded, the subject of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and how to address it culturally, socially and politically, can benefit from accepting that it is not just violence that shapes the nature and outcomes of extremist interactions.

Chapter 1 acts as a literature review, while also contextually defining some contentious terms and issues in the thesis narrative. The meaning of cumulative extremism is explored, notably how it relates to post-9/11 rhetoric on the so-called ‘war on terror’, and how it benefits from development and expansion beyond Eatwell’s formulation. Following this, the terms ‘terrorism’, ‘blowback’ and ‘radicalisation’ are discussed by way of noting existing literature of particular relevance and merit. It is important for this thesis that these terms are understood with a uniform contextual clarity by author and reader to facilitate effective engagement in qualitative analyses on why and how the CE concept should be developed to account for wider cultural, social and political phenomena. Chapter 1 seeks to situate this thesis as part of an informed debate around these meanings, rather than simply describing existing definitions.

The first section of chapter 2 examines some of the developments in Islamic terrorism since 9/11. This involves a brief review of important events such as the 2001 war to oust Afghanistan’s Taliban government, the invasion of Iraq in March 2003, the hunt for Osama bin Laden and consequent pursuit of al-Qa’ida and other Islamic terrorist organisations, and the rise of Daesh or Islamic State. Chapter 2 introduces a post-9/11 worldview, with perceptions of Islamic terrorism as an international threat from both highly organised groups and from self-starting terrorism (often referred to as ‘lone wolf’ terrorism). 9/11 brutally demonstrated the scale and reach of Islamic terrorism as a global threat, and although a massive response has been made to it, a situation remains where “if Americans believe that they are no longer threatened, they are oblivious to the dynamic nature of the threat and the adaptive capability of the enemy” (Chertoff

4 2009, 221-222). Following 9/11, the spectre of terrorism has grown, in a world where technology allows attacks to be reported and/or publicised, and then viewed worldwide, almost as they happen given the Internet and a relentless news-cycle.

Relevant human rights norms and legal instruments are discussed in the second part of chapter 2 in reference to US counterterrorism measures via programs of extraordinary rendition (kidnapping), enhanced interrogation (torture), and targeted assassinations by drone strikes. By developing and expanding cumulative extremism theory, the challenges these security policies present to human rights, and the way the resulting social and media discourses are framed, can be viewed as a part of what causes further threats of terrorism. Whenever an effective balance between our security and our rights is sought, there are degrees of subjectivity to the questions that arise: to whose ends do the rights apply, and how are these rights served? Chapter 2 includes elements of utilitarian reasoning to navigate a better understanding of a subject that does not adhere to absolutism of rights, ethics and morality. This thesis raises the question of whether there may be merit in considering variable moral degrees in subjects usually viewed as morally absolute. This possibility recognises incidents where there are arguable abnegations of moral authority in post-9/11 US counterterrorism policies.

Chapters 3 and 4 expand on the idea of ‘suspended moralities’. This term is used to refer to abnegations of previously held or assumed moral authority. For example post-9/11 US policies of enhanced interrogation clearly make use of what most would consider torture, and then these acts are publicly and officially excused, defended or even justified. The discussions in chapters 3 and 4 reference rewriting and/or new interpretations of accepted norms and international law being used to support the major post-9/11 US counterterrorism responses. The question of whether a morally absolutist position is too restrictive in the context of the fight against terrorism is reviewed. This thesis analyses how human rights norms can conflict with certain counterterrorism policies, and how this conflict might be addressed.

Chapter 3 discusses an abnegation of morality by US counterterrorism policy concerning intelligence gathering through practices of extraordinary rendition and torture. The chapter begins with an overview of UN instruments and domestic and international laws that absolutely prohibit torture, and then engages with theoretical arguments on

5 enhanced interrogation. Ticking Bomb Scenarios are noted along with ideas of the moral differences between torture being excused, defended or justified. Post-9/11 counterterrorism case studies involving US government-sanctioned enhanced interrogation of high-value terror suspects are cited to engage in the realities of the contemporary torture debate.

The use of torture to gather intelligence against post-9/11 Islamic terrorism chronologically led into an increasing reliance on CIA and US military drone programs to counter Islamic terrorism. The analysis in this thesis generally follows that same order. Chapter 4 notes how targeted assassinations by drones have largely replaced the use of enhanced interrogation as a post-9/11 US counterterrorism policy, and develops chapter 3 to discuss how and why this happened. US torture and drone policies as suspending or eroding morality are discussed here as high profile US counterterrorism responses. The positioning of torture and drone strikes as counterterrorism policies illustrates their importance to post-9/11 US neoconservative thinking in terms of hard power responses to Islamic terrorism, even though these policies arguably play a part in radicalisation and further incidences of terror. Although the worlds of torture and drones are very distinct from each other in many respects – capture as opposed to killing – they both in their context as US counterterrorism policies feed directly into Eatwell’s 2006 classic cumulative extremism formula, risking the expansion of the US-led so-called ‘war’ against terrorism. The two policies are also linked through a historical relationship, where drones have been used by the US to replace state-sanctioned torture, and through the involvement of both as an abnegation of US moral authority. Post-9/11 torture and drone strikes call for particular translations and/or understandings of international law that create difficult challenges to our moral positions. This is due to the fact that these policies collide with general understandings of certain human rights, such as the right to a fair trial, and the right to life. These challenges are analysed in the context of impacting cumulative extremism, and supporting its necessary expansion and development.

Chapter 4 discusses the legal and moral implications of increasing drone use for targeted assassinations, in their role as a contemporary US counterterrorism asset. The drone – Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV), Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle (UCAV) or Remotely Piloted Vehicle (RPV) – has become a symbol of an expanding battlefield against Islamic

6 terrorism. As platforms for surveillance, reconnaissance and weapons delivery, modern drones are seen by some as symbolising freedom and the extension of Western understandings of human rights and democracy, and by others as death to collateral innocents and the devastation of whole communities, where drones have come to risk radicalising not only individuals but also whole regions.

In analysing post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and the policies that attempt to address it, the question of society’s perceptions is crucial. News of security threats from Islamic terrorism reaches into homes worldwide via the Internet and media, and is often sensationally reported on a scale that raises levels of international insecurity. Through developing the concept of cumulative extremism to include Western media and social responses, and analysing how terrorism’s discourse is presented, how these fears grow to instigate social and cultural mistrust, racism and nationalism can be better understood. Chapter 5 introduces social perceptions of post-9/11 terrorism, and how these can be formed and influenced by popular culture, movies, books and traditional print and television (TV) media which portray and distort the scale of terrorism’s successes. Chapter 5 discusses how reporting on terrorism, the priority and status it is given in news and media culture, and the reactive policies of the US, act performatively to arguably contribute to a cumulative negative impact on society. Media responses to incidents of transnational and homegrown terrorism alike create “the oxygen of publicity” for violent ideologies, and can influence views on immigration, racism and asylum (Thatcher 1985, 29). Reports of terrorism, just as terrorism itself, may exert pressure on “societies and their governments to overreact and inflict great cost on themselves” (Nacos et al. 2011, 14).

Mainstream popular media can contribute to influences on radicalisation, and popular disaffection, particularly among the young and politically active. Society is influenced by what it sees, hears and reads in its media, where “popular media and political discourses now routinely juxtapose issues more usually associated with integration and immigration with terrorism and radicalization, such as the wearing of the Hijab, arranged marriage, and the fundamental compatibility of Islamic religious ideology and practice with liberal democracy”. This “‘securitization’ of Islam” assigns to the religion of Islam the label of a potential existential threat to the West (Githens-Mazer 2012, 560). Popular fears of terrorism, formed in part by media reports, may be quite discordant

7 with the actual sources of risk and danger in the world, and this thesis considers actual incidences and reports of terrorist attacks against social perceptions of terrorism, and against the fear terrorism instils as part of its emotional and political weaponry. It is also noted that terrorist events can serve to radicalise on the opposite sides of political and ideological arguments. Increases in incidents of racism, reduced support for multiculturalism, and even shifts in national identity have been observed with rising profiles and mobilisation of groups such as the English Defence League (EDL) in the UK, as well as comparable right-wing organisations elsewhere.

Chapter 6 looks at the dissemination of information by Islamic terrorist organisations and individuals through social media and the Internet, as part of the discussions of how terrorism discourses are framed by certain media exposure. Noting case studies of online self-radicalisation, the chapter engages with how the Internet works as a strategic and political tool to further terrorist ideologies. Towards the end of the 20th century, terrorism engendered something like an international brotherhood whose idealism traversed race and national identity, seeming to make allies of groups as diverse as the Libyan government and the Baader-Meinhof Gang (Davies 2003, 103-106). However, the development of the Internet in the 21st century has realised an even more transparent picture of stateless or intrastate terrorism, and pushed world leaders to publicly address issues of terrorist violence as an overt global threat.

As noted above, the aim of this thesis is not to apportion blame for post-9/11 Islamic terrorism, or to necessarily reposition the responsibility for it. However, by developing the concept of CE, it aims to academically inform debates on the issues at stake, by way of interdisciplinary discussions to bring together how we view post-9/11 Islamic terrorism in terms of the politics around it, two of the major US counterterrorism policies to address it, and the popular media exposure and publicity that serves to fuel it. This thesis does not offer comprehensive alternatives to existing political thinking or counterterrorism policy regimes, but through a developed concept of cumulative extremism identifies how overstating the power of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism crudely justifies policies such as torture and drone strikes, and enhances the results of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism in creating high levels of fear of future attacks in a seemingly open- ended ‘war’ against terrorism. A sharper view of how the discourses of terrorism act using the developed concept of CE, aids our understanding of those politics, policies and

8 media publicity needed to more successfully disrupt post-9/11 Islamic terrorism, without the cost of further escalation.

Thesis methodology and approach Much of the research in political science and particularly terrorism studies in which this thesis is situated is necessarily multi- and inter-disciplinary, and the methodology of this thesis reflects that emphasis in drawing on research and perspectives across the disciplines of politics, history, anthropology, human rights, psychology, law, and peace and conflict studies. This thesis incorporates a multiple case study approach to develop and extend the CE concept. The case studies are explained and justified in detail throughout the thesis. As it engages with contemporary mainstream media/terrorism debates concerning post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and its countermovements this thesis offers critical and interpretive responses to high-exposure policies, events and actors. These are critically analysed against an overall narrative of wider phenomena creating and feeding an advanced interplay between elements that make up the developed CE concept.

The wider cultural, social and political reactions to post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and associated responses relate to pre-existing considerations of how terrorism is met by counter-violence from the state. Through an analysis of how these wider phenomena can cumulatively impact extremist and state interplay, the subject of critical terrorism studies is enriched by the CE concept moving beyond Eatwell’s 2006 considerations of terrorist violence primarily as an instigator of, and as being met by, reactive counterviolence in an open-ended and destructive cycle. Cultural, social and political analyses of post-9/11 events in terms of US foreign policies on counterterrorism in the so-called ‘war on terror’, and in post-9/11 developments in Islamic terrorism are used as an approach to understanding the importance of developing the CE concept.

This thesis is open-ended and exploratory in nature, its development of the CE concept is therefore distinct from cumulative extremism as viewed by its original formulation, which has been somewhat limited by considerations of CE as an upwardly spiralling interplay between terrorism and violent state responses, and/or revenge attacks by opposing extremists. Barker et al. (2002) suggest that “exploratory research proves ideal

9 for a qualitative approach”, noting that qualitative strategies are appropriate to circumstances where little is known in a particular research area, or where existing research is confusing, or contradictory (Elliott and Timulak 2005, 149).

Because of the often illegal, extreme and/or sensitive nature of the subject matter researched here, the use of interviewing or surveying supporters of, and/or actors involved directly in post-9/11 Islamic terrorism presented insurmountable ethical difficulties for a thesis at this level. Also, much of the detail of state counterterrorism policy and activity is highly confidential. However, the high quality of scholarly literature and research material – peer-reviewed publications, official government and intelligence agency releases, and media output on many of the relevant policies and case studies – merits detailed discussion and analysis in developing the concept of CE. The variety and depth of open-source material available on post-9/11 terrorism has meant that despite source material initially seeming to be limited, the developed concept of cumulative extremism presented by this thesis should be considered when researching the continuance, evolution and growth of post-9/11 terrorism and its countermovements.

The interpretivist approach used differs from some other data collection and research methods in shifting the focus from making and proving research predictions towards allowing information to be assessed via social constructs, cultural norms, and the relationship between post-9/11 terrorism and the researcher. The use of pre-existing open-source data respects a preference noted by Silverman (2006) for naturally occurring data in contrast to material that is researcher-provoked. Elliott and Timulak (2005, 149) explain why interpretive and critical approaches are suited here, noting the following guiding points on these types of analysis: Interpretive: Why does the phenomenon come about? How does it unfold over time? Critical: What’s wrong (or right) about the phenomenon? How could it be made better?

A common theme in such research is the use of linguistic rather than numerical data analysis, with a self-reflexive approach to assessment of material used in research. The qualitative case study method used in this thesis within this framework provides suggestive connections rather than the rigour of the natural sciences. As Bloomberg and Volpe note (2008, quoted in Ponelis 2015, 538), “Dependability (reliability), credibility (validity), confirmability (objectivity), and transferability (generalizability) are used to

10 establish the trustworthiness of qualitative research”. Through the use of case studies in an interpretivist approach, this thesis seeks to make persuasive connections between phenomena illustrating the way in which cumulative extremism works. This methodology clarifies a revision of the concept of cumulative extremism as involving an expanded set of connections and implications relevant to the wider phenomena at issue.

While these approaches understand and respect some researcher bias as an unavoidable part of the research process, and recognise that gaining knowledge proves impossible without a conceptual structure, qualitative research does have some drawbacks. Silverman (2006, xiii) notes that it often proves to be heavy on description and light on data analysis. However, for the ethics reasons noted above and as acknowledged in a later discussion on text translation and image analysis difficulties, deeper testing of policy and media material would cause this thesis to creep beyond its scope as an exploratory argument and a concept development.

Elliott and Timulak recognise there is an importance in placing qualitative findings as developed in this thesis “within a context of previous theory and research” and by developing an existing theoretical concept such as CE to update its relevance in post- 9/11 terrorism studies this is achieved. They state that probing the implications of research can include subjecting existing literature to the same kind of rigorous process of analysis and categorisation as with one’s own data. In addition, there is value in locating new and/or developed findings within a socio-historical context, and to then imagine useful further research. The validity of the interpretive approach and methodology is tested throughout this thesis via the variety and depth of case studies used, “resonation with the reader of the research paper is an essential form of validation in qualitative research. [To facilitate this] the qualitative study should ground the findings in many illustrative examples, so readers may make their own judgements” (Elliott and Timulak 2005, 156).

To effectively develop the concept of cumulative extremism as an exploratory process the methodology for an evolution of Eatwell’s 2006 term should not be unnecessarily limited, but rather maintain flexibility, open to influence from future advances in terrorism/counterterrorism theory. It is possible that the results of qualitative research may rest on a few well-chosen examples, as pejoratively described by Silverman (2005)

11 as anecdotalism. To avoid this as much as possible it should be noted that any development of the CE concept is by necessity an ongoing process; to an extent this is as a consequence of terrorism evolving as a political tool as it continues to be a social threat. By ensuring the developing view of CE is an ongoing exercise, anecdotalism can be minimised and the concept remain up-to-date, CE can then continue informing terrorism studies through a wider cultural, social and political context, and better acknowledge and react to terrorism’s negative impacts on society beyond the obvious violence that obscures and dominates much of contemporary terrorism research.

Methodologies acknowledge that empirical research should be understandably mindful of the importance of reliability, and the internal and external validity of measures and procedures. As a work in qualitative research however, this thesis forgoes to an extent an absolute idea of these terms, thereby avoiding within its context an overreliance on objectivism and arguments that could prove to be inappropriate for naturalistic or explorative inquiry. As part of an open-ended, interpretive analysis the methodology and approach used in this thesis recognises a responsibility to convince both researcher and audience that its findings are based on critical investigation, and this is noted throughout the thesis.

12 CHAPTER 1 A REVIEW OF LITERATURE AND DEFINITIONS

This chapter acts in part as a literature review of a body of existing knowledge and research relevant to this thesis. The review process also serves to contextually define and extrapolate from perceived meanings of some of the major contested terms in terrorism studies. As its point of distinction, this thesis seeks to develop and expand the concept of cumulative extremism (CE) in regard to the post-9/11 US fight against Islamic terrorism. Developing the CE concept as introduced by Eatwell (2006) allows ‘non- violent’ events in terrorism/counterterrorism discourse on politics, society and popular media to be studied alongside terrorist events and counterterrorism reactions. The implications of this will be covered in greater detail in the following chapters, where the development of CE reveals that the concept itself, as well as the wider study of post- 9/11 Islamic terrorism, benefits from being understood as more than tit-for-tat spirals of political violence.

The definitions of some of the terms covered in this chapter are ‘essentially contested concepts’, covering problems or events that may be widely recognised but in different ways. In particular, terms concerning ‘terrorism’ are discussed here as requiring specifically defined understandings, which also take into account the motives of those making the definitions. The term terrorism is clearly political, and matters of great importance can be dependent on whether an act is defined as an act of terrorism or as, say, an incident of criminal violence. Perspectives on targeted assassinations by drone strikes range from their characterisation as murder through to legal and justified killing. Rather than merely reviewing legal or dictionary definitions, this chapter seeks to inform academic and political debates as to what these terms mean in social, political and contemporary popular contexts – and why they do so. The five sections of this chapter review literature and definitions on: ‘cumulative extremism’, ‘war’ (in particular the so- called ‘war on terror’), ‘terrorism’, ‘blowback’, and ‘radicalisation’. These definitions are placed within the contextual aims of this thesis concerning intersections of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism, US counterterrorism policies, international law, and social and media responses. The relationships between these phenomena influence how events, policies and performative responses to post-9/11 Islamic terrorism contribute to increasing or

13 indeed creating radicalisation towards further terrorist acts, that is, underlining the need to develop the concept of cumulative extremism in understanding them.

1.1 Cumulative extremism: Developing the concept As the Introduction notes, Roger Eatwell an expert on far-right extremism in European politics, first used the term ‘cumulative extremism’ to refer to how one form of extremism feeds off and magnifies other forms (Eatwell 2006, 205). Noting a general pattern as being “one of extremist animosities fuelling each other”, Eatwell provided an example of how following the London bombings of 7 July 2005 (7/7), some Muslims “rather than ask[ing] more troubling questions about the Islamic faith and changes within the Muslim community” accused the far-right British National Party (BNP) of provoking violence against ethnic minorities. This point was highlighted by the BNP in their counter-propaganda, providing an example of these extremist animosities at work (Eatwell 2006, 213-214). The English Defence League (EDL) demonstrated in areas with large Muslim populations, with Islamists retaliating by “provocative demonstrations… to provoke and anger the far-right”. A UK counterterrorism officer in the West Midlands police suggested in this context “that EDL demonstrations were in some cases pushing Muslims toward radicalisation; and may make recruitment to Muslim militancy easier” (cited in Bartlett and Birdwell 2013, 4).

Existing academic research on CE has identified an opportunity to develop and expand the concept, noting it “appears to offer interesting possibilities for strengthening our understanding of patterns of contentious politics involving extreme political groups”. To better understand what fuels extensions of post-9/11 terrorism/counterterrorism movements, CE can be understood as including the impact of discourses from popular media and society upon post-9/11 Islamic extremism. Analysis of some CE discussions recognise “a tone of grim inevitability” from escalations by one group drawing responses from a countergroup (Macklin and Busher 2015, 54). Macklin and Busher note that there are various other factors shaping the character and outcomes of these interrelations (2015, 61). An essay following the public murder of British soldier Lee Rigby in London in 2013 suggests that although increases in revenge attacks may be expected for a short period, “this does not necessarily mean a general and sustained uptick of violent attacks in society… [Suggesting] it will fall back to the same level as before an attack (which it

14 did post-7/7) rather than sparking a self-sustaining cumulative process” (Bartlett and Birdwell 2013, 8-9).

A study tracing “patterns of escalation during four waves of movement– countermovement contests involving the British extreme right since 1945” found that interactions between anti-Muslim, extreme Islamist and anti-racist groups are now widely considered to be the context in which Eatwell’s concept of cumulative extremism has taken a strong hold (Macklin and Busher 2015, 54). This post-9/11 positioning of the significance of CE is supported here, but this thesis goes further to argue that Eatwell’s formulation of CE can be developed around the politics, policies and popular media publicity of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and counterterrorism.

Carter notes that at its core, cumulative extremism “is concerned with how the confrontational relationship between opposing social groups can radicalise those involved… causing wider trends of social polarisation”. Over the last 10 years or so, this violence/counterviolence theory has achieved wide currency from academics and policy makers “with the relationship between far-right groups and Islamic extremists taking centre stage”. Although Carter notes that there is a lack of empirical investigation into cumulative extremism at large (Carter 2017, 37). This thesis expands the concept with regard not only to rises in movement/countermovement violence levels, but also in the troubling way that post-9/11 terrorism discourses are framed, and how these discourses then feed back into cumulative extremism itself.

In their six proposals to enhance the conceptual clarity of cumulative extremism, Busher and Macklin argue that research into the “wider cultural, social and political environment” can aid in understanding how the movement-countermovement contest may be shaped by matters other than violence instigating further violence. They note that “if we are to take seriously the idea that CE is a process of coevolution that involves multiple actors and not just the two opposing ‘extremist’ groups, another valuable avenue for research would be to undertake a more reflexive analysis of how the debates about and efforts to countermand CE are shaping our societies’ interpretations of and responses to the threat of terrorism and political violence” (Busher and Macklin 2015, 899-900). Sensationalism in the framing of terrorism discourses in social and popular media contexts plays into the narratives of terrorists themselves, such that non-violent

15 and non-state responses to terrorism by society and its media take on a significance beyond impotent reactions. Later chapters in this thesis examine in greater detail how errant discourse framing of post-9/11 terrorism issues may add to the threat, frequency and levels of terrorism. Further they note how CE narratives that accept inevitable processes of escalation are feeding into a “general tendency towards risk inflation in discussions about ‘radicalisation’ and ‘extremism’” a tendency that David Anderson QC warns “is likely to encourage overreaching of security apparatus and play into precisely the kind of politics of fear on which extreme political groups tend to thrive” (Macklin and Busher 2015, 54).

By developing the concept of CE, possible negative impacts from media reporting on the so-called ‘war on terrorism’ can be discussed so as to question the efficacy and reasoning of some media in its publicity and treatment of terrorist events and counterterrorism policies. For this purpose, the concept of cumulative extremism needs to be allowed to evolve beyond the parameters of Eatwell’s original 2006 formulation around violence. Eatwell notes that “whilst the specific term ‘clash of civilisations’ is used much less frequently [in the Muslim community] than in extreme right propaganda, the idea of a fundamental clash of cultures is strong” (Eatwell 2006, 214). In recognising Eatwell’s motivations for constructing the term CE in the first place, this thesis seeks to build upon this term and concept by way of using the cultural, social and political ‘othering’ of Muslims since 9/11. For Eatwell, “an important neglected question concerns how different forms of extremism are constructed in discourse by other extremists and how they relate in the concrete world” (2006, 213). This summarises his initial formulation of CE; however, Eatwell’s question seems to end in consideration that extremism and its discourses are only constructed by extremists. This is where an expansion of the CE concept proves useful: in recognising that other less sinister factors are contributing to CE, in the way societies interpret and respond to threats of terrorism and political violence (Busher and Macklin 2015, 899-900).

In further support of developing research on cumulative processes affecting post-9/11 terrorism (and consequently counterterrorism initiatives), Bartlett and Birdwell note that, “other aspects of the environment are likely to be significant in how groups respond to provocations” (2013, 14). Referring to ‘cumulative radicalisation’, they note that movements and countermovements instigating political violence are acknowledged

16 in other disciplines. Behavioural and social psychology, for example, recognises the “creation of enemy outsiders, and the process of ‘othering’ different social groups” (Bartlett and Birdwell 2013, 4). An aspect of the hypothesis here around developing the concept of cumulative extremism is to argue that these processes are not solely the domain of extremist actors, but can be performed by cultural, social and various media representations and discourses of post-9/11 terrorism and counterterrorism. These types of essentially non-violent contributions towards an expanded concept of CE are further noted in chapters 5 and 6, when discussing media and social media representations of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism.

1.2 War: A clarification, particularly of the term ‘war on terror’ Since 9/11, the term war has developed some meanings beyond those around classical inter-state political and violent conflict, civil war, and guerrilla warfare. Classical formulations of war still exist in recent history books and in our geo-political present, but this thesis is concerned with non-state ideological and political conflict, and the state’s reaction to it, particularly in terms of a post-9/11 war on Islamic terrorism.

As an entrée to popular understandings of the term ‘war’, the Oxford Dictionary (2015) provides the following notes: 1 A state of armed conflict between different countries or different groups within a country: ‘Japan declared war on Germany’ 1.1 A state of competition or hostility between different people or groups: ‘she was at war with her parents’ 1.2 A sustained campaign against an undesirable situation or activity: ‘the authorities are waging a war against smuggling’

It is the final entry that proves most useful in what is to be understood by a ‘so-called’ war on terror in this thesis: war as a campaign waged against a situation or activity. A contextual examination of terms such as jus ad bellum and jus in bello as noted in just war theory would perhaps be helpful, including discussions of distinction and proportionality. However, there is controversy about whether counterterrorism measures of a physical nature constitute war at all. There is much academic debate on whether non-state actors can be “at war” with legitimate states. O'Connell recognises that “when we hear ‘non-state actor’ we tend to think ‘terrorist organisation’”; however, the term non-state actor simply refers to any actor in the international arena

17 that is not a sovereign state. With most sovereign states recognisable by their membership of the United Nations (UN), for example, non-state actors can simply be designated as those international actors who are not UN members, that is, inter- governmental organisations, non-governmental organisations and individuals (O'Connell 2005, 437).

We can also question whether the so-called ‘war on terror’ is still being waged. The ‘war on terror’ of the US and allied forces can be viewed as a perpetual conflict against Islamic terrorism or what has in some discussions been called ‘Perma War’, despite statements to the contrary by the US administrations of both George W. Bush and Barack Obama. Looking at the question of whether the so-called ‘war on terror’ is over or not, it is important to view the term ‘war’ precisely as well as to look at what it is that the post-9/11 conversation on terrorism considers to be ‘terror’.

Before 11 September 2001 (discounting civil war, as discussed later) war could be fairly argued to be a state business, a violent continuation of interstate politics. The usual understanding of von Clausewitz’ aphorism in his unfinished work Vom Kriege (On War, 1832) that “war is a continuation of politics by/with other [very violent] means” is that through war, politics continues “by other means” (Holmes 2014), although a literal translation of ‘mit Einmischung anderer Mitteln’, is “with the addition of other means”. The literal translation suggests that armed force is used to supplement diplomatic and other instruments, which are not abandoned in the rush to pick up arms, which disrupts the usual interpretation of there being a radical discontinuity between war and peace. Rather, the violent and strategic competition of state-to-state war would fall along a continuum between peacetime diplomacy and open armed conflict.

In terms of defining civil war, Collier and Hoeffler note in arithmetical terms that it is “an internal conflict with at least 1,000 combat-related deaths, with both an identifiable rebel organisation and government forces suffering at least five percent of these casualties” (2004, 565). Civil wars are far more common than international conflicts between states, with all of the 15 major armed conflicts in 2001, as listed by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, taking place within national state boundaries (SIPRI 2002).

18 Iklé marks a notable point of difference between civil wars and conflicts that occur between states: in civil wars it is almost impossible to achieve any outcome outside of total victory or total defeat, as “one side has to get all, or nearly so, since there cannot be two governments ruling over one country”. This is especially so in cases where “passions aroused and political cleavages opened render a sharing of power unworkable” (Iklé 1971, 95).

US President George W. Bush declared what he called the ‘war on terror’ on 20 September 2001 in one of the defining speeches of his presidency, a nationally televised address to a joint session of the US Congress (Gani and Mathew 2008, 1). Bush went through various steps aiming to rally the US and its allies against international terrorism following the attacks of 9/11. He declared that the US was determined to fight this new international conflict: “Our war on terror begins with al-Qaida, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated” (noted by Gardner 2005, 15). O’Connell reports that despite “the requirement of a state connection for terrorists to be considered part of an armed conflict and to be considered combatants”, the Bush administration declared the US to be in a “global war on terrorism”, and designated terrorists as enemy combatants (O’Connell 2005, 452).

Howard explains that the Bush declaration conferred a legitimacy of sorts upon terrorists, raising legal questions of whether terrorists qualify as belligerents, capable of receiving the protection of the laws of war: “To declare war on terrorists or, even more illiterately, on terrorism is at once to accord terrorists a status and dignity that they seek and that they do not deserve”. Britain fought many such ‘wars’ but the word ‘war’ was purposely avoided in favour of the word ‘emergencies’, such that “the police and intelligence services were provided with exceptional powers and were reinforced where necessary by the armed forces, but they continued to operate within a peacetime framework of civilian authority” (Howard 2002, 8). In what Howard aptly calls an “intricate game of skill played between terrorists and the authorities”, terrorism has already won a victory where it can provoke governments into reacting with overt armed force. The terrorists achieve a win-win situation where they will “either escape to fight another day, or they will be defeated and celebrated as martyrs”, and in the very process of fighting violence with violence there is inevitably collateral damage to civilians (Howard 2002, 10).

The position of this thesis is in accord with Howard’s position that these consequences further erode “the moral authority of the government”: “Whatever its military justification, the bombing of Afghanistan, with the inevitable collateral damage, has whittled away the immense moral ascendency gained as a result of the terrorist attacks in America” (Howard 2002, 10). In the process, the events of 9/11 are at risk of being remembered as mere history, while “every fresh picture… of a hospital hit, or children crippled by land mines, or refugees driven from their homes by Western military action will strengthen the hatred and recruit for the ranks of the terrorists, as well as sow fresh doubts in the minds of America’s supporters” (Howard 2002, 11).

1.3 Terrorism: What it is and what it is not Schbley (2003, 105) asks the question about terrorism of what is in a definition. His answer is: everything. According to Schbley, the absence of a simple and unambiguous definition suggests a continuing international ambivalence about terrorism that weakens efforts in enforcing international anti-terrorism laws and forging transnational intelligence cooperation. That is, the importance of an accurate and consistent understanding of what is meant by, and what is understood as, terrorism is much more than academic. More widely, to use the term terrorism or to brand a person or group as terrorist is to prescribe a certain range of actions.

The difficulty with trying to comprehensively define terrorism is broadly linked to two considerations. First, there is the matter of who it is making the definition, and secondly, what do they need it to mean. A useful starting point is the claim by philosopher Igor Primoratz that terrorism is “The deliberate use of violence, or threat of its use, against innocent people, with the aim of intimidating them, or other people, into a course of action they otherwise would not take” (Primoratz 1990, 135). However, in the context of this thesis, Primoratz’s definition is of limited use beyond the ignition of critical thought. It is broad to the point of suggesting that terrorism does not need to have a political end. In his analysis of the term Primoratz asks the question, “Should we use the word only in a political context?” but his final definition turns out to be much wider (Primoratz 1990, 129). Primoratz’s definition attracts support from Sinnott-Armstrong who notes, “Terrorism is often done to bring about political change, but Primoratz rightly broadens

20 his definition to include non-political (e.g. religious) aims. His final definition includes terrorists who seek a change in any kind of action” (Sinnott-Armstrong 1991, 117). This wide definition of what is meant by and understood as terrorism can be viewed as somewhat naïve. Although many examples of terrorism have an undeniable religious, social or cultural basis, these generally cannot be detached from the political, as will be explained below. This thesis maintains that terrorism stems from a desire for change and impact on behaviour or policy areas that we should understand as political. Terrorist ideologies being primarily considered as political, that is as aimed towards effecting policy changes, translates whether terrorism is considered as a non-state or state- centred instrument for change.

Primoratz does recognise certain limitations to his definition, suggesting that what he is hoping to achieve is to capture “the trait, or traits, of terrorism which cause most of us to view it with repugnance” (1990, 129), and he later acknowledges there is a limited applicability to his suggested definition of terrorism (1990, 137). An important question is whether state acts that would otherwise constitute terrorism if committed by non- state actors should be considered under the umbrella of terrorism. Primoratz notes that “The word ‘terrorism’ was originally used to refer to the ‘Reign of Terror’ set up by the Jacobins, i.e. to a particular case of state terrorism” (1990, 134). However, for the purposes of this thesis, acts of terror by states are best allotted to different categories of criminal action, for example as war crimes and/or genocide.

Stohl claims that, “states rather than insurgent groups… have been the most persistent and successful users of the strategy of terrorism” (1984, 55). However, as Sproat notes, despite a growing and rich variety of literature on what many authors would term state terror, “the term terrorism is now widely used to denote the systematic use of terror by non-governmental actors” (1991, 28). This suggests an overlap of views on this issue; for example, although there are strong arguments to suggest that states cannot by definition be terrorists, Duvall and Stohl maintain it would be wrong to accept that “political terrorism is exclusively the activity of non-governmental actors” (1988, 180).

By suggesting that terrorism can apply to state or non-state violence or threats of violence, Sproat refers to the assumption that a state is a neutral arbiter in regard to social conflict, and is often itself the victim of terrorism “perceived a priori as an

21 antistate phenomenon”. However, he goes on to argue that in reality this latter problem is an emotional one and will be overcome on solving the conceptual problem: “that is, when one shows that the state can be terrorist, terrorism will… no longer be equated with the insurgent's antistate violence” (Sproat 1991, 19). For clarity as an acceptable evolutionary path in seeking a comprehensive definition of terrorism, this thesis considers state aggression as essentially outside of the term. As noted above, alternate terms and categorisations can be applied to state action more effectively.

In the context of defining terrorist acts as political, this thesis should acknowledge what Primoratz and others consider to be non-political terrorism. Primoratz suggests that his definition, cited above, “makes it possible to speak of both state and non-state terrorism, of revolutionary and counter-revolutionary terrorism, terrorism of the left and of the right. The definition is politically neutral” (1990, 136). Arguing that human behaviour in society governed whether democratically or by cultural or religious norms is always controlled, restricted or encouraged by political systems, makes a link between what is considered political and what is deemed to be terrorism. In terms of what Primoratz terms as religious terrorism, the terrorism of Islamic groups such as IS/Daesh or al-Qa’ida can be viewed as issuing from an ambition to install Islam as not only a ‘state’ religion, but also as a political system. The Qur'ān, along with Hadiths and Sharia central to the faith of fundamentalists are ethical and political handbooks, a ‘guide to life’, to the norms and laws of orthodox Islam, not purely religious texts. As the basis of faith for many Muslims, the Qur'ān demonstrates that what some may consider as cultural or social behaviour can also be argued to constitute political action. As Malik (2015) recognises, in discussing the political bureaucracy of IS/Daesh, there is a strong relationship between religious faith and political and constitutional systems: “The state requires an Islamic system of life, a Qur’anic constitution and a system to implement it”.

Silke argues that in a conversation about terrorism, “the first hurdle to be cleared… is to clarify what exactly is meant by ‘terrorism’”, noting that questions over what and to whom any related terms apply are “deeply problematic” (2008, 100). Shafritz et al. maintain that a definition of terrorism is unlikely to ever generally be agreed upon (1991, 260). That terrorism is always linked to the political is supported by Crenshaw, who describes terrorism as “a particular style of political violence, involving attacks on a small number of victims in order to influence a wider audience” (1992, 71). Complete

22 clarity remains elusive when dealing with a political definition whose meaning is dependent on who is using it, and to what they are applying it. Terrorism is an insurgent style of violence or threat, a strategy employed by weaker groups or individuals relatively lacking in “numerical, physical or direct political power in order to effect political or social change” (Friedland 1992, 82).

Reminiscent of the aphorism by von Clausewitz quoted above, Quiggin (2010) links terrorism and politics in noting, “Terrorism, like war, is the continuation of politics by other means”, adding that, “All terrorism is political. Many types of terrorism exist, but each of these has the same objective of effecting change within, or in respect of, a political system through the threat or use of violence”. This clarity in the definition forms the understanding of terrorism of this thesis in its contention that terrorism is always driven by politics, despite the justifications given for killing innocent people and the recruiting pitch of many terrorist groups often employing language cast in religious, ethnic or moral terms. Even groups such as al-Qa’ida and its affiliates seem reluctant to attack the West in terms of theological differences between Islam, Judaism or Christianity; this reluctance supports the idea that purely religious motives are not a fundamental cause of terrorist action. Quiggin notes, “The grievances expressed by Al Qaeda are broadly political in nature, and address, explicitly and implicitly, such issues as economic oppression, colonialism and political corruption”. Public statements from al- Qa’ida often begin with statements invoking religion, but the grievances expressed, as well as the group’s objectives, can be shown to be political in character (Quiggin 2010). This thinking illustrates that in order to best counter or defeat terrorism it should be confronted with a will that is equally political, rather than just sheer physical and/or military power. This speaks to debates on the need for soft power approaches, at least in conjunction with hard-power thinking on how to fight terrorism. Soft power approaches refers to policies that address the conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism, ranging from effective social welfare policies of health and education, to more targeted community deradicalisation initiatives that engage collaboratively with immigrant communities.

Primoratz (1990, 137) offers a useful observation on the question of what may have caused the growth of terrorism by way of indiscriminate attacks against the innocent, as opposed to previous tactics concentrating on targeting ‘non-innocent’ actors, such as

23 political assassinations of heads of state or other officials in high standing. He notes the point of US historian and political commentator Walter Laqueur that “in the twentieth century, human life became cheaper; the belief gained ground that the end justified all means” (Laqueur 1987, 84). Primoratz further cites an explanation by Edward Hyams that “chiefs of state are more carefully guarded than they used to be, and revolutionaries have learnt that the elimination of individual leaders is apt to resemble driving out Satan with Beelzebub” (Hyams 1974, 166). This part explanation on the growth and evolution of terrorist strategies speaks towards a widening of target communities, and therefore the need to expand and extend contemporary definitions and concepts that relate to the study and treatment of terrorism, such as a development of the concept of cumulative extremism.

Engaging with the often-quoted phrase that “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter“, Davis (2013) rephrases it “one man’s terrorist is another’s recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize”. He takes advantage of this flawed but common thinking to demonstrate that “Terrorism defies definition”, noting that the use of the word terrorist by both sides in the conflict between Israel and Hamas underlines its ambiguity. The idea of terrorism being too contentious to conclusively define has, as Davis claims, resulted in many scholars such as Laqueur declaring, “Disputes about a detailed, comprehensive definition of terrorism will continue for a long time and will make no noticeable contribution towards the understanding of terrorism” (Davis 2013).

However, the fact that the United Nations in various forums has been debating the meaning of terrorism since 1963 seems to indicate that elaborating on definitions of terrorism is an important process. Following 9/11, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) Resolution 1373 called on member states to take co-operative legislative action against terrorism (UN 2001, Res. 1373). Notably however, the resolution left terrorism undefined. Davis suggests that “States maintain this ambiguity because it enables them to utilise the phrase ‘terrorism’ without having to clarify what it means”, such that it simultaneously allows them to avoid condemnation of behaviour conforming to the definition (Davis 2013). This section does not conclude with a definitive statement of terrorism, but canvasses the interests and values at stake in defining terrorism.

24 1.4 Blowback: The repercussive costs of US foreign policy decisions As reported by Chalmers Johnson, ‘blowback’ is a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) term first used in March 1954 in a now declassified report on the US operation to overthrow the Mossadegh government in Iran in 1953. It is now a widely used term for unintended consequences of a state’s foreign policy and international activities that in many cases have been kept secret from the public. The CIA’s fears that there might be blowback from its interference in Iran were well founded, with American embassy staff in Tehran held hostage for over a year during Khomeini’s 1979 revolution (Johnson 2001; also Sharpe 2006, 120).

Following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, President Bush claimed that the reason for the attacks was that “[we are] a beacon for freedom”, and that the attackers were “evil”. In his address to the US Congress on 20 September 2001 Bush said, “This is civilization’s fight.” Such attempts to define complex events as a conflict over abstract values, or as a clash of civilisations, evade responsibility for the blowback generated by US foreign policy and its international actions. As Johnson argues, the 9/11 terrorists did not “attack America” or make an assault on freedom; rather, the attacks were against US foreign policy. Osama bin Laden, who joined in the US call for resistance to the 1979 invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union (USSR), and as a recipient of US military training and equipment, was himself an example of blowback. The day after the 9/11 attacks, Georgia’s Democratic Senator Zell Miller postured, “I say, bomb the hell out of them. If there’s collateral damage, so be it.” Such massive military retaliation and its inevitable collateral damage tap into radicalisation, recruiting supporters and fighters to the terrorists’ cause (Johnson 2001).

Writing on the CIA’s secret proxy war in Afghanistan, Prados describes blowback as a “tendency for actions to rebound and damage the initiator” (2002, 470), while noting that perhaps the mujahideen would commit terrorist acts in and against the US was not yet a hypothesis that had been considered. Cogan argues that before bin Laden, there was a degree of blowback from some mujahideen leaders during the 1980s such as Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Jalaluddin Haqqani in joining al-Qa’ida and the Taliban against the US. However, Cogan argues that to refer to “Osama bin Laden as a creation of the United States is simply fantasy”, claiming that bin Laden joined the conflict in Afghanistan very late, “participating in one battle and not very prominently”. The

25 Taliban however formed immediately following the war in Afghanistan and “was created initially as a wholly owned subsidiary of the Pakistani ISI in 1992, with the purpose of having a friendly regime in Afghanistan and thereby assuring Pakistan’s strategic strength” (Cogan 2008, 155). It is fair to say that to consider the character and actions of Osama bin Laden as a concrete example of blowback against the US would be oversimplifying a complex subject, however, certain actions and events relating to the rise of al-Qa’ida (notably the bombing of the USS Cole, and 9/11) are often argued as such.

Looking beyond references to mujahideen bringing their fight to the US or its allies by way of ‘imported terrorism’ Kennedy-Pipe and Vickers discuss actions by UK Prime Minister Tony Blair around the beginning of 2003. They argue that Blair misunderstood the “pattern of politics at home and perhaps more seriously of the ‘threat’ to the domestic security of the United Kingdom”, and argue that there was not a danger from Saddam Hussein’s alleged weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), “or even from ‘foreign’ terrorists as had happened on 9/11 but from home-grown suicide bombers, some of whom claimed to be inspired by opposition to Blair’s wars… This was the blowback that mattered – and would continue to do so – for the UK” (Kennedy-Pipe and Vickers 2007, 205). In pursuit of his vision for international security, Blair understood the links between international war and domestic terrorism, yet even after 9/11 he failed to appreciate its potential for devastation: “Disregarding the role of the west in the creation of regional crises to which it seeks to respond is unlikely to produce effective policy” (Barkawi and Laffey 2002, 30). This was a lesson too late for the UK involvement in the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

The term blowback is prominent in discussions of US foreign policy. Barkawi and Laffey note, blowback is more than “just a contingent property of particular policies; it is an ever-present and pervasive phenomenon of world politics” (2002, 30). Jay considers blowback “as a label for the ways in which history produced ironic, symmetrical inversions” (2002, 50). In a prediction of the insecurities following the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and a cruel symmetrical inversion from a conflict that aimed to bring greater security to the Middle East with the removal of Saddam Hussein, Bergen and Reynolds in 2005 wrote of “the current war in Iraq” as a struggle that “will generate a ferocious blowback of its own, which – as a [recent] classified CIA assessment predicts – could be

26 longer and more powerful than that from Afghanistan. Foreign volunteers fighting US troops in Iraq [today] will find new targets around the world after the war ends”. However, the Bush administration was at that time busy with numerous crises in Iraq and devoted little time to preparing for longer-term consequences (Bergen and Reynolds 2005, 2).

Considering blowback as a phenomenon not just resulting from US aggression in various regions, but as a symptom that emerges from its strategic and political decisions in various conflicts and proxy wars, may mean broadening the understanding of the term. One week after 9/11, Foden explained that “The sophisticated methods taught to the mojahedin [sic], and the thousands of tonnes of arms supplied to them by the US – and Britain – are now tormenting the west in the phenomenon known as ‘blowback’, whereby a policy strategy rebounds on its own devisers. The sins of the father, it might well be said, are being heaped on the head of the son” (Foden 2001). Clemons updated this line of thought using the example of IS/Daesh: “Like elements of the mujahideen, which benefited from US financial and military support during the Soviet war in Afghanistan and then later turned on the West in the form of al-Qaeda, ISIS achieved scale and consequence through Saudi support, only to now pose a grave threat to the kingdom and the region”, a cautionary lesson in arming Syrian rebels (Clemons 2014).

Sachs (2015) uses a term “blowback terrorism” when discussing attacks on the US by IS/Daesh as “a dreadful unintended result of repeated US and European covert and overt military actions”. Citing discussions of US-supported Israeli violence against Palestinians, Drake refers to a certain hypocrisy in defining these terms, noting “a ridiculously inconsistent concept, with Palestinian violence always presented as a criminal enterprise against which Israeli violence stands in the sharpest possible contrast for its counterterrorist intentions, even when the collateral loss of innocent Palestinian lives is taken into account” (Drake 2008, 81).

In narratives of terrorism, “torture is often cited as a reason for acting against western states, values and intentions both in situ and around the world. The reference to torture has become a key supporting plank of the Al-Qaeda-inspired ‘single narrative’ of western oppression and repression of Islam around the world” (Githens-Mazer 2009, 1024). The question of torture in this context is considered at greater length below.

27 Perhaps most simply summarised, then, blowback is “shorthand for saying that a nation reaps what it sows” (Johnson 2000, 223).

1.5 Radicalisation in a post-9/11 context Neumann notes that the term ‘radicalization’, like terrorism, is “considered political, and its frequent use – especially by governments and officials – is believed to serve political agendas rather than describe a social phenomenon that can be studied and dealt with in a dispassionate and objective manner” (2013, 878). Political radicalisation discussed here involves an increase in preparation for and commitment to intergroup conflict. Descriptively this results from changes in one’s beliefs, feelings and behaviour in a direction that justifies violence and can demand personal sacrifices in defence of a political ideology (McCauley and Moskalenko 2008, 416). Radicalisation of behaviour can evolve from radicalised beliefs and feelings of an individual, a group or a cause.

Even after narrowing the context of the definition in this way, the term political radicalisation remains, as with terrorism, difficult to effectively define, with its analysis partly dependent on who is making the definition and to whom that definition applies. This thesis is concerned with a ‘radical as extremist’ view of the term, whereby it leads to acts of violent extremism against innocents. Violent extremism is classified by the United Kingdom Crown Prosecution Service (UK CPS), as behaviour encouraging, seeking, promoting or justifying the use of violence of any kind to further particular beliefs (UK CPS 2010). In noting that “radicalization refers to increasing extremity of non-state challenges to state authority”, McCauley and Moskalenko summarise a focus on radicalisation of behaviour as relevant in the study of terrorism (2008, 416). The scholarly literature on the phenomenon shows no agreement over what the process is or what the term entails (McFarlane 2010, 4), adding to confusion in the development of counterterrorism research (Richards 2011, 143). King and Taylor assert that it is unrealistic to think that any one model to explain the radicalisation could be distinguished as being more self-evidently accurate than any other (2011, 615).

Macfarlane notes that radicalisation is “a term that is used liberally and generally within law enforcement and security stakeholders alike and creates much debate” (McFarlane 2010, 3). Looking at what it means to be radical offers a solid starting point in any

28 debate on defining terrorist/political radicalisation. Radicalisation is the process of moving away from a position where one’s social views and actions are considered normative, traditional and status quo to a point that is under the same parameters generally considered extreme. Researchers from the Monash Radicalisation Project note that radicalisation refers to “an individual, or group, developing, adopting, supporting and/or advancing belief systems and behaviours which conflict with normative societal behaviour” (Monash 2011). Behaviours or beliefs need to merely conflict with what are considered social norms, a somewhat subjective position but perhaps no less so than if trying to dictate what society might consider as extreme. Putting this explanation of radicalisation into a political context, these evolutions of behaviour amount to increases in “time, money, risk-taking, and violence in support of a political cause” (McCauley and Moskalenko 2008, 416). As most political causes can be shown to have association with, or support from a complimentary political group, these increases in a radicalised individual’s time, money, risk-taking and violence can also be understood to evolve into support for political groups in affiliation to the particular cause.

Radicalisation, or radical behaviour and thoughts, without the use or threat of violence, may not necessarily be considered as problematic as tendencies towards violence, and it can be argued that non-violent radicalisation underpins notions of democratic free speech. However, when individuals or groups use or incite acts of violence to further their cause, stakeholders are required to act (Sageman 2008, 109). Although this thesis does touch on points that also relate to what could be considered non-violent radicalisation, the main discussions are mindful of the term as a concept whereby individuals or groups are moving towards supporting or engaging in violent extremism by way of committing terrorist acts.

The Grand Mufti of Australia Dr Ibrahim Abu Mohamed states that “Radicalism is a disease without country, race, or religion; its direct cause is usually a lack of understanding of religious teachings, wrongly nourished through error of interpretation by individuals who lack the religious education and training” (Mohamed 2016). King and Taylor support this view that the process of radicalization is not confined to any particular group, although noting that in its current form the term “is most often used to describe a phenomenon that leads to home-grown terrorism” (King and Taylor 2011, 603). As will be argued in chapter 6, the misunderstandings and errors that Dr Mohamed

29 mentions have become more prevalent where mass communication is aided by access to the Internet. Via the Internet and social media networks, post-9/11 calls for violent jihad have become increasingly more untested intellectually and theologically. As McFarlane argues, this leaves Individuals seeking scholarly religious advice online all too often in the face of extreme political and ideological views, backed up by overly simplistic religious interpretations with little in the way of counter-narratives (McFarlane 2011, 15-16). These rallying calls to jihad are part of what is known as Online Violent Radicalisation (OVeR). The rapid and continuing growth of the Internet transforms the dynamics and structures of evolving terrorist threats via changes in the way that terrorists and supporters of terrorism interact, although it is still not well understood by terrorists or by those whom they target (Sageman 2008, 109).

Cases of personal research over the Internet into facets of Islamic identity and behaviour have become known as the ‘Sheikh Google Phenomenon’. As reported by Jamal, Gabriele Marranci’s study of the impact of ‘Sheikh Google’ on young Muslims and non- Muslims in the UK, Singapore, Malaysia and Australia, found “a widespread problem” (Jamal 2013). Marranci argues that, “Sheikh Google was responsible for misinforming some young Muslims, particularly on themes such as democratic values and the treatment of women” (cited in Jamal 2013). Marranci further delineates the difference with more traditional ways of seeking advice and counsel in noting that “A website based in Afghanistan or Pakistan, for example, has nothing to do with Australia… And the context – where you live – matters. If you go to an imam, they can say, ‘I know in your village you used to do that, but here you can’t do that’” (cited in Jamal 2013).

Aftab Malik, a global expert on Muslim affairs, notes that while the Internet allows young people to search for answers quickly, the platform ignores “the complexities and nuances of Islamic scholarship” (cited in Jamal 2013). These problems can be compounded by growing linguistic and cultural gaps between many young Muslims and imams at their local mosques with limited grasp of the English language (Jamal 2013). Unlike many more traditionally schooled imams, online extremists are often fluent in English, culturally well briefed or experienced, and capable of building simple narratives of good versus evil, with information quickly disseminated without the requirement of any formal Islamic training. Creating convenient answers and a form of rapidly acquired faith that does not need to be learned, but merely experienced, means the paths of

30 communication are wide open for extremists to take advantage of people seeking answers.

A useful case study of an Internet imam highly skilled at radicalising is the Islamic lecturer Anwar al-Awlaki, a dual citizen of Yemen and the US, born to Yemeni parents in New Mexico in 1971. Alleged by US officials to have been a senior recruiter and motivator for al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and also known as Ansar al- Sharia in Yemen, al-Awlaki released a 23-minute online video in November 2010 in which he called for Muslims to kill Americans regardless of whether they were military or civilian. Dressed in traditional Yemeni clothing including a sheathed dagger, he wore round spectacles while sitting behind a desk to deliver his sermon that appeared on several pro al-Qa’ida websites. Al-Awlaki asserted that, “clerics do not need to issue any special fatwas or religious rulings allowing Americans to be killed because all Americans are the enemy”. He continued in Arabic that jihadis need not consult with anybody in order to kill Americans, "as fighting the devil doesn't require consultation or prayers seeking divine guidance. They are the party of the devils… It is either us or them" (Al Jazeera 2010). McFarlane notes that in 2010 AQAP had made “numerous online pleas for neo-jihadists around the world to kill the kuffar (disbelievers) regardless of its permissibility or sanctioning within the Islamic religion” (2011, 16). The second issue of al-Qa’ida’s Inspire magazine carried an article by Yahya Ibrahim stating that,

It is a simple idea and there is not much involved in its preparation. All that is needed is the willingness to give one’s life for Allah… The idea is to use a pickup truck as a mowing machine, not to mow grass but mow down the enemies of Allah. You would need a 4WD pickup truck. The stronger the better. You would then need to weld on steel blades on the front end of the truck. These could be a set of butcher blades or thick sheets of steel. They do not need to be extra sharp because with the speed of the truck at the time of impact, even a blunter edge would slice through bone very easily. You may raise the level of the blades as high as the headlights. That would make the blades strike your targets at the torso level or higher… (MEMRI 2010).

Messages from al-Awlaki had previously encouraged Muslims to kill US soldiers, and justified the deaths of innocent civilians with claims that the US and its allies have been intentionally killing millions of civilian Muslims in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere. However, the message of his 2010 sermon appeared much stronger, stating explicitly that justification for US and allied deaths was no longer needed (Al Jazeera 2010). Al- Awlaki and other clerics recruiting to the jihadi cause provide evidence of how people

31 can be encouraged to modify their understanding of faith, and of what it can permit or forbid them to do in pursuit of perceived justice. As with terrorism, the meaning of radicalisation can be made malleable by the definer, and complicated further depending on whom it is they refer to as the radicalised subject.

US intelligence was able to link al-Awlaki to at least two of the five hijackers responsible for crashing American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon, on the basis of interviews with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM). Al-Awlaki regularly met Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Midhar during 2000 while he was serving as imam at Masjid Ar-Ribat al-Islami, the Sunni mosque in La Mesa in California. Another imam to meet the two hijackers was Omar al-Bayoumi who served at a mosque in San Diego. This is among evidence taken from documents obtained via the US Freedom of Information Act and the US government’s 9/11 Commission, suggesting that al-Awlaki along with other respected religious figures was a dangerous motivator indifferent to more widely accepted understandings of Islamic texts that condemn violence against innocents (Berger 2011; Jones 2012, 293). Further evidence points to al-Awlaki as a likely recruiter of those wishing to engage in violent jihad on behalf of al-Qa’ida: “for the helpers, Awlaki was not just a friend or an acquaintance… but an authority figure and a source of inspiration” (Berger 2011). Another follower of al-Awlaki around this time was Nidal Hasan, a US Army psychiatrist who in 2009 shot dead 13 soldiers at Fort Hood following email exchanges with al-Awlaki (Berger 2011).

Movement away from faith-based justifications for violent extremism to more radical rhetoric eroding premises of mainstream faith can also be seen in al-Awlaki’s verbal assaults on many rulers of the Arab world, whom he called on religious scholars to designate as “non-Muslims" for betraying the Muslim community or umma: “Kings, emirs, and presidents are now not qualified to lead the nation, or even a flock of sheep… If the leaders are corrupt, the scholars have the responsibility to lead the nation”. Al- Awlaki argued that, “the only way Muslims can protect themselves from the threat of the infidels is by supporting the ‘mujahedeen’… referring to al-Qaeda fighters” (Al Jazeera 2010).

For King and Taylor, “the term radicalization in its current form is most often used to describe a phenomenon that leads to homegrown terrorism. In contrast to transnational

32 terrorism, where people plot to attack a foreign country, homegrown terrorism is characterized by perpetrators who are born and raised in the very country they wish to attack” (2011, 603). Many terrorist acts in the US and particularly in Europe have been attributed to groups such as IS/Daesh and al-Qa’ida despite being committed by small autonomous homegrown cells, or individuals described as lone wolves or self-starting terrorists. As Sageman noted in 2009, “78% of all global neo-jihadi terrorist plots in the West in the past five years came from autonomous homegrown groups without any connection, direction or control from al-Qaeda Core or its allies”, but nevertheless inspired by them (2009, 11, 20).

Homegrown terrorists feature among the highest threats to national and international security for many states, following events such as the train bombings in Madrid on 11 March 2004, the murder of the Dutch film director Theo van Gogh on 2 November 2004, and attacks in Berlin, Paris, Manchester, London and Barcelona in 2017. These incidents are in addition to failed terrorist plots such as the ‘Toronto 18’ in Canada, Denmark’s ‘Vollmose group’ and the ‘Benbrika group’ in Australia (King and Taylor 2011, 603). Cases of homegrown terrorism involve people recruiting themselves to an extremist cause, in effect self-radicalising and shifting their ideas of social and/or political justice to seek out what they see as legitimate justifications for violent extremism.

A propensity for self-radicalisation along with access to “Sheikh Google” and exposure to political narratives from speakers such as al-Awlaki, bin Laden and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi can blur distinctions between right and wrong in a socio-political as well as a psychological sense. As an example of this Pearson cites the case of British university student Roshonara Choudhry, who attempted to kill her UK Member of Parliament (MP) Stephen Timms by stabbing him during a constituency surgery on 14 May 2010. This case is one of solitary online radicalisation rather than of a collective real-world phenomenon; Choudhry’s name has even “became a by-word for the possibility of violent self-radicalization on the Internet and a symbol of Muslim women as a new security threat” (Pearson 2015, 2; Brown and Saeed 2015, 1953). Choudhry’s actions were considered to be the result of indoctrination by Anwar al-Awlaki, whose entire set of around 100 hours of video sermons she had downloaded and watched (Neumann 2012). In seeking to fully understand terrorist radicalisation, individuals who are

33 essentially extremist motivational speakers passing themselves off as religious scholars and clerics add to the difficulty of effectively defining the term.

The specific processes of radicalisation are beyond the scope of this review, but discussions of some findings concerning paths to and causes of radicalisation are covered in chapter 2, and chapters 5 and 6 further discuss the impact of popular culture and media on radicalisation and terrorism, and how the Internet and social media have affected patterns of Islamic radicalisation since 9/11. Having canvassed a definition of sorts via reviewing previous research into terrorist radicalisation, this thesis engages with debates on radicalisation as a process relating to post-9/11 Islamic terrorism. It uses case studies alongside theoretical debates on the positioning of post-9/11 Islamic and relevant far-right radicalisation. Any analysis of post-9/11 radicalisation is not a central theme, but it is something that can be viewed with an expanded perspective accompanied by developing the concept of CE beyond that set out by Eatwell in 2006.

Conclusion This chapter reviews literature concerning the five contested terms of cumulative extremism, war, terrorism, blowback and radicalisation, and the debates around those terms. This process goes beyond discussing dictionary or legal definitions for these terms so as to place this thesis within debates on what each term means in post-9/11 conversations on security and Islamic terrorism in the context of wider international relations research. The terms discussed are engaged with as nodes of argument, or arguments per se in some cases, rather than as stipulations.

34 CHAPTER 2 THE IMPACT OF POST-9/11 ISLAMIC TERRORISM

This chapter introduces the impact of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism, leading into questions around its impact on civil liberties. Tensions between international security, and civil liberties and social freedoms have become more acute since 9/11. A central narrative of this thesis revolves on a security versus rights balance, where political, social and media discourses can contribute to cumulative extremism and arguably radicalisation to violent extremism. Using arguments reviewing the five terms set out in chapter 1, this chapter assesses some impacts from Islamic terrorism, and examines how they directly and indirectly threaten well-established rights and liberties in Western society. The thesis moves towards analyses of political and military reactions to 9/11 by US-led programs of torture and increases in targeted assassinations by drones. It then reflexively analyses the part played by mainstream news media in the framing of post-9/11 discourses on terrorism, indicating the usefulness of developing the concept of cumulative extremism. Issues of rights versus liberties, moral parameters on counterterrorism policy and popular media narratives affect how the public views the so-called ‘war on terror’, and thereby what policies and restrictions on our freedoms we may be prepared to accept in disrupting post-9/11 Islamic terrorism.

The substance of this two-part chapter linking the global reach and immediacy of post- 9/11 Islamic terrorism with restrictions on human rights and liberty is underpinned by the concern of human rights lawyer Helena Kennedy that “One of the reasons why it is now so hard to engage popular support for the protection of civil liberties is that we are also losing our historic memory of the need for such safeguards” (Kennedy 2004, 13). Baroness Kennedy notes that most people would agree that “preventing terrorism, combating crime and securing justice for victims are clear moral imperatives; arguments about civil liberties and human rights are vulnerable to dismissive accusations of abstraction and vagueness when compared to the tangible effects of violence on the lives of real people” (Kennedy 2004, 13). The way in which governments, media, and terrorist organisations have used 9/11 and the ‘war’ against terrorism for political capital can perhaps jog our historic memory in considering issues between security and rights.

The first section of this chapter discusses reactions to the violence of 9/11, the wars initiated and the lives lost, along with the rhetoric of the so-called ‘war on terror’ and some US policy decisions that followed the attacks. The second section focuses on how post-9/11 US rhetoric, US counterterrorism policies, and efforts to increase security in response to transnational jihadi terrorism have affected our liberties and human rights. Some arguments for restricting our liberties and rights in the name of security may initially seem abstract and overly theoretical when viewed against the more tangible physical violence of terrorism, but this does not render them any less important.

To contextualise Islamic terrorism and discussions on security as well as moral ambiguity and social compromises since 9/11, an overview is provided of its political and social aftermath beginning with the war to remove Afghanistan’s Taliban government. This is followed by discussion of the unsanctioned US-led invasion of Iraq under President George W. Bush in March 2003, and the pursuit of al-Qa’ida leader Osama bin Laden and associated figures. This chapter then examines developments in organisations such as al- Qa’ida, and later IS/Daesh, which have evolved from roles as the chief operators in Islamic terrorism to effectively its chief motivators. After 9/11 radical preachers began targeting people with ideas of justice opposed to the US and its allies, reaching out to groom extremists and self-starting terrorists to wage a global holy war. This chapter provides a brief historical overview of the trends and evolution of the two major Islamic terrorist groups IS/Daesh and al-Qa’ida, since 9/11 up to mid-2018, along with US interactions. It does this to later help explain how the concept of cumulative extremism being expanded and developed beyond violent movements and state reactions can help us better understand and inform the relevant academic and political debates.

PART 1: THE EXTENDED REACH OF ISLAMIC TERRORISM The spectre of Islamic terrorism was transformed by 9/11, and increased its reach via the momentum of technology and globalisation. New and evolving forces such as the self-declared Caliphate of the Islamic State active in parts of Syria and Iraq are discussed here, as well as a trend of ‘franchising’ by inspiring self-starting radicals in support of terrorist networks. Both IS/Daesh and al-Qa’ida operate with overarching central control structures laid over cell networks, working as motivators for self-starting terrorism. These ‘homegrown’ attacks are achieved through converting disenfranchised individuals

36 into jihadis, as well as through increasing the radicalisation of members of Muslim Diasporas around the world. Actions by converted and self-proclaimed terrorists such as the 2013 public murder of UK soldier Lee Rigby in London, and the 2014 incident in the Canadian parliament involving gunman Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, exist alongside those of self-confessed jihadis such as the UK’s Richard Dart, which are cited in the discussions on jihadism and terrorism.

As the Dutch politician and former European Union anti-terrorism co-ordinator Gijs de Vries states, the threat posed by Islamic terrorism does not only come from the human casualties it creates (cited in Coolsaet 2008). De Vries notes that statistics do not tell the whole story, with the most insidious consequences including

… a climate of suspicion and fear both between Muslims and non-Muslims and among Muslim themselves. In democratic countries terrorism deepens ethnic and religious divisions. In non-democratic states it bolsters the forces of authoritarianism. Everywhere governments are at risk of over-reacting in the fight against terrorism and of compromising the very rights and liberties they have pledged to uphold (in Coolsaet 2008, xv-xvi).

Post-9/11 terrorist threats represent a patchwork of local self-radicalising groups aided by international contacts, able to operate to a large degree independently of a central engine. Coolsaet refers to Glenn Audenaert, a leading Belgian police official working in counterterrorism, who observes that jihadi terrorism is a “glocal phenomenon: a cloak patched from different sources of local discontent, stitched together by a puritanical and radical interpretation of Islam, and thriving on a global momentum” (Coolsaet 2008, 1).

Post-9/11 Islamic terrorism ties its narratives to considerations that US and allied foreign policies bear some responsibility for creating international and domestic enemies, with reference to torture, drones, collateral damage and disproportionality. However this thesis goes further than much of the existing body of literature to date, by also analysing overtly sensationalist social and popular mainstream news media reactions as playing a part in an expansion of cumulative extremism, themselves contributing to the spectre of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism.

2.1 The morning of 12 September 2001: A new world dawn Al-Qa’ida’s unprecedented attack on the US and the reaction it provoked marked a fundamental reshaping of international relations. De Vries notes that, “although the war [on terror] paradigm may have proven controversial legally as well as politically, it is the prism through which America has come to see and deal with much of the world” (Coolsaet 2008, xv). This development cannot be considered inevitable, given the warnings of Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev almost 30 years earlier in respect to the US supporting Afghanistan’s mujahideen, soldiers who had previously been considered by the US as ‘freedom fighters’, and the failure to address the power vacuum in Afghanistan with the effective defeat of Russian forces (Gardner 2005, 9).

As noted above, President Bush first used the term ‘war on terror’ in his 20 September 2001 address to Congress (Bush 2001). In declaring a US-led ‘global war on terror’ the speech invoked legal, military and political difficulties associated with defining terrorism and war as discussed in chapter 1, and revisited in chapter 4 in discussing legal arguments concerning drone use and proportional responses under international law. Gardner addresses other provocative aspects of US foreign policy rhetoric that fuel disputes with inflammatory terms such as the “axis of evil”. This merging of simplistic quasi-religious “good versus evil” dichotomies with misleading references to global struggles such as World War Two, serves to garner domestic and international popular support for US policies through manipulating the language of mass media. As a catchphrase for post-9/11 US administrations, the so-called ‘war on terror’ has become a “perfect formula for perpetual conflict”, providing “no direction… and no foreseeable resolution” (Gardner 2005, 14).

Seth Jones, Associate Director of the International Security and Defense Policy Center at the RAND Corporation and a former senior adviser at US Special Operations Command, records that after 9/11, the US resorted to a variety of counterterrorism strategies, one being “overwhelming force – the deployment of large numbers of conventional forces overseas to destroy terrorist groups and their support networks” (Jones 2012, 25). The build-up of US and allied military in Iraq and Afghanistan illustrated these strategies clearly. However, the removal of the Taliban regime in Kabul by the US and its post-9/11 allies was at best only a job half done. There was also a “light-footprint approach”,

38 which comprised a much smaller military presence and reliance on clandestine law enforcement, intelligence and special operations designed to aid foreign governments in dismantling al-Qa’ida and offering more precise targeting of terrorist actors. Jones notes that this lighter approach has in fact been more effective in weakening al-Qa’ida, while at the same time minimising radicalisation (Jones 2012, 25).

There were almost immediate changes to laws affecting the rights of citizens in some US allied states. For example, in Australia new powers were granted to the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), to allow questioning, detention and monitoring of suspected terrorists, and of “Australian citizens who are not suspected of any involvement with terrorism but who might have information of use to the government” (Lynch and Williams 2006, 29). The ASIO Legislation Amendment (Terrorism) Bill, Introduced on 21 March 2002, was one of Prime Minister John Howard’s first legislative responses to 9/11. It allowed ASIO to strip-search and detain adults and children who were not suspects but were deemed to have useful information about terrorism (Lynch and Williams 2006, 32). Detainees were denied the right to silence and risked up to five years in prison if they failed to answer any question put by ASIO; access to legal advice was only guaranteed after the first 48 hours of detention. Although the ASIO Bill did state that people “must be treated with humanity and with respect for human dignity”, there was no penalty specified for officers subjecting “detainees to inhumane treatment, or even to torture” (Lynch and Williams 2006, 32-33). A revised compromise version of this legislation was passed on 26 June 2003, permitting questioning only on the order of a judge, and providing that any interrogation was to be carried out before a retired judge (Lynch and Williams 2006, 33-34). The formulation and passage of the bill provides an example of a panicked legal response to 9/11 outside of the US, and raises questions about how far Australia has gone in limiting democratic rights as part of its fight against terrorism. ASIO as an organisation grew massively at this time, with its budget increasing from AU$69 million in 2001-2002 to AU$340.6 million five years later (Lynch and Williams 2006, 30).

2.2 Empires of jihad 1: The Taliban, bin Laden and al-Qa’ida Since the 1979 Iranian Revolution, a variety of fundamentalist Muslim groups have conducted international terrorist attacks on Western-based democracy. The journalist

39 Hooman Majd stated, “Until the Iranian revolution, the United States had been very reluctant, under [President] Jimmy Carter, to create a base in the Middle East… The revolution changed their calculus” (cited in Parvaz 2014). Majd argues that since the emergence of Hezbollah in the aftermath of the Israeli invasion of South Lebanon in 1982, the Islamic Republic of Iran in effect opened a second front of resistance to Israeli geopolitical ambitions that had not previously been imagined (Parvaz 2014).

David Rapoport, the founder of the academic journal Terrorism and Political Violence, in discussing the evolution of political violence, speaks of historical waves of terrorism and argues that “Islam is at the heart of the [fourth] wave”: a “religious wave”. Rapoport argues that “The political events providing the hope for the fourth wave [that] originated in Islam, and the successes achieved apparently influenced religious terror groups elsewhere” (Rapoport 2004, 61). Although religious elements have long contributed to terrorism with overlaps between political, ethnic and religious identities, religion now has a stronger significance than prior to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the beginnings of the Taliban and al-Qa’ida. Many religious groups through faith- based/political extremism go further than just committing terrorism; some offer political manifestos, organising principles and even extended justifications for the creation of new strictly religious, non-secular states.

There was a gathering of force by the “religious wave” following the USSR invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, with local resistance to the invasion strengthened by Sunni volunteer fighters from around the world, including the Riyadh-born Saudi Arabian millionaire known as Osama bin Laden (Gray 2003, 77). Resistance to the Soviet invasion was subsidised by the US, and the Soviets were forced out of Afghanistan in 1989, a step that Rapoport calls “crucial… in the stunning and unimaginable disintegration of the Soviet Union itself”. States with large Muslim populations, such as Azerbaijan, Chechnya, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan suddenly became important new political battlefields for Islamic rebels, with confident and experienced veterans of the Afghani campaign becoming major participants in these new conflicts (Rapoport 2004, 62).

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, geopolitical unrest and the movement of battle-trained jihadis aided the evolution of Islamic extremists towards a new radicalisation against the US, continuing through the build-up to 9/11 and beyond. An

40 understanding of the events at this time helps in identifying the growing impact and significance of Islamic terrorism. By 9/11 an average of 109 people each month were being killed by Islamic terrorists, with the global rate increasing to about 158 people killed per month in the six years following 9/11, a 45% rise in casualties. This figure however excludes fatalities from terror attacks in the resulting conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan; if these conflicts are included, the fatality rate in the six years following 9/11 reached an average of 529 people killed monthly by Islamic terrorism (Berman 2009, 1). Kennedy observes in response to patterns of increasing religious violence that the question of a new legal regime to respond to international terrorism became urgent (Kennedy 2004, 44). Discussions of political violence and how international law needs to keep up with its trends are reflected in the Council of Europe’s statement that “Extremism, whatever its nature, is a form of political activity that overtly or covertly rejects the principles of parliamentary democracy and very often bases its ideology, and its political practices and conduct, on intolerance, exclusion, xenophobia, anti-Semitism and ultra-nationalism” (Council of Europe 2003, I [3]). This statement supports the position of this thesis on defining terrorism from chapter 1, and that expressed in Quiggin (2010): that terrorism is essentially a political act.

In 1996 the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan was established by the Taliban, ultraconservative Sunnis mostly educated in religious schools in Pakistan, which seized power in the aftermath of the 1989 Soviet withdrawal. This new emirate strictly enforced Islamic law or Sharia, and oversaw an extreme and austere public code, prohibiting women from attending schools, as well as from most other social activities unless accompanied by a male relative, and mandating the wearing of the burkah at all times when in public. All forms of electronic entertainment and music were forbidden (Wright- Neville 2010, 188). As supporters of terrorism against the US, the Taliban government under Mullah Omar offered shelter to likeminded extremist groups, most notably al- Qa’ida (McCants 2016, 9). The government acted as the host of Osama bin Laden, along with several al-Qa’ida training camps from the late-1990s through to 2001, in which the 9/11 attack was planned (Wright-Neville 2010, 188).

2.3 “We have some planes” On 11 September 2001 a Boston air traffic controller heard a transmission from an al-

41 Qa’ida hijacker: “We have some planes. Just stay quiet and you’ll be okay. We are returning to the airport” (Sherwell 2011). This was the initial move in what is described by Andrew Tan as “the first true mass-casualty terrorist act in modern times” (2002, 233), with approximately 3000 people killed in the combined attacks (Elsis 2002). Under the effective leadership of Osama bin Laden, al-Qa’ida had long been suspected of being behind a number of attacks against US interests overseas, most against US military personnel (Davies B 2003, 86). However, the attacks of 9/11 on the mainland United States exhibited a new degree of power and global reach for al-Qa’ida. President Bush stated that the US-led ‘war on terror’ would begin with Osama bin Laden and al-Qa’ida, but that it would not end there (Gardner 2005, 15; O’Connell 2005, 452).

A great deal of literature and debate on al-Qa’ida and its associates around the end of 2001 was devoted to discussing and trying to gainsay the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden, and much of the US counterterrorism infrastructure was involved in attempting to locate the al-Qa’ida leader to bring him to justice ‘dead or alive’. President Bush issued stern warnings to any state found to have sheltered bin Laden: “All I can tell you is that Osama bin Laden is a prime suspect and the people who house him, encourage him, provide food, comfort or money are on notice” (Orin 2001). Bush also warned Americans that the ‘war’ to stamp out terrorism would be long and costly and “might be short on the kinds of operations and obvious victories that are seen in traditional wars” (ABC News 2001). After the attacks, the Taliban called bin Laden a guest, and denied that he had any role in the 9/11 attacks as well as other events in which the US considered him a suspect, such as the October 2000 attack on the US Navy vessel the USS Cole in Yemen. President Bush noted in particular that the “Taliban must take my statement seriously” (Orin 2001; ABC News 2001).

Sayyid Imam Abd al-Aziz al-Sharif, former leader of Egyptian Islamic Jihad and a close friend of the al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, considered the attacks of 9/11 to be barbaric and un-Islamic. Al-Sharif wrote that Osama bin Laden betrayed his hosts Mullah Omar and the people of Afghanistan “by orchestrating an international terrorist attack while living on Afghan soil under Omar’s protection”. He felt that this opened up the Taliban to an inevitable military response from the US: “Afghanistan and its people were the ones who paid the price” (Jones 2012, 72).

42 It is necessary to report on the actual attacks of 9/11 as forming an effective start date of arguments for this expansion and development of Eatwell’s initial 2006 CE formulation, towards a concept going beyond studies of violence spiralling upwards. In the wake of such historical and tragic events political science should be able to effectively encompass cultural, social, and other political factors (beyond hard power) as impacting on extremist violence.

2.4 Empires of jihad 2: From Al-Qa’ida in Iraq to the Islamic State/Daesh Following the Soviet Union’s 1988/1989 withdrawing of forces from Afghanistan, a major al-Qa’ida figure in Qandahar and former colonel in Egyptian Special Forces, Sayf al-Adl, was reported as believing that an Islamic state would develop out of the Taliban’s new Islamic emirate. However, he abandoned this belief following the 2001 US invasion of Afghanistan (McCants 2016, 7-10). As early as mid-November 2001, US and allied forces had removed the political leadership of the Taliban, paving the way for a new US- approved-government in Kabul. However, most of the Taliban’s rank and file members, were unscathed by the US military operation. Wiener notes, “They trimmed their beards and melted into the villages” awaiting the chance to return when the US would inevitably tire from the physical, economic and political costs of this Afghanistan invasion (Wiener 2007, 558). For al-Qa’ida, the US invasions “demonstrated the power of al-Qaida to provoke the sole remaining super power to drain its military and human resources in endless and costly occupation”. The US invasion unwittingly weakened many of al-Qa’ida’s competitors, those with largely regional agendas who had opposed attacking the US: “These groups lost their sanctuaries in Afghanistan and their remnants gravitated towards al-Qaida” (Lia 2008, 5).

After the fall of the Taliban government, al-Adl along with the Jordanian jihadi Abu Mus’ab al-Zarqawi fled Afghanistan and sought shelter in the Islamic Republic of Iran. The two men discussed strategies as to where al-Zarqawi and his supporters should go next: “After ‘long study and deliberation’ Sayf al-Adl later wrote, Zarqawi’s group decided to relocate to Iraq, where their ‘appearance’ and ‘dialect’ would help them blend in” (McCants 2016, 7-9). Predicting that the US would invade Iraq in order to overthrow Saddam Hussein, al-Zarqawi and al-Adl felt it was necessary for them to remain there in order to play a major role in the conflict and to be inspirational in the

43 forthcoming confrontation and resistance. Al-Adl considered this to be a “historical opportunity… to establish the state of Islam, which would play the greatest role in lifting injustice and bringing truth to this world, by God’s permission” (McCants 2016, 9-10).

Late in 2002 and into early 2003, al-Zarqawi built a clandestine network of jihadists in Iraq. When the US invaded in March 2003, al-Zarqawi’s Baghdad cells were waiting for the invading US forces. By the end of August 2003 his new group Monotheism and Jihad had bombed the Jordanian embassy and the UN headquarters in Baghdad, along with one of Shi’a Islam’s holiest shrines, the mosque of Imam Ali. The beginning of a long sectarian war was signalled by tensions among Iraq’s majority Shi’a population, coinciding with the departure of the UN mission from Baghdad. The sectarian divide at this stage should not be underestimated, for as far as al-Zarqawi was concerned, Shi’a Muslims were “selling out the Sunnis” to the US, and as “servants of the Antichrist” the Shi’a would “appear at the end of time to fight against the Muslims” (McCants 2016, 10).

Haykel summarises the worsening situation in Iraq being more than a ‘war’ against Islam, noting that “The Jihadi-Salafi movements of al-Qaeda (AQ) and the so-called Islamic State (IS) are the product of a history of Sunni Islamic revivalist movements that have sought to empower Muslims against what they describe as Islam’s enemies”, adding that these enemies were “both external and internal” (Haykel 2016, 71). Al- Zarqawi’s hatred of Shi’a Islam influenced his long-term political focus. In February 2004 he sought official membership of al-Qa’ida, and concentrated on a strategy to win over the Sunni community in order to defeat the transitional US-sponsored government of Iraq, and to drive the infidels from the region (McCants 2016, 10-11). Al-Zarqawi sought alliance with the existing al-Qa’ida leadership in “fighting the sects of apostasy”, and promised that if AQ assented to his strategy, he would publicly join his group to theirs: “we will be your readied soldiers, working under your banner, complying with your orders… swearing fealty to you publicly and in the news media, vexing the infidels and gladdening those who preach the oneness of god” (McCants 2016, 11; Al-Zarqawi 2004, ch. 6).

In contrast to plans by bin Laden and al-Zawahiri to continue attacks on the US and stir up wider Muslim support to compel the US and its allied forces to leave the region, al- Zarqawi sought to first “overthrow the local autocrats and eliminate the ‘traitorous’

44 Shi’a, whom he believed were collaborating with the Americans to subjugate the Sunnis”. Al-Zarqawi’s strategy was to ignite a sectarian civil war in Iraq, believing that he “could will a caliphate into being regardless of what its subjects might say”, that is, popular support was far less of a concern for him than it was for bin Laden and al- Zawahiri (McCants 2016, 11). In October 2004, bin Laden and al-Zawahiri accepted an oath of allegiance from al-Zarqawi. Al-Qa’ida was desperate for a role in the growing Sunni insurgency in Iraq, and the joining of al-Zarqawi’s Monotheism and Jihad with al- Qa’ida achieved that: al-Qa’ida in Iraq (AQI) was born. Although sharing in al-Zarqawi’s desire to work towards re-establishing an Islamic caliphate, bin Laden and al-Zawahiri advised the AQI leader to first build popular support, and to concentrate on expelling the US forces from the region before declaring an Islamic emirate and consolidating Sunni support in Iraq and the surrounding countries on the way to reaching the “level of caliphate” (McCants 2016, 12). Al-Zarqawi was counselled to ignore for a time the heresies of some Sunni clerics whose support the organisation needed, and to cooperate with community leaders. The AQI leader was also counselled to cease the broadcast of executions, notably beheadings, with al-Zawahiri chiding him that although these displays “may thrill zealous young men”, the wider Muslim community would “never find them palatable”. Al-Zawahiri felt that AQI jihadis should not “stir questions in the hearts and minds of the people about the benefits of our actions”, but instead should accept that the movement was involved in a media battle for support from a much wider base, if not the whole of the Muslim community (McCants 2016, 12-13).

Questioning al-Zarqawi’s cornerstone strategy in trying to start a sectarian civil war between Sunni and Shi’a Muslims, al-Zawahiri maintained that there was nothing to gain from attacks on Shi’as that “won’t be acceptable to the Muslim populace however much you have tried to explain [them]” (McCants 2016, 13). Attiya Abd al-Rahman, a member of bin Laden’s inner circle was more direct in a letter to al-Zarqawi in December 2005, stating that policy “must be dominant over militarism… one of the pillars of war that is agreed upon by all nations, whether they are Muslims or unbelievers”, and cautioning that the jihadis’ short-term goal and successes should serve their “ultimate goals and highest aims”, or risk exhausting themselves to no effect (McCants 2016, 13; al-Rahman 2005). Al-Rahman’s letter was critical of al-Zarqawi’s strategies and behaviour in Iraq, and although al-Rahman praised al-Zarqawi’s military successes against US and allied forces in Iraq, he was generally more concerned by al-Zarqawi’s apparent failure to

45 respect al-Qa’ida’s broader strategic objective of attracting support from the wider Sunni community in Iraq. Al-Rahman reminded al-Zarqawi that military operations should be subservient to al-Qa’ida’s long-term political goals. According to al-Rahman, al-Zarqawi’s violence against popular Sunni leaders undermined al-Qa’ida’s ability to win the hearts and minds of the people and al-Zarqawi’s ever-widening scope of operations, culminating in the November 2005 hotel bombings in Amman, alienated many fellow Sunnis and reduced global support for the al-Qa’ida movement. In the letter al-Rahman instructed al-Zarqawi to follow orders from Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri on all major strategic issues, asserting that, “You need all of these people… to destroy a power and a state and erect on its rubble the state of Islam” (al-Rahman 2005).

Al-Qa’ida leaders in Pakistan were particularly dismayed at al-Zarqawi’s approval and planning of the triple suicide bombing in Amman in 2005 that resulted in the deaths of 60 people, and injuring 115 others. Most of the victims were Muslims and television footage of the attacks showed severed body parts and blood-splattered floors. Al- Rahman’s message was that al-Zarqawi should show restraint and consult with al-Qa’ida leadership more closely. Although al-Zarqawi had formally joined al-Qa’ida, he remained out of touch with its senior counsel in Pakistan, and for many in the organisation this was unacceptable (Jones 2012, 250).

At first al-Zarqawi appeared to accept the views of bin Laden and al-Zawahiri, that expelling the US and allied forces in Iraq should be the first priority. He exclaimed, “First we will expel the enemy… Then we will establish the State of Islam”, following which he envisaged that the jihadis would embark on conquests of Muslim lands, reclaiming them before setting their sights on the infidels. However, by April 2006 al-Zarqawi had changed his mind. When announcing the formation of a new consultative council in the region, made up of several jihadi groups including AQI, he described it as the nucleus for an Islamic state to be established in around three months (McCants 2016, 14-15). However, before he could see his prediction through, al-Zarqawi was killed on 7 June 2006, with AQI at the time facing a growing revolt in Iraq’s Anbar province (Jones 2012, 250; McCants 2016, 15). Different versions of his death were reported, including an account hosted on the respected Special Operations Forces Situation Report website run by Brandon Webb, a former US Navy SEAL sniper, that al-Zarqawi was killed in cold blood as he lay grievously wounded (Harnden 2014). What is agreed upon is that the

46 Jordanian terrorist was traced to a palm grove in Hibhib, northeast of Baghdad, whereupon US forces called in a F-16 fighter aircraft firing laser-guided bombs and shortly afterwards al-Zarqawi was dead (Scahill 2013, 179). Coalition authorities buried al-Zarqawi’s remains “in a secret location in Baghdad”. His home country Jordan refused to have his body interred there given the numerous attacks for which he was responsible (Michael 2007, 352).

Underlying political ambitions exacerbated differences between the traditional core of al-Qa’ida, and the incoming Islamic State (IS/Daesh) group. But perhaps it was Al- Zarqawi’s death that hastened the decision by AQI to carry out their leader’s dying wish, instead of waiting for the US to withdraw from the region before publicly declaring the first modern incarnation of the Islamic State, as both bin Laden and al-Zawahiri wanted and as al-Rahman had strongly counselled. Against the private wishes and advice of al- Qa’ida central, the Islamic State was proclaimed on 15 October 2006. The leadership responsible for the announcement required that “Muslims in Iraq pledge allegiance to a certain Abu Umar al-Baghdadi”. IS called this new figurehead the “commander of the faithful” in order that it would “encourage jihadists to think of him as the caliph without explicitly saying so” (McCants 2016, 15). These moves betrayed the motives of this early version of Islamic State as striving for legitimacy and increased leadership over Muslims worldwide. Abu Ayyub al-Masri, the frontline successor to al-Zarqawi, effectively dissolved AQI following the declaration of the Islamic State in Iraq. According to the chief judge of the Islamic State in Iraq, al-Masri was in a rush “to establish the State because he believed the Mahdi, the Muslim saviour, would come within the year. To his thinking, the caliphate needed to be in place to help the Mahdi fight the final battle of the apocalypse”. On being made minister of war for the state al-Masri proclaimed, “We are the army that shall hand over the flag to the servant of god, the Mahdi… if the first of us is killed, the last of us will deliver it” (McCants 2016, 32).

The so-called Islamic State under the command of Abu Umar al-Baghdadi was one of scores of militant Sunni groups fighting in northern Iraq, and as Fisher reports, “accounts differ about how effective or distinct it was”. However, in March 2008 US Lieutenant Colonel Rod Coffey remembers finding the Islamic State’s gold-fringed black banner about 50 miles north of Baghdad. Coffey recalled, “These were people who, unlike Bin Laden, said, ‘We are going to control ground now, create a government, create a

47 society, run this place on a steppingstone to creating a caliphate’” (Fisher 2015). When the Islamic State in Iraq was proclaimed it had no flag of its own, and it was not until January 2007 that al-Qa’ida’s media arm al-Fajr released a picture of the new flag of the Islamic State (McCants 2016, 19-20). Despite this there was confusion in the messages from al-Qa’ida and from IS, including an underlying ambiguity that seemed to suit the new organisation, “although most of the Islamic State’s members at this time were part of al-Qaeda in Iraq, the Islamic State made no mention of al-Qaeda or of members’ pre- existing oaths of allegiance to Bin Laden or to Mullah Omar, the head of the Taliban” (McCants 2016, 16). This lack of clarity was allowed to exist despite the proclamation by the head of AQI and later founder of Islamic State al-Masri of loyalty to bin Laden as head of al-Qa’ida, and to Mullah Omar, just four months earlier.

A jihadi commentator summarised the unfolding confusion on a private Internet discussion board: “How can we pledge allegiance to Abu Umar al-Baghdadi when we may have pledged allegiance to Mullah Omar? What do we do with the pledge of allegiance to Shaykh Osama if we want to pledge allegiance to Shaykh Abu Umar?” (Abi 2006). The decision proclaiming the Islamic State was taken without consulting al- Qa’ida’s leadership, taking bin Laden and al-Zawahiri by surprise. US spokesman for al- Qa’ida Adam Gadahn noted that this unauthorised proclamation had “caused splits in the ranks of the mujahids and their supporters inside and outside Iraq” (Gadahn 2011, 8). Al-Zawahiri later confirmed that neither al-Qa’ida general command nor its emir bin Laden were asked for permission, consulted, or even warned prior to the announcement of the Islamic State (McCants 2016, 16-17).

McCants notes that the Islamic State sought privately to mend the rift with bin Laden and al-Zawahari. Al-Masri as the former head of AQI and the “actual leader of the new Islamic State” assured the al-Qa’ida leadership that his “commander to the faithful” Abu Umar al-Baghdadi had pledged his allegiance to bin Laden before the jihadis in Iraq. Al- Masri was keen to preserve the state’s ties to al-Qa’ida, yet also to encourage onlookers to view it as a separate entity, in the hope the world would see IS as a state rather than an Islamic terrorist franchise. Creating ambiguity was a large part of early IS propaganda. Abu Umar al-Baghdadi declared on 22 December 2006 that al-Qa’ida was “but one of the groups in the Islamic State”. On 19 April 2007 it was announced that al-Masri “was now the minister of war in the State’s first cabinet” (Youssef 2007; McCants 2016, 17).

48 Al-Qa’ida’s leadership was angered by these perceived challenges to bin Laden’s authority. In Spring 2007 there were many questions as to the haste with which the proclamation of the Islamic State had occurred, such as whether the commander’s appointment followed Islamic rules, and why had the state been declared sooner rather than later in contravention of the advice and rulings from central al-Qa’ida leadership. “By declaring itself prematurely, the Islamic State had taken on the burdens of governing and invited foreign intervention, both of which could prove lethal to the nascent enterprise” (McCants 2016, 18; al-Ansari 2014). This historical narrative is provided to illustrate the geopolitical evolution in Iraq and Syria around this time, as it went beyond mere efforts towards proclaiming statehood, and extended to providing a new basis for terrorist motivations and franchises against US and other Western interests globally.

Other jihadis were more outspoken in their criticisms of IS and its leaders. Kuwaiti scholar Hamid al-Ali noted that Islam does not recognise pledges of allegiance to an unknown, or what he called a concealed leader, and that by declaring an Islamic state in Iraq under false pretences those responsible “had divided the jihadist movement… which should be united under the banner of jihad, rather than the banner of a single group” (McCants 2016, 18). In public however, a united front was presented. To the outside world al-Qa’ida appeared to fully endorse the establishment of IS, with al- Zawahiri proclaiming in December 2007 that IS was “a legitimate emirate established on a legitimate and sound method”. IS has never publicly addressed questions surrounding its power dynamic with al-Qa’ida, relying instead on the existing ambiguity to imply much greater power and autonomy than it actually possessed. This ambiguous audacity captured the jihadi imagination globally and become crucial in the organisation’s later swift and brutal rise to power (McCants 2016, 19).

In the six years following 9/11, al-Qa’ida central under the leadership of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri proved unable to launch a single major attack anywhere in the world. Rather than remaining active in terms of attacks against the West, al-Qa’ida evolved as a communications hub and motivator for self-starting violent jihad. Transnational terrorism continued but the jihadis themselves scattered, making do with smaller groups and operations on a more local level, and with no strong connections to al-Qa’ida’s central base. According to Zakaria, this improvised strategy proved to be a weakness, killing many local Muslims and alienating ordinary people from al-Qa’ida’s

49 ideology. The grasp on Islamic terrorism against the US and its allies that al-Qa’ida had been enjoying was beginning to slip (Zakaria 2008, 13).

For some Al-Qa’ida is “totally dependent on the continuation of violence. Its brandname [is] simultaneous with car bomb attacks and suicide bombers, not state building and party politics” (Lia 2008, 7). However, the worldwide approval of al-Qa’ida among Muslims was in decline. Support for suicide bombings between 2002 and 2007 had always been quite low, but dropped further by over 50% in those Muslim countries where it was tracked. There was greater denunciation of Islamic violence, and an increase in the number of fatwas issued against bin Laden, including from prominent Muslim clerics in Saudi Arabia (Zakaria 2008, 14). Al-Qa’ida had something to gain from a relationship with IS despite the rogue nature of the state’s proclamation, and its image in the region. Al-Qa’ida likely “wanted to keep a hand in the Iraq game and avoid further dissension in the ranks” (McCants 2016, 19).

Al-Masri’s position in IS formally answered to Abu Umar al-Baghdadi, the organisation’s “commander of the faithful”. However, at the time of seeking a candidate for the position of commander, al-Masri had confided to his chief judge that, “a man will be found whom we will test for a month. If he is suitable, then we will keep him as the commander of the faithful. If not, we will look for someone else” (McCants 2016 32-33). The man chosen was Hamid al-Zawi, a former police officer and according to a former member of IS in Iraq known online as Abu Ahmad, “a normal person and not a leader… Everyone was astonished [Masri] gave an oath of allegiance to him” (Ahmad 2014). According to McCants, the selection of al-Zawi as commander of the faithful was a source of confusion for many in the organisation itself and in al-Qa’ida overall, and was “more like a casting call than anything resembling an Islamic procedure for choosing an emir or leader”. Many jihadis in Iraq saw equivocation by al-Masri as to whether IS in Iraq was a state or not to mean that it could be assumed to be an extension of the emirate declared by Mullah Omar in Afghanistan, to whom they, along with Osama bin Laden, had pledged allegiance. However, at various other times al-Masri insisted that the Islamic State in Iraq was an entity unto itself, believing Abu Umar al-Baghdadi to be the caliph despite not having the intention of declaring this until the US had left Iraq (McCants 2016, 33).

50 In viewing IS as an actual state, its leaders were brutal in dealing with groups and individuals reluctant to pledge allegiance to it. An IS spokesman in early 2007 explained to other rebel Sunni groups they had a choice to “either join us in forming the Islamic State project in the Sunni areas or hand over their weapons to us before we are forced to act against them forcefully”. To reinforce this point IS kidnapped and killed leaders of other insurgent groups. The Islamic Army was a particular target, with thirty members killed by the Islamic State in Iraq for refusing to bow to the state’s authority in the region, leading the harassed group to write “an open letter to Bin Laden criticizing his Iraqi franchise” (McCants 2016, 33-34).

Although Islam forbids taking an innocent life, especially of a fellow Muslim, IS designated anyone who criticised or stood against them as apostates or rebels, implying that these lives could then be legitimately taken (McCants 2016, 34). In later literature IS noted, “One of [the] great principles is that all people must be fought until they accept Islam or come under a shar’ia covenant. This principle establishes the prohibition of shedding Muslim and covenant-bound kafir blood as well as the permissibility of shedding the blood of all other kuffar” (Rumiyah 2016, 35). In 2016 IS suggested that the deaths of apostates and kuffar (or non-believers) can count towards prayer, and that Muslims living in Dar al-Kufr (foreign lands) should be reminded that “the blood of the disbelievers is halal, and killing them is a form of worship to Allah” (Rumiyah 2016, 36).

Other clandestine terrorist groups were fastidious in deciding who could or could not join, being worried about infiltration by spies or simply by incompetents who would end up destroying the organisation from the inside, but IS opened its doors wide for membership in seeing itself as something greater than a terrorist group. Late in 2006, a complaint letter reached al-Masri from Abdallah al-Shafi’I the emir of Ansar al-Sunna’s jihadist elements, which noted, “Individuals from your group have kidnapped, tortured and killed people from our group with their [full] knowledge that they were from the Ansar [al-Sunna] group” (McCants 2016, 35). This conflict between IS in Iraq and Ansar al-Sunna shook al-Masri’s group significantly. Brian Fishman of the Combating Terrorism Center at the US Military Academy in West Point noted efforts to “reassure Ansar al-Sunnah [sic] quickly went from urgent to pathetic”. In January 2007 al-Masri wrote a grovelling letter to Abdallah al-Shafi’i that illustrated “just how weak al-Masri’s position was becoming”. Al-Masri’s fear of losing the last important IS ally in Iraq was apparent in

51 his apology: “I pledge to become a faithful servant and a loyal guard to you. I would carry your shoes on my head and kiss them a thousand times” (Fishman 2009, 8-9).

Fishman discusses how AQI/IS suffered due to mistakes by its leadership, notably al- Masri and Abu Umar al-Baghdadi, which led to broad sectors of the local Sunni population rejecting AQI/IS after over three years of violent cooperation. As the al- Qa’ida leadership of bin Laden and al-Zawahiri had repeatedly warned, the local Sunni Muslims became increasingly angry over the brutal extremist stance. AQI/IS made two fundamental strategic mistakes exacerbating its alienation from the Sunnis in Iraq. First, it created a sectarian revolt by Iraqi Shi’a without having the means to effectively defend Iraq’s Sunni Muslims from the onslaught of revenge this provoked. Second, it proclaimed openly a new formal political entity, the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), with the aim of dominating Iraq after the planned US and allied withdrawal of troops. However, AQI/IS did this without broad support from the Sunni population in Iraq (Fishman 2009). IS brutality steadily destroyed its support base among Iraq’s Sunnis, support that “was crucial for keeping alive its state-building enterprise”. Ansar al-Sunna, the Islamic Army, and others, began talking to the US in 2006 and early 2007 about how to get rid of AQI/IS (McCants 2016, 35). These strategic mistakes by al-Masri’s group compounded the tactics of provoking the Shi’a population and depleted any control by IS in Iraq.

The Islamic State in Iraq was not alone in failing to create and maintain an extreme Islamic version of political statehood around this time. As with other al-Qa’ida affiliates such as al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and al-Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), an al-Qa’ida franchise in Somalia known as Harakat al-Shabaab al-Mujahideen (commonly referred to as al-Shabaab) “squandered [much of] its support by meting out harsh punishments for violating its austere brand of Islamic law”. Al-Shabaab imprisoned without food those found to not be praying five-times daily, beat women considered to not be fully covered when out in public, and stoned to death any women alleged to have engaged in extramarital sex, “including a thirteen-year-old who had been raped by Shabab [sic] men” (McCants 2016, 65; Reuters, 2008). In addition to a system of extreme punishments, al-Shabaab put in place many social restrictions that proved extremely unpopular in some of the less conservative areas of Somalia. Music was forbidden, smoking and participation in sport were banned, women were required to wear hijab,

52 cinemas showing international films were closed, and Internet use was banned just as its popularity grew (McCants 2016, 65).

Considering that advice from bin Laden and al-Zawahiri for Islamist insurgencies was always to cooperate with other Sunni groups, not to kill Muslim tribesmen, not to broadcast executions, and not to attack Muslim civilians, the group closest to the al- Qaida leadership’s ideal was AQAP. McCants suggests that we see AQAP as “attempting to win hearts and minds and the early Islamic State as trying to cut them out” (McCants 2016, 68). In the period from 2006 to 2012, al-Qa’ida franchises around the world failed to establish and hold onto any tangible form of government besides the failing IS in Iraq. Across the world jihadis and their supporters could interpret the failed attempts at creating workable Islamic States in two ways. First, the reasoning was that the groups’ leaders in refusing to adhere to the advice of bin Laden and al-Zawahiri had proven the al-Qa’ida leaders were correct, and that harsh restrictions, even harsher punishments, attacks on fellow Muslims, and public brutality had eroded the earlier popular support enjoyed by insurgent groups. Secondly, jihadis could choose to believe that the failures were because the insurgent al-Qa’ida affiliates had not been brutal enough in trying to create and enforce their new Islamic States. This second theory guided the reborn Islamic State in Iraq and beyond into Syria. However, it should be noted that IS improved on its first attempt when it came to “providing government services and co-opting the tribes”. Coinciding with this later attempt to cement Islamic statehood in the region, “the coming civil war in Syria would give [IS] a few years to find out what would happen if the international community let them do as they pleased” (McCants 2016, 68-69).

In contrast to a much reduced ‘ground’ support for IS from Muslims both regionally and worldwide, the spectre of Islamic State continued to grow online (McCants 2016, 69). The tactic of ambiguity again served IS well: when some al-Qa’ida affiliates began to fly the flag of the Islamic State, many jihadis wrongly assumed that these groups had joined IS. “The whole world has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State” wrote a jihadi forum member with the online pseudonym al-Islah in 2010, who posted videos of the IS flag being waved in Indonesia, Somalia and Yemen as ‘proof’ (McCants 2016, 70).

By the time the US withdrew troops from Iraq in 2011, the perceived threat from IS was so attenuated that the earlier $5 million bounty for the capture of its leader Abu Umar

53 al-Baghdadi had been reduced to just $500,000 (Fisher 2015). However, in the chaos of revolution across much of the Middle East, many new jihadi groups were being formed with the word ‘Ansar’ (helpers) in their name. These groups shared the global jihadist ideologies of al-Qa’ida but without formal ties to the organisation. Members and supporters of these new groups began to fly the IS flag which was still deemed by many to be affiliated with al-Qa’ida at this time; Ansar al-Din in Mali, Ansar al-Shari’a in Tunisia, and a different group by the same name in Libya were among those flying the black flag publicly (McCants 2016, 70).

Many but not all participants in the Arab uprisings were jihadis, including the brother of al-Qa’ida’s Ayman al-Zawahiri. However, many non-jihadis were pictured waving the IS flag (also historically known as the black banner, or black standard), unaware of its source and taking it to merely be a reproduction of the first pillar of Islam, known as the testimony or Shahada, that there is no god but Allah and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah (Prince 2017). Other protesters knew the source and clearly “relished the provocative meaning attached to it”, but either way the Islamic State black standard had “transcended its origins to become a symbol of political protest. But the group that had designed the flag was about to remind the world of its original meaning” (McCants 2016, 70-71). These often naïve adoptions of the IS identity by members of Muslim communities worldwide support discussions of how politically and culturally IS could misdirect perceptions of their strength, which in turn had an impact on their image in the West, adding to the efficacy of their messages, and playing further into cumulative extremism. Expanding the CE concept to include cultural and social factors as impacting on extremist/state interactions, such as popular news media directed perceptions, then becomes important when analysing the extent and impact of messages originating from these groups, and being digested by Western audiences as reasons to be fearful, and to consequently support state reactions that had they been entirely guided by reality may not have been quite so palatable.

2.5 Operation Neptune Spear: Geronimo EKIA An overview of the killing of Osama bin Laden in regard to media coverage and discourse on Islamic terrorism, and reactions to it, contributes to arguments in this thesis for a development of the concept of cumulative extremism. There remain questions as to the

54 nature of the operation, its legality, and the fact that at least officially it was undertaken without permission from Pakistan’s authorities (Jones 2012, 420). These questions speak to topics of international law and human rights covered in some detail below, although in general they are perhaps best considered as lying outside the scope of this thesis.

While in detention at the US prison in Guantánamo Bay, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Abu Faraj al-Libi reportedly helped to confirm that a man by the name of Abu Ahmed al- Kuwaiti worked as a trusted confidant and courier for Osama bin Laden. US intelligence capitalised on this information and with a phone number to monitor they were able to lock onto al-Kuwaiti’s movements, tracking his vehicle in the hope it would lead them to bin Laden’s whereabouts. Al-Kuwaiti repeatedly led US agencies to a self-contained walled compound in Abbottabad in Pakistan (Jones 2012, 417). Osama bin Laden was living in the compound, “starved for information but unable to leave because of the suffocating security precautions”. After over seven months of gathering information about the Abbottabad compound, President Obama chaired a National Security Council meeting to assess potential courses of action (Jones 2012, 419). Options to strike at the compound and in particular to capture or kill bin Laden seemed limited. The course of action most popular with the Obama administration, and the US military and intelligence agencies involved, was to use Special Forces in cooperation with the CIA. President Obama turned to US Navy SEAL Team Six via the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) under Vice Admiral William McRaven to execute a raid in collaboration with the CIA on the Abbottabad compound on 1 May 2011. Over the audio coverage of the raid came the words “Geronimo EKIA”. The execution checklist word to refer to bin Laden, and the use of the military acronym for enemy killed in action indicated that Osama bin Laden had been killed (Jones 2012, 425-426).

This brief summary of the assassination of bin Laden by the US under the Obama administration is important as signalling a shift in the fortunes of the so-called ‘war on terror’ for hard power supporters, and neo-conservative arguments of how to counter post-9/11 terrorism. In the face of such events this thesis and its arguments for expanding the CE concept become more important, and face off against legal and political postures borne from this apparent victory, and consequently from movies such as Zero Dark Thirty (discussed further in chapter 5) that speak to an extent on behalf of torture as a legitimate weapon against terrorism.

2.6 Empires of jihad 3: Islamic State version 2.0 Following the regional civil wars of the ‘Arab Spring’, more accurately the Arab revolutions and in particular the continuing conflict in Syria, alongside the 2011 withdrawal of US and allied forces from Iraq, there was a reinvigoration of the so-called Islamic State. As far as its ongoing impact on the US and its allies was concerned, after 9/11 al-Qa’ida had weakened to become a political and ideological motivator, and a facilitator of training for smaller-scale transnational jihad operations. Islamic State or Daesh on the other hand, following its second real grasp for power and territory, was running brutally and relatively effectively on two main fronts. IS showcased extreme violence and ambitious political state-building operations in its newly won territories in Iraq and Syria, while also rallying calls, finance and logistical support to extend a global jihad against non-believers and apostates, resulting in many small-cell and self-starting Islamic terrorist attacks across the world. The political rhetoric and counterterrorism policies of the US, along with the overt publicity that Islamic terrorism attracts, combined with the actions and messages of the terrorists to play their parts in the cumulative extremism narratives that make up the major protagonist in this thesis.

In May 2010 two years before issuing any public statements, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi (born Ibrahim Awwad Ibrahim al-Badri), assumed leadership of IS/Daesh, after the US killed his predecessor Abu Umar al-Baghdadi in April, along with his minister of war and the effective founder of Islamic State, Abu Ayyub al-Masri (McCants 2016, 45; 73). Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as the newly installed commander to the faithful may have seemed an unlikely new head for the rising state/terrorist organisation, having no bureaucratic or military background. As a member of the Muslim Brotherhood in the mid-1990s, he had aligned with the ultraconservative Salafi wing of the organisation in Baghdad (McCants 2016, 73-75). He had the scholarly credentials to uphold the role of caliph of the Islamic State on its upward trajectory (McCants 2013, 146). The messianic fervour had cooled in the ranks of the group’s new leadership; however, its apocalyptic rhetoric was intensifying, with references to the “End Times” now filling IS/Daesh propaganda online.

The region’s civil wars lent credibility to the prophecies and proved to be a selling point for the recruitment of foreign fighters wishing to travel to the lands where the final

56 battles of the apocalypse are predicted take place, with many European jihadis dying to help capture the strategically unimportant town of Dabiq, merely because it is mentioned in the prophecies. The Internet at the time abounded with videos of fighters overlooking this small town and explaining to their fellow Europeans that they were “living in the End Times” (McCants 2016, 147). The rise to power and conquest of territory was steady, and from 2012 to 2014 the international community’s cautious approach emboldened IS and swelled its ranks, creating a threat to US and allied interests in the region. Soon the group was “expanding to other hot spots, like Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen and Egypt”, creating further instability and poisoning the already complex political situation in the Middle East (McCants 2016, 155-156). The message of the Islamic State was once again becoming international in its appeal to people vulnerable to radicalisation.

There are many accounts of the impact of the arrival of IS/Daesh on the local populations in Syria and Iraq, such as The Raqqa Diaries: Escape From Islamic State (2007), written by a member of the Al-Sharqiya 24 resistance movement in Syria under the pseudonym Samer. Although these readings have provided useful research for this thesis, their stories lie outside of its scope in analysing the impact of groups and ideologies such as IS/Daesh on individual and community radicalisation towards transnational Islamic terrorism, via social as well as political narratives (Samer 2017).

2.7 New jihadis, terrorists and foreign terrorist fighters Some actors in the arenas of post-9/11 radicalisation and terrorism have been prone to self-identify as jihadis, yet would maintain that this is quite different from being a terrorist. A notable example of this is the British Muslim convert Richard Dart. Dart had strong links to the Islamic activist and preacher Anjem Choudary and his group Muslims against Crusades. Born into a middle-class family in the British town of Weymouth, Richard Dart began exploring the Islamic faith in his twenties, and following his conversion in 2011 changed his name to Salahuddin al-Brittani. Dart’s radicalisation was the subject of two television documentaries My Brother The Islamist in 2011 and My Brother The Terrorist in 2014, both made by Dart’s stepbrother the British filmmaker Robb Leech (Mabe 2013, 79-82). Leech’s documentaries chart his attempts to reconnect with his stepbrother and to try to understand Dart’s conversion to extremist Islam and

57 his radicalisation to a point where Dart was convicted on terrorism charges.

In discussing his stepbrother, Robb Leech notes that people like Dart are able to justify violent jihad to themselves as somehow separate from terrorism, “out of a sense of responsibility and powerlessness at the plight of fellow Muslims”. Leech writes that although “fighting on a foreign battlefield and owning your own AK-47” might be considered exciting, more crucially the motivation for jihadis seems not to be about killing people. He argues that they are not necessarily thinking about blowing themselves up in a suicide attack, but rather their narrative is one of saving humanity, and they believe their actions contribute to protecting and fighting for the vulnerable. However, these are warped ambitions of people who are trying to appease “deep lonely spaces of the human condition. It’s about feeling important, valued and ultimately having a stake in the world surrounding them”. These ‘new’ jihadis are operating in a world in which they feel wronged, or shunned by society: “they resented it – they were lost, empty and had no stake in the western world. Becoming a radical Muslim reversed the polarity”. Coming from a position of feeling marginalised and disenfranchised to a “radical new status they felt empowered, superior… righteous” (Leech 2014). Many of these feelings find a focus in blaming the West, notably the US, and they often refer to impurities corrupting the orthodoxy of Islam (see below).

The following two incidents support theories by Leech, of people acting out of a position of powerlessness, disenfranchisement and a flawed sense of responsibility to protect fellow Muslims. The first began on 29 October 2014 at the Canadian National War Memorial in Ottawa and continued later that day at the Canadian parliament, involving gunman and Muslim convert Michael Zehaf-Bibeau and resulting in his own death and that of Corporal Nathan Cirillo. The second case study involves the attack on British soldier Lee Rigby in London on 22 May 2013 by two Muslim converts, Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale. These attacks exhibit similarities but also some contrast to the motivations of self-confessed jihadi Richard Dart (Canada OPP 2015; Burke 2016; UK ISC 2014, 1, 11, 57).

The London attack in particular illustrated terrorism at its most public, and is reminiscent of the methods of an ancient sect of Shi’ite Islam known as the Nizari Ismaili or as the Assassins (Gray 2010). Unlike the latest wave of Muslim extremists which tends

58 to come mainly from Salafists and Wahhabis following Sunni doctrines, the Nizari Ismaili were Shi’a Muslims and targeted mainly Sunni monarchs and government officials. They notably sought to never kill civilians by discriminating between officials and those they considered innocent. These ideas of attacking officials as a legitimate calling, along with their purposeful decisions to make their attacks public, were certainly aimed at enhancing the levels of terror among their victims and potential victims (Rapoport 1984, 667). These assassins, or fedayeen, preached about purifying Islam from corruption, and hoped to establish communities where politics and religion were inseparable. The term fedayeen comes from fida’I, meaning someone who risks their life voluntarily (from an Arabic word for sacrifice), the plural being fidaiyn, or the present-day fedayeen. In similar circumstances to those employed by the Nizari Ismaili, Adebolajo and Adebowale in London, and the Canadian terrorist Zehaf-Bibeau (although Zihaf-Bibeau used a rifle rather than knives) mimicked these ancient assassins, choosing not only personal methods of murder, but performing their acts coldly and refusing to flee afterwards, appearing in fact to welcome their own swift deaths or capture. It could also be that the attackers in Ottawa and London were targeting people they considered as officials or combatants, rather than bystanders or innocents (Canada OPP 2015; Rapoport 1984, 664; Gray 2010; Burke 2016; UK ISC 2014).

Richard Dart on the other hand never reached a position where his plans could be carried out to violent effect. He was however on the path to becoming an active Foreign Terrorist Fighter (FTF), part of a rising trend, as Interpol states: ”increasingly, we are seeing terrorist groups work to radicalize individuals and inciting them to leave their homes to become foreign terrorist fighters. These groups leverage the Internet and social media for recruitment, creating a truly global security threat” (Interpol 2017). The United Nations Security Council Counter-Terrorism Committee (UNSC CTC) support Interpol’s observations in recognising that,

According to the Security Council, terrorist organizations such as Al-Qaida, the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as Da’esh) and associated groups have attracted over 30,000 FTFs from over 100 Member States. Because the related challenges are by their nature international, the Council has called on Member States to enhance their international cooperation in preventing their travel. Attempts to combat the threat through a purely domestic approach will not work (UNSC CTC 2017).

59 The UNSC has responded to this trend with UN Resolution 2178:

Recognizing that addressing the threat posed by foreign terrorist fighters requires comprehensively addressing underlying factors, including by preventing radicalization to terrorism, stemming recruitment, inhibiting foreign terrorist fighter travel, disrupting financial support to foreign terrorist fighters, countering violent extremism, which can be conducive to terrorism, countering incitement to terrorist acts motivated by extremism or intolerance, promoting political and religious tolerance, economic development and social cohesion and inclusiveness, ending and resolving armed conflicts, and facilitating reintegration and rehabilitation (UNSC S/RES/2178 2014).

If viewed without recognising the lives affected, statistics and stories of foreign fighters travelling to train and/or fight in the Middle East can seem somehow otherworldly. But as Leech has discovered, terrorism finds new ways to destroy the lives of innocent people through the families and friends of those who become radicalised (Leech 2014).

Mabe (2013) reports how Dart, who claimed he was prepared to die for jihad, was arrested by British authorities in July 2012 for his involvement in “preparing for acts of terrorism,” and was accused of travelling to Pakistan for terrorism training and of targeting British soldiers in the UK. In April 2013, Dart was gaoled for six years, along with two co-conspirators, Jahangir Alom and Imran Mahmood. The judge described all three men “as committed fundamentalists who would have been prepared to kill” (Russell 2013). During sentencing, Dart refused to stand and maintained that “Judgment is only for Allah”, demonstrating that his personal narrative and justifications for his actions were that he was not committing a crime, and was in fact being wronged by the legal system that charged and sentenced him (Tomlinson 2013). Leech (2014) suggests that this behaviour is common among newly converted jihadis.

What Fishman calls globally distributed jihadist propaganda is not always as compatible with the conflicts on the ground and as well integrated locally as it may appear from the outside, instead often creating “unrealistic expectations among arriving jihadists”. Many foreign fighters travelling to the Middle East would be “unprepared for the hardships and frustrations of insurgency, expecting instead to participate immediately in glorious attacks like those illustrated in al-Qa’ida propaganda”. These high expectations often cause rifts with local fighters who are more accustomed to the steady planning, logistical problems, and general drudgery of insurgency (Fishman 2009, 17). Newly arrived foreign fighters carried “a sense of moral superiority relative to their Iraqi counterparts, who

60 tended to be less ideologically motivated”, with some local members of Islamic State considering “jihad an ‘Additional Duty’, rather than their core life’s mission, an attitude that grated on foreign fighters who had arrived in Iraq expressly to die for the cause” (Fishman 2009, 18).

2.8 New Islamic radicalisation in plain view Appealing to the conditions most suited to this thesis and in contrast to some models of radicalisation depicting stages occurring in a sequential order, King and Taylor (2011, 608) illustrate Sageman’s non-linear emergent model (2008). Sageman suggests that radicalisation emerges from the interplay of four factors (Sageman 2008, 223-231). Three of these factors can be considered cognitive, whereas the fourth is situational. One of the cognitive factors leading to radicalisation is a sense of moral outrage resulting from perceiving events as moral violations. An example of this is the reaction to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which many US intelligence analysts have concluded became a ‘‘primary recruiting vehicle for violent Islamic extremists’’ (De Young 2006).

The second of Sageman’s cognitive factors is the framing of how we make sense of the world. A specific frame used by contemporary Islamic extremists is that the West is waging a ‘‘war against Islam”, which also then involves Western countries seemingly having a united strategy to confront Islam, and is recognised by intelligence agencies who label it as the ‘‘single narrative”. The third cognitive factor is a resonance with personal experiences. These experiences can be personal moral violations, such as discrimination or unemployment, resulting in a lack of or limited opportunities. These three cognitive factors reinforce each other. Personal experiences for example can lead to moral outrage, and render a person sensitive to other people’s discrimination. All in turn can reinforce the perception of a conspiratorial Western or global attack on Islam. In addition to these cognitive factors, Sageman emphasises the interactions of likeminded people as being crucial for radicalisation to occur. He labels this fourth factor ‘‘mobilisation through networks,’’ which involves validating and confirming one’s ideas and interpretation of events with other radicalised people. To fully understand this factor, one should consider Sageman’s view that the al-Qa’ida-inspired wave of terrorism can be regarded as a social movement, rather than a coherent strategy directed by a hierarchical organisation. Mobilisation can occur through virtual networks,

61 such as social media and the Internet, as easily as it can operate in person (King and Taylor 2011, 608; Sageman 2008, 223-231). This idea of networks as alternative to, or in addition to, personal interactions, further supports arguments for developing the CE concept to include virtual interconnections of media, Internet and popular culture referencing and discourse.

Radicalisation according to Richards (2011, 152) “is a relatively new concept that has become a buzz-word in counterterrorism, policy-making and academic circles”. In this context, Draper (2014) quotes the libertarian Nick Gillespie saying, “We don’t have to pretend anymore that radical Islam is an existential threat to the West. It’s herpes, but it’s not AIDS. It’s a chronic condition, but it won’t kill us. Just keep the attacks to a minimum”. This passage illustrates a problem of whether the post-9/11 world should resign itself to a state of eternal vigilance in the name of security at the expense of social and personal freedoms. This conundrum becomes an important theme in the second part of this chapter, in looking at how society is experiencing pressures to change, and limitations on its liberties and some of our widely accepted human rights.

2.9 Cumulative extremism: Feeding and extending the fear In developing and expanding the concept of cumulative extremism, scenarios are discussed where extremist groups can effectively manipulate and direct the narratives of groups, communities or states that they oppose. Many terrorist organisations gain forms of validation from those they target, enabling them to mount campaigns that can then be argued to prove their point to the individuals and communities whose support they seek. McDuff (2017) notes that in Northern Ireland during attacks and publicity by the Irish Republican Army (IRA), Eatwell’s 2006 formulation of cumulative extremism was evident in the form of tit-for-tat violence. There was an upward trend in the number of violent events on both sides of the conflict, enabling the IRA to argue to the people of Northern Ireland that the British were against their interests. In the context of post-9/11 Islamic extremism, these cumulative narratives are being used by groups such as al- Qa’ida and IS/Daesh to reach out to the wider Muslim communities to illustrate how increases in xenophobic nationalism, racism, mistrust and disenfranchisement target mainstream Muslims and originate from non-Muslims.

62 One incident providing an example of Eatwell’s classic CE concept, and illustrating tit-for- tat violence reflected against the wider Muslim community, occurred near the Finsbury Park mosque in London on 19 June 2017. Darren Osborne, a supporter of the nationalist and anti-Islamic English Defence League (EDL), has since been convicted of this terrorist incident. Court records from Osborne’s trial report that he received an email from the former EDL leader Tommy Robinson (real name Stephen Yaxley-Lennon). Discussing the IS linked attack that killed 22 people at a music concert in Manchester on 22 May 2017, the email said, “What Salman Abedi did is not the beginning, and it won’t be the end… There is a nation within a nation forming just beneath the surface of the UK. It is a nation built on hatred, on violence and on Islam.” Robinson’s message was also sent to other supporters signed up to The Rebel website, and made allegations against Abedi’s mosque, adding, “It has now been left to us, the ordinary people of the United Kingdom, to stand up to hate, to unite and in one voice say ‘no more’”. Evidence obtained by police analysis of two iPhones and an iPad from Osborne’s home revealed a second email from the former EDL leader on 14 June 2017. Detailing a campaign for a victim whose rapists were not prosecuted, it read: “Dear Darren, you know about the terrible crimes committed against [name redacted] of Sunderland… Police let the suspects go... why? It is because the suspects are refugees from Syria and Iraq? It’s a national outrage... I know you will be there for her and together, we’ll get her the justice she and her family have been denied” (Dearden 2018).

Prior to undertaking the attack killing one and injuring 12 people, Osborne was reported to have “binged on social media postings by Robinson and members of Britain First [another extremist hate group]”. Although accessing the material online does not break the law, Commander Haydon of the UK’s Scotland Yard counterterrorism command stated, “We have to be alive to the fact that people are accessing this material and they are using it to self-radicalise, and that’s what happened in this case”. Chief executive of the anti-extremist charity Hope Not Hate, Nick Lowles, recognised that this case highlights how far-right identities and “rightwing media” have contributed to bringing “anti-Muslim hatred into the mainstream” (Dodd and Rawlinson 2018). Callum Spencer, a soldier in the UK Royal Engineers, told the jury in Osborne’s trial that less than two days before the attack he overheard Osborne in The Hollybush public house in Cardiff exclaiming, “I’m going to kill Muslims, your family are going to be Muslims, they’re all terrorists and I’m going to take it into my own hands”, with other witnesses describing

63 Osborne as getting aggressive before being asked to leave by the licensee of the premises (Dearden 2018; Hamilton 2018).

Some in the UK news media have been accused of reporting the Finsbury Park attack as an act of revenge rather than as Islamophobic terrorism. Initial reports of the incident suggested that the Muslim community should bear a responsibility for, and answer for violent Islamic extremism – contrasting with how non-Islamic terrorism is often portrayed as separate from wider community elements, and reported as one-off issues of mental health rather than premeditated terrorism. Early reporting of the Finsbury Park incident avoided the term terrorist when referring to Osborne. Sensationalist reporting risks jeopardising more considered attempts to disrupt Islamic terrorism, such as seeking to build bridges in the aftermath of such an attack as an important part of anti-extremism strategies (McDuff 2017).

The idea of cumulative extremism should not be limited to violence, the fears surrounding it, and the way society reacts to it; the developed concept should also include consideration of popular news media. For example, Hoffman notes that in civil aviation terrorist attacks are rare, “Despite media impressions to the contrary and the popular mis-perception fostered by those impressions” (1997, 10). In Inside Terrorism, Hoffman asserts that such perceptions are “in large measure doubtless a direct reflection of the disproportionate coverage accorded terrorism by the American media” (Hoffman 2017, 198). Editorial decisions around commercial imperatives can contribute to marginalisation and become triggers for radicalisation in some sections of society. Discussing research into Somali immigrants in Australia, Gerrand (2015) writes that, “while Australia’s service provision to migrants within a multicultural model might be among the best in the world, full social and cultural belonging is limited”. Gerrand notes that engaging with terrorism provides some people with purpose and belonging that they may otherwise lack, and she claims that “the gravitation of some disenfranchised young Muslims towards IS is reminiscent of young Somali men joining al-Shabaab”. She argues that “one of the key factors influencing belonging is the way culturally diverse Australians are represented in the media. The media powerfully influence the ways in which group identity is constructed and framed and may ‘do’ and ‘undo’ the project of multiculturalism”. Muslims in Australia are often portrayed as threatening the security of wider Australian society, a type of fear-based reporting with an indirect but material

64 effect on the sense of belonging experienced by some Australian Muslims, and contributing to social and cultural perceptions and problems in a negative and cumulative way (Gerrand 2015).

The case of former Australian terrorism suspect Zaky Mallah illustrates problems with controversial policies such as the Australian Citizenship Amendment (Allegiance to Australia) Bill 2015, which amended the Australian Citizenship Act 2007 to provide “explicit powers for the cessation of Australian citizenship in specified circumstances where a dual citizen engages in terrorism-related conduct”. Such laws play into the hands of Islamic extremists and can serve to strengthen the recruitment propaganda of organisations such as IS/Daesh, which is “designed to appeal to alienated young Muslims” (Australian Government 2015; Gerrand 2015). The bill itself encountered opposition given Article 15.2 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), which states that no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his or her nationality (UN 1948).

As a major actor in processes of an expanded cumulative extremism, the mainstream news media betrays accuracy in its reporting, contributing to and even creating situations where society accepts a climate of rhetoric over substance, and counterterrorism policies such as torture and drones distinct from conventional political and social morality, and often from existing international law. These policies are not only aimed against extremism directly. Certainly interrogational torture or targeted assassinations in the so-called ‘war on terror’ do not have an immediate effect on the home lives of families in New York or Sydney, but society in its fear of terrorism becomes open to suggestions to restrict human rights in the name of security.

This second part to chapter 2 addresses of some of the political and social arguments between security and liberty, and security versus privacy when discussing how to combat post-9/11 Islamic terrorism.

PART 2: A SECURITY VERSUS LIBERTY CONUNDRUM Baroness Kennedy notes the centrality of the principle of dignity in human rights questions, as “directly protective of the basic rights of the individual” (Kennedy 2004, 57-58). However, the principle is infrequently invoked in discussions of human rights in

65 regard to terrorism. In this section, dignity forms a shadow principle in an analysis of the way in which security and liberty collide in regard to terrorism. Fundamental human rights are under threat when we position them against the need for increases in human, national and international security. Particularly since 9/11, policy changes have treated many of our rights and liberties as in some way mutually exclusive with our security needs when considered alongside legal measures to counter terrorist threats. Narratives on post-9/11 Islamic terrorism in the previous section go towards demonstrating its impact on society to a point where our social constructions and laws have become vulnerable to accepting weaker protections of our liberties and rights.

International legal instruments and principles, along with elements of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and how these may collide with each other and with counterterrorism policies and international law, are an aspect of this expansion of existing debates. These discussions follow a narrative on how post-9/11 US policies relate to the ‘war’ against terrorism and international law, and how in areas such as rendition, torture, drone strikes, and the Washington Consensus there are deep conflicts with accepted human rights norms. Human rights central to this narrative and critical analyses are reviewed in this section. Theories drawing on political and social philosophy are used as a lens through which to comment on issues around radicalisation, terrorism and their counter-measures. The evolution of Islamic terror threats heralded to a great extent by 9/11, and evident in events since then (as noted above) has meant that Western societies are increasingly called on to consider shifts in the position and importance afforded to certain human rights. For example, the right to life and the right to a fair trial are in question in cases of targeted assassinations by US drone strikes.

2.10 Developing a human rights culture As Gijs de Vries recognises, threats posed by Islamic terrorism are not solely the human casualties it causes. He claims that among the most insidious of consequences to Islamic terrorism,

… is a climate of suspicion and fear both between Muslims and non-Muslims and among Muslim themselves. In democratic countries terrorism deepens ethnic and religious divisions. In non-democratic states it bolsters the forces of authoritarianism. Everywhere governments are at risk of over-reacting in the fight against terrorism and of compromising the very rights and liberties they have

66 pledged to uphold (Coolsaet 2008, xv-xvi).

Such considerations are important not only in terms of human rights forming a shield to protect individuals, but as forming a standard of social achievement and social aspiration: “Too often we speak of human rights only in terms of how they are violated and not in terms of how they can affirm and legitimise the aspirations of a society” (Kennedy 2004, 301-302). In the late 20th century a cottage industry has evolved to advance an array of economic and social rights, conceived of, defined by, and promoted by governments and international organisations (Hart 1979, 1-25). Much of contemporary social and political discourse maintains that all societies should respect human rights, as well as expectations that states govern themselves as democracies. The development of instruments governing non-derogable human rights such as the right to life, the right to be free from torture and other inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, the right to be free from slavery, and the right to be free from retroactively applied penal laws is a goal in many societies.

Recognition of moral and natural rights exists in a number of modern instruments asserting specific rights, such as those covered in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) (UN 1948) and The Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms within the European Convention on Human Rights (Council of Europe 2010). Rights included in the European Convention and protected via the European Court of Human Rights include the right to life (Article 2), prohibition of torture (Article 3), the right to liberty and security (Article 5), and the right to a fair trial (Article 6) (Council of Europe 2010, 6-9).

Recognising disagreements among theorists surrounding both the nature and the legitimacy of some human rights as noted by Renteln (1988, 343) is critical in discussing the rights themselves, especially where post-9/11 rhetoric and counterterrorism policies appear in conflict with international law. The impact on individuals and society of ignoring or arguing ways around human rights law becomes a matter of more than just moral theory. As Renteln explains, “One might expect to encounter difficulties when various proponents defend different and sometimes conflicting rights based solely on the claim that the rights are self-evident”. However, she suggests, “philosophers have not welcomed discussions of competing moralities, largely because they take their own values to be obviously correct” (Renteln 1988, 348). This speaks to a contentious notion

67 canvassed in this thesis, that of questioning moral absolutes, and how post-9/11 US governments by engaging in a so-called ‘war on terror’ are culpable of bending morality or even in some cases suspending morality. This is evident for example in the rewriting of interrogational torture as enhanced interrogation, and the continued use of drones to assassinate terror suspects across national borders. In fighting post-9/11 Islamic terrorism, extraordinary rendition, torture and drone strikes arguably contravene international law, as analysed in greater detail in chapters 3 and 4.

The human rights most relevant to this thesis are the right to life, the right to freedom from torture, and the right to a fair trial, all noted in more detail below. The 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) considers the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family as the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world. The UDHR is proclaimed as

… a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction (UN UDHR 1948, preamble).

Acknowledgement of human equality is noted in Article 1 of the UDHR: “all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood”. Article 2 of the UDHR expands on the universal scope of such rights:

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty (UN 1948, Art. 2).

Human rights (definitionally) exist for all humans. To waive this responsibility in any way is to weaken the aspirations of social and political norms for all humankind and to fundamentally weaken the societies of even those not at direct threat from losing protections afforded to all.

2.11 Life, liberty and security of the person: Fundamental rights Article 3 of the UDHR notes that, “Everybody has the right to life, liberty and security of person”, a matter of international law crucial to this thesis (UN 1948, Art. 3). The provision throws into doubt the legitimacy of practices such as extraordinary rendition that deprive targets of their liberty without charge, without trial, and without any need to provide evidence that a crime has been committed. Perhaps even more strikingly in regard to Article 3 is evidence of US counterterrorism policies that allow targeted killing of terrorist suspects by drones, with the cases of Anwar al-Awlaki and his son indicating that these policies even extend to its own citizens. The areas most controversial in terms of the protection of human rights in times of terror are when states have removed the right to be free from torture, and the right to a free and fair trial.

Targeted killing is not a term defined distinctly in international law, yet it has come into common international usage since 2000 after the Israeli government made public a policy of targeting terrorist suspects in the occupied territories. This particular act of lethal force undertaken by a state’s intelligence agencies or armed forces varies from employing cruise missiles, to armed drone strikes, to raids by special forces (Masters 2013). It is an easy argument to mount that policies where human rights are so thoroughly abused by the US and its allies when employing assassination programs and other hard power military responses outside of international legal instruments, have a negative effect on the ability of the West to maintain a superior moral stance against terrorism. In fact this also complicates attempts at defining terrorism and its position as a state/non-state enterprise. For Western democratic states to engage in illegal killing risks eliding distinctions between terrorist organisations and responsible government.

Along with a chapter on drones and their role in targeted assassinations, this thesis discusses acts of enhanced interrogation or ‘interrogational torture’ as one of the catalysts responsible for post-9/11 radicalisation of individuals and groups to support or engage in Islamic terrorism. The UDHR addresses the practice of torture in all its forms in Article 5: “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” (UN 1948, Art. 5). Article 5 of the UDHR is supported by and expanded on in greater detail by the 1984 Convention Against Torture (UN CAT 1984). Protection from torture is now widely recognised as jus cogens. Interrogational torture,

69 as distinct from torture with other aims such as punishment, deterrence and revenge, is discussed in greater detail in chapter 3. The aim is to support a position that finding and releasing public evidence of interrogational torture of Muslim terror suspects risks increasing post-9/11 radicalisation towards Islamic terrorism. Attempts to navigate around the absolute prohibition on torture with enhanced interrogation practices such as waterboarding, extreme sleep deprivation and stress positions, have damaged the legitimacy of the US and its allies in addressing Islamic terrorism from a position of moral authority.

Article 9 of the UDHR states, “No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile”. This should be read alongside Article 10 the universal right to a fair trial: “Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him”. The European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) covers the legal application of fair trials in Article 6: in the determination of civil rights and obligations for any criminal charges, everyone is “entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law”. Further it requires that judgment shall be pronounced publicly although the press and public may be excluded from all or part of the trial in the interests of morals, public order, or matters of national security. These rights are those most often ignored or violated in cases of torture and/or targeted assassinations. Arguments in chapter 3 examining the practicality and morality of ticking bomb scenarios in discussing torture further explain this point.

Baroness Kennedy states that terrorists are generally considered by academic, political and legal communities to be non-state actors, and as such as not waging war in the sense acknowledged and accepted under existing international law (2004, 45-46). Those suspected of committing terrorist acts are already liable to be covered by the applicable domestic legal apparatus of wherever they are apprehended, and are addressed under charges such as murder, attempted murder, criminal damage etc. (Kennedy 2004, 45). However, should any of these human rights not be afforded to someone suspected of a crime, even to those suspected of acts that can contribute to terrorism, then society itself becomes morally negligent from a human rights (and a natural rights) position. This indicates a difficulty in trying to balance security against liberty, or security against

70 human rights when considering counterterrorism policies. These questions now also attract greatly extended media attention and representations in global popular culture, as discussed in chapter 5.

Conclusion This chapter serves to indicate how governments, media, and various Islamic terrorist organisations have been using 9/11 and the conflict against terrorism that followed as political and ideological capital, and an expansion of the concept of cumulative extremism helps to recognise impacts on our historical memory and how issues of national and international security in relation to human rights are now debated.

Serving to link parts 1 and 2 of this chapter, the question arises of whether increases in perceived fear of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism from groups such as al-Qa’ida and IS/Daesh and those inspired by them, translate to mean there is a case for accepting restrictions on our liberty and privacy, and to accept limits on what have long been considered basic human rights. There is an evolving narrative that US foreign policies bear responsibility for creating international and domestic enemies, such as through collateral damage and disproportionality. An argument here is that this is part of cumulative extremism and extends to include some Western responsibility for radicalisation towards Islamic terrorism. Chapter 5 extends an examination of popular news media reactions to terrorism, and questions on the role of various media in publicising terrorism and its narratives, while also discussing effects on social perceptions of terrorism’s efficacy. When questioning something as important as the restriction of the universal application of certain human rights, recognising we are living in a society that has torture and drone programs to its name, it becomes even more important to govern and legislate based on truth, rather than populist discourse and/or inaccurate rhetoric. Politics must be able to effectively identify and address mistruth in society, such as in sensationalist news media, and state agencies should recognise how this contributes to cumulative extremism. An analysis of the media treatment of terrorism and its effect on public fears illustrates that obfuscation is often an issue where the politics, policies and publicity of post-9/11 terrorism are concerned.

This thesis recognises a need to inform debates on repositioning or re-apportioning the

71 responsibility for conflicts between Islamic extremism and those aligned against it, away from a conceptualisation of terrorism versus state. Historical context has been outlined with the most tangible and immediate reactions to 9/11, along with analyses of some rhetoric and relevant policy evolutions that followed these terrorist attacks. This chapter seeks to situate the thesis in terms of arguments around Islamic extremism, US counterterrorism policies, and a developed view of cumulative extremism enabled by including wider cultural, social and political impacts in the way it works.

72 CHAPTER 3 SUSPENDING MORALITY 1: INTERROGATIONAL TORTURE

“Intelligence is analysed information. Until analysed, data remains information and is not intelligence. So one must gather the information and then analyse it”

(Winks and McGrew Eifrig 1993, 228-229).

Following President Bush’s declaration of ‘a global war on terror’ in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, and further reactions to 9/11 as outlined in chapter 2 of this thesis, a new focus of US intervention in the Middle East has developed. The invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, the Arab revolutions, along with the US-led ‘war’ against terrorism, and the hunt for Osama bin Laden and other Islamic extremists, have elicited new policies and tactics that have been criticised as inconsistent with international law. A context of growing trends in post-9/11 Islamic terrorism (see chapters 2 and 6) raised new strategic and political challenges for US and other Western military and human rights responses.

The next two chapters cover what are perhaps the two biggest policy uptakes outside of the overt military responses to 9/11: the instigation of morally and legally questionable programs of ‘interrogational torture’, and a massive increase in the use of armed drones via programs of targeted assassination by both the US and some of its close strategic allies. This chapter addresses US practices of enhanced interrogation and extraordinary rendition designed to gather information so as to create usable human intelligence (HUMINT) in the post-9/11 fight against Islamic terrorism. Rendition is only touched on here as a tactical precursor to a terrorist suspect’s becoming subject to enhanced interrogation techniques, and being interrogated in a secure site by or on behalf of the US. Such terms adopted by the Bush administration are more simply, kidnapping and torture. The term ‘interrogational torture’ is more accurate, in that its use to extract information is distinct from cases of torture with other motivations or aims, such as revenge, punishment or deterrence.

Engaging with these policies should be part of any serious discussion of how the US plays a role in cumulative extremism contributing to the causes of rising Islamic

73 terrorism since 9/11. Wider cultural, social and political factors are crucial in expanding the CE concept to effectively inform debates on post-9/11 security threats.

This chapter provides an overview of UN instruments and domestic and international laws that place an absolute prohibition on torture. It then engages with theoretical arguments defending or excusing ‘interrogational torture’, notably the ticking bomb scenario (TBS). This scenario involves sensationalised thought experiments used to argue against the absolute ban on torture, with the experiment involving a hypothetical captured terrorist suspect or suspects who have knowledge of an imminent attack, along with the likelihood that intelligence can be gathered to avert that attack through torture. The discussion here uses case studies of US sanctioned enhanced interrogation of Islamic terror suspects, as part of expanded post-9/11 counterterrorism policies, an important example being that of Abu Zubaydah, a suspected operational al-Qa’ida commander captured by the US in March 2002. Arguments for and against enhanced interrogation are discussed, the primary one involving a time-critical requirement for actionable intelligence in preventing future attacks. This work argues that an answer to questions of whether torture ever works, let alone whether legal instruments are then able to excuse, justify or sanction interrogational torture with any efficacy, still cannot be found. Torture acts not only in a physical sense but also existentially in opposition to our normative humanity with high moral costs. Post-9/11 torture should be criticised and analysed more openly, and more thoroughly than by a blanket prohibition, if we are to properly assess any value it may hold.

3.1 Outlawing torture Torture has been used as an exercise of power, a form of punishment, and most relevant to this thesis, an interrogational tool. David Luban notes that, “through most of human history there was no taboo on torture in military and juridical contexts” (Luban 2005, 1428). Michel Foucault writes on torture as punishment and as a spectacle of power in his description of a torture scene in 18th century France, involving the drawn- out, violent and public execution of Damiens, convicted in 1757 of regicide: here (Foucault 1975, 3-6). However, as a social and political instrument of control, torture did not attract sustained political or legal hostility until the 20th century, and only after World War II did the international community decide to act against torture in

74 international law, as an infraction of human rights (Lippman 1994, 289).

The 1945 Charter holds the protection of human rights as a central purpose of the UN, as stated in its first chapter Purposes and Principles, Article 1(3): “To achieve international co-operation in solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural, or humanitarian character, and in promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion”. Torture first featured in Article 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR 1948): “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”. As Lippman (1994) reports, despite international law starting to address the practice of torture it was still seen by some as a legitimate antidote to unrest, in crises such as in the colonies of great powers facing independence uprisings, quelling communist subversion during Cold War proxy conflicts, and in arresting destabilisation by movements working towards political reform. Two examples are the French torture of Algerians to combat the uprising, and the mistreatment and abuse of prisoners in Northern Ireland by the British aimed at quelling opposition and gaining information and confessions: “These types of abuses led professional associations to adopt ethical codes of conduct which prohibited their members from engaging in torture and abuse” (Lippman 1994, 334).

The UN General Assembly (UNGA) adopted the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) in December 1966 with Article 7 of the covenant stating, “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. In particular no one shall be subjected without his free consent to medical or scientific experimentation” (UN 1966, Art. 7). In December 1975 the UN endorsed the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Being Subjected to Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, proclaiming it as a “guideline for all States and other entities exercising effective power” (Lippman 1994, 300). The Declaration stated, “No State may permit or tolerate torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. Exceptional circumstances such as a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency may not be invoked as a justification of torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” (UN 1975, Art. 3). As a precursor to the 1984 Convention Against Torture (CAT), Article 2 of the 1975 Declaration recognises “Any act of torture or other cruel,

75 inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment is an offence to human dignity and shall be condemned as a denial of the purposes of the Charter of the United Nations and as a violation of the human rights and fundamental freedoms proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights” (UN 1975, Art.2).

In 1977 the UN called on member states to make unilateral declarations expressing their intention to comply with the 1975 Declaration. A UN Voluntary Fund for Victims of Torture was established, designed to assist those abused by governments (Lippman 1994, 303). However, the non-binding 1975 Declaration and later efforts by the UN to address torture internationally became lost in the Cold War. The US and the USSR effectively split much of the world into spheres of influence, often made up of authoritarian client regimes, some of which maintained social and political control with intimidation and threats, using torture as “a major mechanism of governance” (Lippman 1994, 334). In the late 1970s Amnesty International rejuvenated global campaigning against torture and began to lobby for an international prohibition on torture. This led to the 1984 adoption of the CAT, and was followed by the UN appointing a Special Rapporteur on Torture to monitor and try to combat incidents of torture. The Convention promotes standards against which state conduct concerning issues or complaints of torture can be measured. Torture is defined in Article 1 as

... any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. It does not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions (UN 1984, Art. 1).

Article 2 of the CAT provides:

1. Each State Party shall take effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent acts of torture in any territory under its jurisdiction. 2. No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture. 3. An order from a superior officer or a public authority may not be invoked as a justification of torture (UN 1984, Art. 2).

The Committee Against Torture was established in order to supervise state reporting

76 systems, as well as optional components for UN committee visits to detention centres worldwide. The Committee of ten elected members acting in their own personal capacity deals with complaints from one state party against another, as well as communications from or on behalf of individuals if the state involved has accepted the 1984 Convention. The Optional Protocol to the CAT was adopted in December 2002, with a monitoring system of UN visits to places of detention (Scott 2010, 224).

Despite the careful wording of the CAT and the work of the Committee Against Torture, the objectives of the Convention were re-imagined or ignored by the US government pursuing its own agenda. The Convention is “categorical that there [are] no circumstances – even a ‘war against terrorism’ – in which torture could be justified”. Sands writes that the US joined the CAT in 1994, and eight years later the issue of detainees in the so-called ‘war on terror’ caused the White House to request that Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) lawyers advise on the CAT, noting that OLC advice “trumps all other legal advice”. Under White House direction, US State Department lawyers with particular knowledge of the relevant treaties were not invited to participate, “because it was known they would have objected strenuously” (Sands 2008, 86-87). “Principles for the conduct of interrogation, dating back more than a century to President Lincoln’s famous instruction of 1863 that ‘military necessity does not admit of cruelty’, were discarded”, and US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld signed new powers despite the fact that, “approval of new and aggressive interrogation techniques would produce devastating consequences” (Sands 2008, 3). Looking at the various methods of intelligence gathering (INTs), legal restrictions placed on torture are supported by ethical arguments on the morality of torture based in international law. These have underpinned opposition to various terrorism suspects being tortured such as Mohammed al-Qahtani, Mamdouh Habib and Maher Arar. The US sanctioned use of post-9/11 interrogational torture, marked a shift in their official government position, from being a champion of the global prohibition of torture, to redefining and excusing, justifying and defending torture practices via enhanced interrogation programs under the Bush administration.

Case studies from the so-called ‘war on terror’ are cited to help understand post-9/11 US programs of kidnapping and torture. These examples of torture have generally preceded the current practice of targeted assassinations of terror suspects via the US

77 drone programs following widespread outrage over the CIA’s use of torture, and black site prisons around the world. This move to using drones rather than torture is addressed in the following chapter.

Lydia Morris notes that an absolute prohibition is enshrined in the CAT under Article 2(2) (Morris 2012, 1128), and that this prohibition is an established part of customary international law, with protection against torture being a basic human right. Torture represents a denial of human autonomy, and forces persons to act against their own conscience, depriving them of agency and turning a person’s own body against their identity and self-conception; in doing this, torture violates our human integrity and dignity. In terms of the liberal anti-torture argument, “to defend the rights of the individual is also to defend the vital interests of society” (Morris 2012, 1128-1129).

The US has federal legislation against torture. However, documents from the US Department of Justice (DoJ) indicate that meetings taking place between the department and the CIA in late July/August 2002 resulted in the department’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) providing advice that the use of commonly understood torture techniques including stress positions, sleep deprivation for up to 11 days, and waterboarding would not violate the US prohibition against torture in 18 U.S.C. §2340A: “The OLC memorialized this advice in a memorandum dated August 1, 2002. According to a CIA OIG report, pursuant to this advice, the CIA interrogated Abu Zubaydah using ‘Enhanced Interrogation Techniques’ in August 2002” (US DoJ 2009, 670). This was although these techniques were in contravention of international law and the 1984 CAT and despite the US domestic prohibition of torture as follows:

Section 2340A of Title 18, United States Code, prohibits torture committed by public officials under color of law against persons within the public official's custody or control. Torture is defined to include acts specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering. (It does not include such pain or suffering incidental to lawful sanctions.) The statute applies only to acts of torture committed outside the United States. There is Federal extraterritorial jurisdiction over such acts whenever the perpetrator is a national of the United States or the alleged offender is found within the United States, irrespective of the nationality of the victim or the alleged offender (US DoJ 2002, 18 U.S.C. § 2340A).

Administration officials including President George W. Bush maintained that the techniques used on Abu Zubaydah “yielded valuable results that justified the costs to America’s moral authority” (Mayer 2008, 175). However, under customary law as well as

78 the 1984 CAT, “there can be no derogation from the prohibitions set out in the Convention”. The Assistant Attorney General at the OLC, Jay Bybee, approved enhanced interrogation techniques for which the CIA sought approval, albeit with some restrictions. For example, “confinement in larger spaces should not exceed 18 hours, or 4 hours for smaller spaces, and sleep deprivation should not last longer than 11 days at a time” (Bybee 2002: 3; Blakeley 2011, 550). Bybee argues that the infliction of pain is not necessarily torture, something that Paust (2007, 152) notes as “patently ludicrous in view of the title, preamble, and Article 16 of the treaty [CAT]”. It should also be recognised that Bybee’s position “was completely erroneous with respect to Geneva law and war crime responsibility” (Paust 2007, 11). The CIA Inspector General’s report shows that “CIA interrogators went much further in the use of these various techniques than [even] Bybee had sanctioned”. In 2005 the CIA sought permission from the OLC for harsher interrogation methods; permission was granted in a memo from Steven Bradbury the Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General to John Rizzo in his role as Senior Deputy General Counsel for the CIA (Bradbury 2005; Blakeley 2011, 550).

Sands explains that there was perhaps a deliberate ambiguity in some of the communications, with the 50-page memo by Bybee and John Yoo, the Deputy Assistant Attorney General at the OLC, concluding that US law only prohibits “extreme acts”. He goes on to state that similarly “the Torture Convention prohibited only the most extreme acts by reserving criminal penalties solely for torture, not for acts of ‘cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment’ that caused less suffering” (Sands 2008, 89). A letter to Alberto R Gonzales, Counsel to the President, on 1 August 2002, known as the Bybee II memo, advised that, “waterboarding – did not constitute torture, although threatening to bury a prisoner alive would” (Sands 2008, 91).

3.2 Torture debates: Defences, justifications and excuses Despite interrogating thousands of detainees since 9/11, the US and its allies still do not know the best way to get detainees to talk: “How do you get a terrorist to talk… experts say there has been little serious research to answer that crucial question” (Shane 2008). Even administrations that have engaged in enhanced interrogation are no closer to knowing if factual and useful information worthy of analysis into actionable intelligence can be obtained via torture, especially from suspects whose ideology does not always

79 include a fear of death. HUMINT is considered as perhaps the best source of information for security and intelligence agencies globally. Whether interrogation has built rapport, or is undertaken within the Human Intelligence Collector Operations (HICO) Army Field Manual 2-22.3 framework, whether a detainee has been the subject of rendition to a regime where information is sought to the point of death, certainty over the quality of information gained or derived remains elusive. Shane asks why the HICO manual has “not been updated to reflect decades of corporate analysis of how to influence consumers”, and why have there been no systematic efforts to study the successes and failures of US interrogations carried out since 9/11 (Shane 2008).

The absolute prohibition of torture is jus cogens, as defined by Article 53 of the 1969 Vienna Convention of the Law of Treaties: “a norm accepted and recognized by the international community of States as a whole as a norm from which no derogation is permitted and which can be modified only by a subsequent norm of general international law having the same character” (OAS 2017, Section2: Article 53). However, certain practices of the Bush administration including waterboarding, stress positions, wall standing and exposure to loud music during interrogations have arguably weakened the social and political torture taboo, along with the laws banning the practice of torture under any circumstances (Barnes 2016, 102). Barnes argues that post-9/11 US attempts to redefine practices such as waterboarding as enhanced interrogation aimed at circumventing the UN CAT were “an attempt to reconcile modern sensibilities of pain and suffering with unnecessary violence”, in the hope of removing connotations like cruelty and abuse of power and to bring the practice “within civilised and necessary conduct”. Barnes argues that legal finesse of these issues by the Bush administration served to demonstrate “the strength of the torture taboo” (Barnes 2016, 103).

The post-9/11 world witnessed the US engaging in interrogational torture, which it repeatedly justified despite the lack of definitive evidence to support its efficacy as a tool of post-9/11 counterterrorism policies. Barnes notes how the Bush administration refused to endorse torture, or even to openly challenge its absolute prohibition. This left the fight against post-9/11 Islamic terrorism in a situation where the US “could go to war and declare the right to kill terrorist group leaders, but it could not justify torturing them” (Barnes 2016, 105). In plain terms, the US made a decision to rebrand the language of torture: “Challenging the torture taboo would have challenged the US

80 identity as a ‘humane’ state”. To this end the military opted to use the term counter- resistance techniques, with the CIA preferring to call the processes enhanced interrogations (Barnes 2016, 106). In effect, the US silently defended torture by not referring to it. Instead, as Kfir notes in reviewing Jared Del Rosso’s 2015 book Talking About Torture, the US came to accept torture as a viable post-9/11 CT policy by reinterpreting what it is (Kfir 2016; Del Rosso 2015), and rebranding it as enhanced interrogation was clearly part of that reinterpretation.

Using these rebranding exercises as a proxy defence of torture has gone even further. Pugliese notes that “Across the corpus of official texts – memos, legal briefs and doctrines – produced post-9/11 by the United States government in order to legitimate and justify the torture it inflicted on its various victims, torture is invariably situated as productive: of truth, knowledge and the prevention of prospective violence and terror” (Pugliese 2013, 1). In what Pugliese calls a “market-oriented economy” of interrogational torture, even the word ‘interrogation’ is lost, with the former CIA Deputy Director of Central Intelligence ordering that it be replaced with the term ‘Human Resource Exploitation’. The physical body of a detainee then becomes “yet another resource that can be mined and exploited for ‘high value’ information or data” (Pugliese 2013, 1). Such linguistic manipulation of understanding was used to address how attaching legitimacy was considered crucial before any enactment of violence, in essence conceding that it is acceptable to use violence if legitimised under certain specific conditions not hitherto recognised. In cases of post-9/11 counterterrorism policies, these conditions occurred under “the ruse of national security’’ (Pugliese 2013, 7; Osuri and Devadas 2014, 5). This fluid translation of reacting to torture taboos entails “rewriting, fine-tuning the rule of law to make room for the [torture] exception” (Osuri and Devadas 2014, 5). A hypocrisy exists in a post-9/11 US that “legitmates instrumentally rational expressions of state violence and abhors torture” (Del Rosso 2014, 385), a process by which the Bush administration “authorized painful interrogation practices in contravention of domestic and international laws against torture (Del Rosso 2014, 384).

Attempting to ignore a need to excuse, justify or defend torture, President George W. Bush vowed to treat detainees held on terror charges humanely, despite removing the Geneva Convention protections that previously existed for “unlawful combatants”

81 (Barnes 2016, 109; Bush 2002, 135; Greenberg and Dratel 2005). Neo-conservative thinking in the aftermath of 9/11 accepted advice that the US could maintain its legal position in regard to their responsibilities under UN CAT 1984, yet still practise what other commentators would consider as torture. Although not an effective defence of torture, this mindset does show that the practice of interrogational torture, enhanced interrogation or human resource exploitation attracts various ingenious responses from those seeking any advantage it may provide in countering terrorism. To further complicate the issue, in order to perhaps avoid being considered as torture apologists, those who entertain its use in counterterrorism often speak of torture as being excused rather than as something that is defended or justified. The US Congress considered that procedures such as waterboarding worked, being part of a broader discursive construction of torture as a legitimate use of force: “To construe waterboarding as a ‘mandated course of action,’ an act ‘representative of proper organizational behavior’, congressional proponents produced nuanced narratives of the procedure” (Del Rosso 2014, 389). These would begin with an offence by an individual known to have engaged in or be planning to engage in terrorism and suspected of possessing knowledge of impending attack/s. This terrorist is captured and traditional interrogation, which does not involve the application of pain, is used. This however fails “to compel the detainee to provide intelligence. Enhanced interrogation, including waterboarding, is then used, and this results in the collection of ‘actionable’ intelligence” that is information containing practical applications for the prevention of terrorism. Very importantly, “these narratives portray the use of waterboarding and ‘enhanced interrogation’ as necessary, instrumental, controlled, and effective. Pain is inflicted only so long as it moves the narrative forward; it ceases once it achieves its goal” (Del Rosso 2014, 389).

Philippe Sands notes that, when discussing the construction of the “Guantánamo System” and its enhanced interrogation programs to produce intelligence for use in post-9/11 US counterterrorism, the Red Cross felt it “cannot be considered other than an intentional system of cruel, unusual and degrading treatment and a form of torture” (2008, 215). Sands reports how the UN Committee Against Torture repeatedly called for the closure of the Guantánamo Bay facility and for an end to the use of techniques such as “search humiliation (internal examinations), ‘short shackling’ (being chained to the floor on short chains) and the use of dogs, ‘that constitute torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment’”. The UN Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) stated that using

82 techniques of nudity, dogs, and heat exposure could give rise to “extreme psychological suffering so as to amount to torture” (Sands 2008, 215-216). Linking back to a point above about not defending torture, but rather excusing its use after the fact, Sands has responded to a question from US neo-conservative pundit Marc Thiessen, previously employed in the White House as chief speechwriter to President George W. Bush. Thiessen challenged various opponents of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation program to put themselves in the shoes of the CIA (Thiessen 2010, 226-228). Jane Mayer, author of The Dark Side, and Tom Parker of Amnesty International both refused his challenge, while Anthony Romero of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) initially replied but then failed to produce a promised response. This left Philippe Sands giving the only response to the question of what he would do in Thiessen’s real-life scenario:

It is March 2003, and you are the CIA official responsible for interrogating Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. You know he is the man responsible for the deaths of 3,000 people on 9/11, the chief operational planner of al Qaeda, and has admitted knowing the details of whatever follow on attacks they have planned. He is refusing to cooperate. When you ask him when the next attack is coming he says, “Soon you will know.” What do you do? Do you rule out using enhanced interrogation techniques to get him to talk? Are there any circumstances under which you would use such techniques? What would you say to the investigating commission if an attack happened, and you did not use every means at your disposal to get to get the information from him that could have prevented it? (Thiessen 2010, 226)

Although Sands did not directly address how he would react if confronted with the prospect of interrogating Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), he did address the problem in a manner shared by a number of other torture opponents, which respects a very difficult position accepting a cost to the moral authority of the non-derogable prohibition of torture, as against the risk to innocent lives of not doing everything possible to prevent a terrorist attack. Thiessen included this response in his book Courting Disaster: How the CIA Kept America Safe and How Barack Obama Is Inviting the Next Attack, as follows:

I can understand that there may be extreme circumstances in which some may find it justifiable to take extreme action – aggressive techniques of interrogation including torture – to protect what they perceive to be the greater good. But let me be clear: there are no circumstances in which the use of torture can ever be lawful. Such information as may be obtained is notoriously unreliable. The torture of Al Qahtani produced nothing useful. Moreover, any benefit (if it could so be called) would be wholly outweighed by the patent harm caused by the global outrage and consequent radicalization that follows, to say nothing of the

83 wholesale loss of moral authority. Once the door is opened, the signal is clear: if a little bit of force is a good thing, then surely a bit more must be an even better thing. No, torture can never be lawful because it is not who we are: the outright prohibition is what distinguishes us from those who seek to harm or destroy us. International law – on the making of which the US has led the world – has it right. The prohibition is and must be absolute. If anyone is ever inclined to go down that route, it must be in the certain knowledge that he or she will be subject to criminal investigation and bear the full brunt of the law. So it must be for those I wrote about in Torture Team who approved the torture of Al Qahtani, including in particular the lawyers at DoJ [Department of Justice] without whom the abuse would never have occurred, and the upper echelons of the Administration who signed off on it (Sands in Thiessen 2010, 227-228).

Thiessen is challenging others to engage with or to step back from a version of the ticking bomb scenario (TBS), an exercise that is discussed in the following section. Thiessen considers that Sands grudgingly accepted “that there may be extreme circumstances in which aggressive techniques including torture may be necessary” (Thiessen 20210, 228). The response by Sands is one shared in part by other actors involved in the question of how to deal with a TBS in terms of the absolute prohibition of torture under international law.

In July 2016 I discussed this conundrum at the inaugural ‘Torture Conference’ at Oxford University’s Mansfield College with the college principal Baroness Helena Kennedy, who supports the absolute ban on torture. Kennedy in her book Just Law addresses the problem of how she would deal with a real-life TBS; she notes that she was once asked by a young Israeli lawyer what she would do were she presented with someone she believed had planted a bomb. Kennedy replied, “I would quite probably beat the hell out of him to tell me where it was but I would have to bear the legal consequences, particularly if he was some poor soul who knew nothing” (Kennedy 2004, 58). Kennedy’s “poor soul who knew nothing” presents a dilemma in the pro-torture argument: what happens if the tortured suspect has no answers, what the wrong man is interrogated? This is a scenario discussed by Henry Shue in an article simply entitled ‘Torture’ (1978). Shue argues against using interrogational torture to gather information in a counterterrorism capacity. He acknowledges what some people feel about even discussing torture, something he refers to as the “Pandora's Box objection: if practically everyone is opposed to all torture, why bring it up, start people thinking about it, and risk weakening the inhibitions against what is clearly a terrible business?” (Shue 1978, 124). Shue remarks, “Although everyone continues ritualistically to condemn all torture

84 publicly, the deep conviction, as reflected in actual policy, is in many cases not behind the strong language. In addition, partial justifications for some of the torture continue to circulate” (Shue 1978, 124). He recognises a general contention that since killing is surely worse than torture, and yet killing is not absolutely prohibited by international law especially in war, then perhaps in certain circumstances torture should be sanctioned or excused. Shue does not argue for this point but rather shows its weaknesses by engaging with how a defence of torture is seen as somehow reasonable. In order to do this Shue notes the following two stages of thinking:

Stage A Noting, 1 Just-combat killing is total destruction of a person, 2 Torture is usually only partial destruction or temporary incapacitation of a person, and, 3 The total destruction of a person is a greater harm than the partial destruction of a person is then, 4 Just-combat killing is a greater harm than torture usually is…

Stage B Assuming, 4 [From Stage A] Just-combat killing is a greater harm than torture usually is, and 5 Just-combat killing is sometimes morally permissible, then, 6 Torture is sometimes morally permissible.

Shue maintains that it is a mistake “to assume that the only consideration relevant to moral permissibility is the amount of harm done. Even if one grants that killing someone in combat is doing him or her a greater harm than torturing him or her (Stage A), it by no means follows that there could not be a justification for the greater harm that was not applicable to the lesser harm” (Shue 1978, 126). Specifically Shue recognises that killing can satisfy moral constraints other than minimising harm, which it is possible no torture could satisfy. Torture is generally considered to be an assault on the defenceless, something that is incompatible with the laws of war. However in response to this, Shue notes that “a literal defense is an effective capability for surrender, that is, a form of surrender which will in fact bring an end to attacks. In the case of torture the relevant form of surrender might seem to be a compliance with the wishes of the torturer that provides an escape from further torture” (Shue 1978, 131). This type of assumption plagues the torture debate, and becomes unwieldy in pro-torture arguments, that is, that the victim of torture has available an act of compliance, which when performed brings an end to the torture. Shue turns this assumption into an effective argument to

85 maintain the absolute prohibition on torture. This argument is distinct from that regarding torture as a means of intimidation, which Shue calls ‘terroristic torture’ and notes, “the extent of the suffering inflicted upon the victims of the [terroristic] torture is proportioned, not according to the responses of the victim, but according to the expected impact of news of the torture upon other people over whom the torture victim normally has no control” (Shue 1978, 132).

Theoretically these arguments speak towards a philosophical problem, about whether morality that is widely considered to be an absolute, can be suspended, or viewed as existing in differing extents. Evans discusses vindications of moral convictions, noting that “the more that historical and political contextual factors are taken into account, the less easy it is to pass moral judgement”, and that “sensible moral judgement becomes impossible at a certain point” (2003, 141-142). Putting such theoretical arguments aside for a moment, is there any academic defence for interrogational torture as a legitimate information-gathering tool? Morally the answer must be no. But does a practical defence exist where torturers would be prepared to accept that their moral authority is worth being compromised? Assuming any real-world scenarios existed whereby information either acquired or derived from torture would be permitted as evidence in law courts (incidentally there are no such situations), should we trust, or in effect can we measure, the reliability of information obtained through interrogational torture? According to Shue “since any sensible willing collaborator will cooperate in a hurry, only the committed and the innocent are likely to be severely tortured” (Shue 1978, 140). He suggests that possible victims of interrogational torture fall into three categories. The first is the ready collaborator, for who just the threat of torture is sufficient to give up any useful information they may have, so resorting to actual torture is not required. Second is the innocent bystander, someone who is passive towards both sides of a conflict and essentially uninvolved. Should the bystander possess any relevant information their impartiality would mean they are most likely willing to share it, or at least not be prepared to undergo personal pain or stress to protect what to them is a worthless secret. This would mean that as with the first category of possible torture victims, no actual torture is required to access the information. Finally, Shue’s third possible victim of torture is the dedicated enemy: a foe for whom no amount of torture will convince him or her to release information, but who may in order to obtain relief

86 offer misleading and/or false information, which could serve to divert resources to false trails, and create more harm than good (Shue 1978, 134-135).

In the first two categories, consider that these innocents who are perfectly willing to provide the information sought in order to escape torture, do not actually have any information. Then any torture performed on them becomes increasingly inhuman, and all the while pointless. When combined with the third category victim being so dedicated as to protect his/her secrets at all costs despite the severity of any torture, any programs of interrogational torture prove futile and dangerous in regard to any possible subject of it. This assessment of the futility of torture is brutally captured by what was the reputed informal motto of the Saigon police: “If they are not guilty, beat them until they are” (Howes 1993, 56).

A question mark remains over whether programs of sanctioned or legally warranted torture could set up an environment that achieves actionable and life-saving results. In very specific cases could torture prohibition be compatible with situations where interrogational torture proves excusable? For example, this might be the case in the point made by Kennedy (2004, 58), leaving the torturer legally vulnerable for their actions, while managing to gain life-saving information. Some distinction exists between torture-acquired information, offered during the act in order to halt the torture, and torture-derived information, obtained from the suspect following their being tortured in order to avoid further emotional and/or physical stresses. Both forms of information are legally of no worth, having involved torture in some form that remains absolutely prohibited.

3.3 The ticking bomb scenario defence of torture A ticking bomb scenario (TBS) is a hypothetical or thought experiment often employed to sensationalise arguments against the absolute ban on torture. A simplified version of a TBS is as follows:

Imagine the architect of an imminent terrorist act that if successful would result in the death of innocent people, has been captured by police or another government security agency, and that these authorities believe the terrorist will reveal the information needed to stop the attack only under torture. Is torture then defendable, excusable and/or necessary? In such a scenario, using torture

87 could be argued to be a lesser evil in order to prevent a greater evil, such as a causing death or injury to a number of innocents if the “ticking bomb” is not found and disarmed in time.

Alan Dershowitz’s TBS synopsis poses a similar story:

The police in New York have, in custody, a suspect known to be a terrorist. He is adjudged perfectly lucid and rational. He admits to planting a nuclear weapon in the heart of the city and informs the police that the bomb will go off within five hours. Other evidence obtained by the police make the threat totally credible. There is no possibility of evacuation and no possibility of finding the bomb, except by the most amazing stroke of luck, during this time. Would I really argue that the state must refrain from torture in this case? (Dershowitz 2003, 289)

There are some essential characteristics to all ticking bomb scenarios. These are the capture and detention of a suspect or suspects possessing the knowledge of or plans for an imminent terrorist attack, along with the likelihood that through effective interrogation with likely resort to torture, information can be acquired to prevent the attack or avert its consequences.

A TBS “is an argument that has been used to justify torture in a set of very extreme and detailed circumstances” (Devlin 2012). However, most terrorism experts argue that a TBS occurs only extremely rarely if at all in the real world. Further, if the necessary elements were to fall into place satisfying the scenario, it would be unlikely to be as simple as theoretically portrayed. As Wellen (2010) states, if a TBS hinges on a weapon of mass destruction due to go off at a predetermined and rapidly approaching time, in a sense this ceases to be an argument for torture programs, and instead becomes about arguing for torture warrants to be granted under specific and extreme circumstances.

This evolution of the pro-torture argument loses the impact of a classic TBS as a method of sanctioning wider laws allowing enhanced interrogation techniques to be used on terrorism suspects. For these scenarios, the arguments often posed as both a counterpoint and a companion to torture are lost owing to time constraints, that is, nurturing a personal relationship with the torture subject and gaining their trust after repeated interrogation sessions. The luxury of developing an interrogator-suspect relationship is something that cannot be reliably entertained in a TBS, where there is a rigid need to acknowledge and respect imminent danger.

88 Deontological perspectives view torture as absolutely wrong under any set of circumstances, however extreme, due to its costs to moral dignity and humanity. However, Cohan asserts that, “while the moral objections to torture are potent, these arguments are not persuasive when the stakes are high enough… any of these moral constraints are also laws that, for the most part, admit of no exceptions” (Cohan 2007, 1589). Findlay similarly notes, “Counter to the argument that torture is in some instances permissible for the protection of elite security interests to the detriment of more universalised and inclusive ordering, is the deontological-based argument that state torture is never permissible because a greater and common morality should be used as the principle to constrain the pursuit of the ideal order” (Findlay 2012, 1049).

Many arguments in politics and international relations are influenced by utilitarianism, and could entertain views that torture might be excused in order to prevent a greater evil. In one statement on torture, Michael Walzer contends, “Even when he [the torturer] lies and tortures, his hands will be clean, for he has done what he should do as best he can, standing alone in a moment of time, forced to choose” (Walzer 1973, 169). Shue uses an example of a nuclear weapon in the centre of Paris, with resort to torture being the only way to prevent the imminent death of thousands of innocent people and the destruction of the city. In this very specific scenario, Shue states, “I can see no way to deny the permissibility of torture” (Shue 1978, 141). These justifications for the acceptability and approval of TBS-justified torture make recourse to the utilitarian argument of the greatest good for the greatest number. However, these arguments are inconsistent with the dominion of human dignity or integrity over human security (Findlay 2012, 1049).

Alex Bellamy argues that the TBS argument as a torture defence was “first articulated by [Jeremy] Bentham and reappears in virtually every academic justification of torture. It is the starting point of Alan Dershowitz’s argument, and the scenario presented to audiences in American television programmes such as 24 and Alias” (Bellamy 2006, 141). In a response to Professor Marcy Strauss, Dershowitz himself refers to the English philosopher, jurist and social reformer Bentham in regard to the concepts that underline a TBS (Dershowitz 2003, 275-276). Twining and Twining (1973) note that in Bentham’s utilitarian calculus, it must be clear that the reason for any mistreatment of prisoners is to acquire information likely to save innocent civilians lives. They discuss at length how

89 the utilitarian maxim relates to a TBS, citing Bentham’s concise view (quoted from Bentham MSS. Box 74.b., p. 429 of 27 May 1804):

Suppose an occasion, to arise, in which a suspicion is entertained, as strong as that which would be received as a sufficient ground for arrest and commitment as for felony – a suspicion that at this very time a considerable number of individuals are actually suffering, by illegal violence inflictions equal in intensity to those which if inflicted by the hand of justice, would universally be spoken of under the name of torture. For the purpose of rescuing from torture these hundred innocents, should any scruple be made of applying equal or superior torture, to extract the requisite information from the mouth of one criminal, who having it in his power to make known the place where at this time the enormity was practising or about to be practised, should refuse to do so? To say nothing of wisdom, could any pretence be made so much as to the praise of blind and vulgar humanity, by the man who to save one criminal, should determine to abandon a 100 innocent persons to the same fate?

In summary Bentham claims it is absurd to prefer the maintenance of scruples and be bound by respecting the rights of just one criminal at the expense of many innocent lives, an example of torture being argued as excusable in certain scenarios.

A TBS involving an actual “ticking bomb” first appeared in Jean Lartéguy’s 1960 novel Les Centurions, written during the French occupation of Algeria (Mayer 2007, 21). Rejali wondered in his book Torture and Democracy whether “Perhaps Lartéguy invented the ticking bomb scenario” (Rejali 2007, 546). Although this evolution of the argument includes a ticking bomb, the concept of a time-critical terrorist threat has been shown to go back at least as far as Bentham. However, Kovarovic notes, “In the decades that followed Les Centurions, the ticking time bomb exception required just that – an actual ticking time bomb”, with the novel’s French hero physically beating the female suspect to uncover an imminent plot to explode bombs across Algeria, beginning a race against time to stop it (Kovarovic 2010, 254).

Alfred McCoy explores some real-life ticking bomb scenarios, discussing how days before the fifth anniversary of 9/11, President Bush spoke in a defence of past and future uses of “alternative set[s] of procedures” by the CIA. Bush spoke to a national television audience of covert action that could have been lifted from the scripts of espionage drama. Bush narrated how CIA officers “risked their lives to capture some of the most brutal terrorists on Earth,” noting how US intelligence “worked day and night” to hunt “a trusted associate of Osama bin Laden” like Abu Zubaydah. However, while in custody

90 Zubaydah was reportedly “defiant and evasive.” Bush maintained, “captured terrorists have… intelligence that cannot be found any other place,” so the CIA with White House approval applied Bush’s “alternative set[s] of procedures” and reportedly revealed time- critical intelligence crucial to “the operation that captured Khalid Sheik Mohammed”. Claims have since been made that the CIA then interrogated KSM with enhanced interrogation procedures, successfully uncovering information preventing further terrorist attacks (McCoy 2006, 21).

3.4 Torture despite international law: Post-9/11 enhanced interrogation Imagine right now that across the cities of New York, London, Paris and Sydney, electronic timers on hidden canisters of sarin and nerve-gas are set to detonate in a matter of hours, sending millions of innocent civilians to their deaths,

But take hope. We have one chance, just one, to avert this atrocity and save the lives of millions. Agent Jack Bauer of the Counter Terrorist Unit has his hunting knife poised over the eye of a trembling traitor who may know the identity of those who set these bombs. As a clock ticks menacingly and the camera focuses on knife point poised to plunge into eyeball, the traitor breaks and identifies the Muslim terrorists, giving Agent Bauer the lead he needs to crack this case wide open.

This is the TBS, brought to millions of homes by Fox Television’s series 24, a show that proved popular among Washington’s neo-conservatives and other US “patriots” (McCoy 2006, 20). How do such post-9/11 fictions increase the popularity of TBS influenced arguments defending torture, affecting the social and political justifications and excuses for using torture to gather information in the ‘war’ against terrorism?

Stephen Lukes argues, “The problem of torture arises where it appears to be the only available means of averting some terrible outcome” (Lukes 2005, 1). For international law to work effectively, these problems need resolution before the need for torture can be defended, excused or denied even if the potential for a real-life TBS could be accepted. An international and domestic legal system that is unprepared because of a perceived unlikelihood of certain events could leave counterterrorism security processes neglected. Human rights protections risk becoming goals with only ad lib protection, lacking legal checks, balances and constraints on what state agencies agree to be within their mandate to respond to terrorist threats.

The chair of the UN Committee Against Torture, speaking on the 25th anniversary of the 1984 Convention Against Torture noted, “it was regrettably not possible to say that torture had decreased over the past quarter of a century” (cited in Scott 2010, 224). An obstacle to realising CAT’s objectives is the refusal by some governments “to clearly define and criminalise torture and to investigate and ensure that perpetrators of torture are brought to justice” (Scott 2010, 224) for even though terrorists may practise torture and do not observe the CAT, this should not change moral imperatives. The compliance of states bound by CAT “should not depend on reciprocity, on whether our enemies observes these rules or not” (Ignatieff 2005, 18). Torture through enhanced interrogation sessions has long been an offensive topic. However, it is a topic that has been moved from the shadows since 9/11 and the reactions by the US to new threats from Islamic terrorism. Torture cannot be eliminated internationally without domestic reforms to many legal procedures and criminal justice systems, aligning them with international law. Lippman argues that all human rights are in jeopardy as long as torture exists. This position should be acknowledged alongside the fact that post-9/11 non-state terrorism is a growing global issue, in which many states face threats from terrorism and radicalisation to violent extremism. Lippman considers the global anti- torture movement as fortifying “our appreciation of the commonality of all people” and providing a “bridge to a more humane future” (Lippman 1994, 334; see also Turner 2006, 9). However, scenarios can be hypothesised where circumstances are so extreme that legal frameworks and warrants might excuse, if not explicitly allow or defend, torture.

3.5 Abu Zubaydah: A case study in interrogational torture The US Oversight and Review Division of the Department of Justice (US DoJ) considers that “the first major incident involving the use of aggressive interrogation techniques on a detainee that was reported to senior executives at FBI Headquarters was… Abu Zubaydah”. Suspected of being an operational al-Qa’ida commander, Zubaydah was captured late in March 2002 after being severely wounded in a gunfight in Faisalabad in Pakistan. He was taken to a secret CIA facility for medical treatment and interrogation (US DoJ 2009, 67). FBI agents Gibson and Thomas (pseudonyms) initially took the lead in interviewing the captive, as the CIA’s own interrogators were not yet on scene:

Gibson said he used relationship-building techniques with Zubaydah and succeeded in getting Zubaydah to admit his identity. When Zubaydah’s medical condition became grave, he was taken to a hospital and Gibson assisted in giving him care, even to the point of cleaning him up after bowel movements. Gibson told us he continued interviewing Zubaydah in the hospital, and Zubaydah identified a photograph of KSM as ‘Muktar’, the mastermind of the September 11 attacks (US DoJ 2009, 68).

After a few days the CIA assumed control over the interviews, with CIA officers informing Gibson and Thomas that as Zubaydah was only providing throwaway information, they needed to “diminish his capacity to resist” (US DoJ 2009, 67-68). The CIA could learn from the fact that Abu Zubaydah was weakened by being in a severely critical state; according to Mayer, “it broke his resistance”. The CIA however denies reports that it refused Zubaydah medical care in violation of medical ethics and international law, but his near-death experience nonetheless showed the agency that pain could be used to advantage (Mayer 2008, 142-143).

After the CIA took the lead role in Zubaydah’s interrogation sessions, Thomas described to the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) the techniques he witnessed CIA officers using on the detainee. Many of the passages in Thomas’s report are still redacted (US DoJ 2009, 68); however, Thomas referred to the treatment as “borderline torture”. He added that Zubaydah seemed responsive to the rapport-based approach of the FBI, before becoming uncooperative when subjected to the CIA techniques. Mayer supports this idea of torture as not being as effective as rapport building during interrogation, noting that in 2001 the Israeli security service had concluded that the best way to convince reluctant detainees to talk was with what they called the three Ks: the Hebrew terms “kesef, or money; kavod, respect; and kussit, a crude sexual term for a woman” (Mayer 2008, 142). Gibson did not express the same concern as Thomas over the CIA’s treatment of Abu Zubaydah. However, he did report the CIA shaving Zubaydah’s head and keeping him deprived of clothing in a cold cell. Some of the techniques that were used such as sleep deprivation for up to 72 hours and loud music are described in the OIG report as “standard interrogation techniques” (US DoJ 2009, 68).

According to the FBI’s Gibson, during the CIA interrogations, Abu Zubaydah gave up José Padilla, a US citizen, as an al-Qa’ida operative (Mayer 2008, 198), and identified several targets for future al-Qa’ida attacks, including New York’s Brooklyn Bridge and the Statue

93 of Liberty (US DoJ 2009, 69). Although disputes exist as to how any information was extracted from Zubaydah, it is accepted that the intelligence gained led directly to José Padilla’s arrest at Chicago airport in May 2002 (Mayer 2008, 155-156). However this information that prevented the detonation of a dirty bomb was gathered, it does not provide a conclusive argument to deny calls for legal enhancements to rapport-based interrogation techniques as used by the FBI, or for not handing over high-value detainees to CIA or military programs who may or may not have more success in obtaining time-critical information from unwilling suspects. In the case of Abu Zubaydah, the information that led to his capture stemmed not from torture but from a tip bought from a taxi driver by Pakistani security service (ISI) officers, then the CIA paying the ISI “$10 million for Abu Zubayda [sic]” (Mayer 2008, 141). A case of kesef rather than of the effectiveness of enhanced interrogation.

After Gibson and Thomas departed the interrogation sessions, the CIA obtained legal opinions from the US DoJ that “certain techniques could be legally used [on Zubaydah] including sleep deprivation, noise, and constant light… the CIA also had sought approval for a technique involving placing a cloth over a detainee’s face and dripping water so the detainee could not breathe”. The CIA requested legal approval from the US DoJ for waterboarding to be reclassified as an enhanced interrogation technique rather than as torture (US DoJ 2009, 70). In a 2006 defence of “alternative procedures for high value detainees”, President Bush cited three pieces of information obtained from Abu Zubaydah using enhanced interrogation methods. The first was that Zubaydah identified KSM as the key planner of 9/11 and uncovered his alias Mukhtar. The second was that information from Zubaydah “helped stop a terrorist attack being planned for inside the United States”; Bush added, “Based on the information he provided the operatives were detained – one while travelling to the United States”. The third claim was that Zubaydah’s information led to catching Ramsi bin al-Shibh, which in turn aided the operation that captured KSM (Mayer 2008, 175).

As with many things political however, events leading to bin al-Shibh’s capture have since been disputed, and there is no guarantee that Bush’s optimism on the interrogations can be declared a success for a TBS defence of torture justifying the legal navigation around 18 U.S.C. § 2340A. Mayer discusses an embargoed interview with KSM and bin al-Shibh secured by Yousri Fouda, a correspondent for Al Jazeera, while the

94 two terrorist suspects were staying together in a Karachi safe house. On camera KSM and bin al-Shibh openly took credit for masterminding the 9/11 attacks and apparently did so convincingly enough “for any jury in the world to convict them”. The two revealed they were in the Karachi area, with KSM even accompanying Fouda into an open street as he left. Fouda then confided in Al Jazeera chairman Sheikh Hamad bin Thamer al- Thani, cousin to the Emir of Qatar, about his interview with the two men. Without Fouda’s knowledge, the Qatari Emir then immediately shared this information with the CIA. By mid-June 2002 the CIA had collected all the details of Fouda’s meetings with the two terrorists, including the likely location and floor of the building in which they were living. The US National Security Agency (NSA) then matched bin al-Shibh’s voice from the interviews to a satellite phone intercept, allowing them to pinpoint his apartment, leading to his arrest along with a number of other suspects just one year after 9/11 (Mayer 2008, 176-177). Whether or not there are any lessons here to help understand if torture proves effective in addressing terror threats remains a difficult question to answer. Even then, if an answer were forthcoming that torture can herald results satisfying the often time-critical nature of counterterrorism operations and successfully avert terrorist attacks, we still would not have satisfied utilitarian arguments surrounding individual human rights protections versus the rights of the community with regard to the costs torture incurs on our moral authority and humanity.

3.6 Waterboarding Among an array of torture methods used on suspected communist agitators by Argentine government junta officials during the “Dirty War”, set out in the 1984 Nunca Mas: The Report of the Argentine National Commission on the Disappeared, was the practice of what is now known as waterboarding: covering the suspect’s head in a cloth hood and immersing it in water, such that “when wet, the hood stuck to the nose and mouth, making breathing practically impossible” (Lippman 1994, 305). Victims report the sensation of drowning and uncontrollable panic. However, unlike justifications for torturing terrorist suspects since 9/11, Lippman argues that waterboarding in Argentina was not done with the purpose of gathering intelligence. Rather it was designed to “break the victims both spiritually and physically, as well as to give pleasure to their torturers”, with the acts being used to humiliate the tortured as much as possible, after which any survivors were killed (Lippman 1994, 305).

For Dick Cheney, Vice President to George W. Bush, waterboarding was nothing quite so serious as it may appear from the Argentine report. A mere “’dunk in the water’ and a ‘no-brainer’ if it could save lives” was Cheney’s position on this US-sanctioned enhanced interrogation technique. Following 9/11, the US adoption of waterboarding as a legitimate interrogation tool placed the controversial technique under Category III in a three-page memorandum listing 18 acceptable and legal tools for interrogation. This followed the signature of Bush’s Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld on 2 December 2002, effectively discarding the international obligations of the US under existing torture prohibition instruments such as the 1984 CAT. All 18 techniques were new to the US military, which at that time “didn’t do aggression or cruelty by way of interrogations” (Sands 2008, 3-6). These memoranda submitted by the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) to the White House Defense Secretary early in 2002 stretched definitions to the point that torture thresholds were considered to be “equivalent to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function or even death”, with any abuse via interrogation below that standard being considered as mere “coercive interrogation” (Ignatieff 2005, 19).

Following massive publicity surrounding waterboarding by the US after 9/11, Christopher Hitchens reported in Vanity Fair (August 2008) on his experience of being waterboarded by men who were once employed to train American soldiers to resist the technique. Hitchens reports that waterboarding was something that “was inflicted, and endured, by those members of the Special Forces who underwent the advanced form of training known as SERE (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape)”. The original inspiration for this training to be part of SERE was that this was not a tactic employed by the US and its allies, but rather treatment they might meet at the hands of a lawless foe disregarding the rules of conflict. By agreeing to undergo the technique as research for his article on whether waterboarding qualified as torture, Hitchens was aware that he had the luxury of personal safeguards that could immediately end his experience if necessary. In these controlled conditions, the “victim” agrees upon a safe word to bring an end to the treatment, and holds a metal baton in each hand, known as “the dead man’s handle”, that if he so much tries to release will halt the exercise, bringing him back to the safety and comfort of civilisation in a North Carolina workshop – rather than in the real world with no safeguards and a return to a dark, cramped cell within a CIA

96 black-site (Hitchens 2008). Before signing the waiver, Hitchens was clear that this was not exactly comparable to how he would feel in “enemy” hands with unknown elements and feelings of isolation and vulnerability. However, there follows an excerpt from the signed waiver indicating that this experiment should not be taken lightly: “Waterboarding is a potentially dangerous activity in which the participant can receive serious and permanent (physical, emotional and psychological) injuries and even death, including injuries and death due to the respiratory and neurological systems of the body”. Hitchens notes that there would be safeguards “during the ‘water boarding’ [sic] process, however, these measures may fail and even if they work properly they may not prevent Hitchens from experiencing serious injury or death” (Hitchens 2008).

Important for any discussion as to whether waterboarding constitutes torture is that Hitchens debunked views expressed by many proponents of the technique that waterboarding creates in the victim the feeling of drowning. Hitchens comments starkly,

… you may have read by now the official lie about this treatment, which is that it ‘simulates’ the feeling of drowning. This is not the case. You feel that you are drowning because you are drowning – or, rather, being drowned, albeit slowly and under controlled conditions and at the mercy (or otherwise) of those who are applying the pressure (Hitchens 2008).

Answering his initial question, Hitchens maintained that waterboarding certainly constituted torture, although he remained generally supportive of the use of torture techniques in the interrogation of terror suspects such as KSM (Hitchens 2008).

An argument against a warranted torture program is that it would open a moral door, one that could prove difficult if not impossible to close. If the assumption is that we the interrogators are always in the right, where do we draw the line? If waterboarding fails to get usable information in time and the clock is still ticking, what next: when and where should torture cease? Hitchens recognised but ultimately dismissed this as a viable reason to support an absolute prohibition argument for torture. His online article now includes photographs of Hitchens undergoing waterboarding where originally there was also a video link of his ordeal that has since been removed. An active YouTube link has been included in the bibliography, not for motives of voyeurism, but rather to illustrate the reality of the technique as torture and to further highlight this extreme practice (Hitchens 2008, VIDEO). Freelance journalist Mike Guy has also been

97 waterboarded and his experience differs from that of Hitchens in that he asked the ‘interrogator’ his own thoughts on the procedure. The interrogator did not believe it to be torture but rather the “invoking of an existing fear”. He explained why a detainee’s head is positioned lower than their feet: once the oxygen in the lungs is used up, carbon dioxide collects at the bottom of the lungs creating an intense psychological panic that negates any ability to merely hold one’s breath as resistance to being waterboarded (Guy 2009, VIDEO). As with discussions on torture methods in a wider sense, society is still unable to draw any conclusive outcome as to efficacy from discussions on waterboarding, other than to note that for some it is a legitimate counterterrorism intelligence option and US counterterrorism policy, and especially so since post-9/11 increases in Islamic terrorism.

Conclusion Having introduced concerns with post-9/11 torture, this chapter has noted the major international instruments placing an absolute prohibition on the practice. Discussing examples of torture in contemporary political use that act not just physically against isolated extremists, but existentially against humanity as a whole by exacting costs to our moral authority. It may be time to cease sidestepping torture debates in public and political forums and ignoring pro-torture arguments as simply unmerited. Instead, political, academic and legal research could openly contribute to informing contemporary debates on post-9/11 torture, especially if one considers the continuing existence of US detention camps such as Guantánamo Bay. The more we understand its use as a purported method of gathering information from suspected terrorists, the more we can then properly question its efficacy and by extension its whole moral value if any to humanity, versus the rights of the individual in a utilitarian sense.

Matthews (2008, 104) states that, “in the torture debates, rule utilitarians typically support the absolute prohibition against torture and act utilitarians treat is as prima facie valid”, that they believe torture as an interrogation tool can be considered as an option in a TBS at first sight. However, to justify or to debate the use of torture rightfully remains a very difficult and morally precarious argument, but one that in times of increasing threats from terrorism should not be ignored. As noted in discussions on CIA use of torture as an intelligence gathering option, “torture is extremely difficult to

98 control once permission is granted for its use” (Blakeley 2011, 545). Perceptions that the US post-9/11 has ‘generally’ been in favour of torture as a counterterrorism tool can be debunked by research on the matter: “Opposition to torture [in the US population] remained stable and consistent during the entire Bush presidency. Even soldiers serving in Iraq opposed the use of torture… a public majority in favour of torture did not appear until, interestingly, six months into the Obama administration” (Gronke et al. 2010, 437).

Chronologically and to a large extent politically, this chapter on torture as part of post- 9/11 US interrogation programs links in with the following chapter on drones, via an umbrella concept of US-led states entertaining the suspension or erosion of morality, where it is viewed as existing in shades of grey. This apparent abnegation of moral authority on torture has resulted in the US and some allied states being prepared to circumnavigate elements of international law. Politically drones seem to provoke less existential aversion than torture from many sections of society, despite the obvious factor that by killing suspects rather than capturing them, there is a deficit in the potential for terror suspects to go on to become information assets in the so-called ‘war on terror’, and in future efforts to disrupt radicalisation and terrorism.

As far as any suspension or abnegation of morality on these policies empirically contributes to cumulative extremism (in both Eatwell’s “spirals of violence” form, and an expanded form whereby CE is further affected by broader and more complex phenomena culturally, socially and politically), some opportunities for increasingly focussed research are clear. The idea of testing and/or demonstrating a wider concept of CE is introduced in chapters 4 and 6 with some archival analyses of interviews, blogs and social media from violent extremists and foreign fighters. A relationship between torture and radicalisation certainly seems to exist, as is noted earlier by Sands when recognising that any benefit from torture risks being outweighed by the “patent harm caused by the global outrage and consequent radicalization that follows, to say nothing of the wholesale loss of moral authority” (Sands in Thiessen 2010, 227-228). This thesis presents opportunities for testing that relationship through further research such as thematic content analyses of both popular news media and extremist Islamic media outputs (notably online jihadi videos, websites and magazines such as Rumiyah, Dabiq or Inspire), adding empirical evidence to support the value of this expansion and development to the concept of cumulative extremism.

CHAPTER 4

SUSPENDING MORALITY 2: DRONES

In the context of this thesis and more generally in international relations, the term drone or Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) refers to a weapons delivery and/or surveillance system. Drones are increasingly used in US actions against terrorism, notably but not exclusively post-9/11, such that “drone warfare has emerged as the preferred counterterrorism measure of the US government, which has institutionalised and normalised the use of drone strikes in areas deemed risky, such as Afghanistan, Somalia, Pakistan, Iraq and Yemen” (Espinoza and Afxentiou 2018, 295). Because of their ability to perform dangerous and repetitive tasks in hazardous and remote environments, drones show promise for the technological and strategic leadership of states in combat, as well as for security more broadly. Militarily drones exhibit a range of applications from artificial interference acting as decoys or bait, to border patrols, air defence, and most relevant to this thesis, as unmanned missile delivery aircraft. Professor John Villasenor, a specialist in engineering, public policy and law, recognises that “an unmanned aircraft… using GPS to navigate a complex flight path without human control, falls squarely within the definition of drone” (Villasenor 2012).

In this thesis the term drones refers to unmanned aerial vehicles capable of making strategic and aggressive use of the latest information and military technologies. Drones are considered in the context of abnegations of morality related to chapter 3’s discussion of torture. This is due to their role in countering post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and radicalisation while occupying a morally vulnerable position. For example, “the use of drones shields the public from the consequences and costs of war… shielding citizens from the costs of war potentially decouples the democratic process whereby leaders must seek public approval for military campaigns” (Kaag and Kreps 2014, 16). Drones have been employed across borders in hot pursuit operations, striking targets in states with which the operating force is not legally at war (discussed in this chapter using the example of Pakistan).

President George W. Bush’s rhetoric of a “global war on terror” (GWoT) raises difficult

100 questions, in recognising how assassination programs within policies to counter post- 9/11 Islamic terrorism contribute directly to the political voices, policy decisions and public coverage of Islamic extremism. As with other new weapons systems, deployment brings debate; in the case of drones and their role in the so-called ‘war on terror’ these assassination programs are argued to be ethically and morally problematic, and may risk becoming politically counter-productive. Social and political dilemmas associated with using drones are particularly useful for the arguments here when expanding the concept of cumulative extremism, as these take a state’s violent reaction to terrorist threats beyond Eatwell’s spirals and into matters that can be expressed and better understood by considering CE in terms of the wider phenomena presented on this thesis.

As a critical and reflexive analysis of political and social reactions to 9/11 and how the so-called ‘war’ against post-9/11 Islamic terrorism is reported, this chapter discusses various methods of targeting alleged terror suspects, using case studies, most notably the deaths of US citizen Anwar al-Awlaki, and his son Abdulrahman. The thesis is cognisant of legal positions where the use of drones is governed by the laws of armed conflict and its principles concerning proportionality, discrimination, and necessity, especially where this last point relates to collateral damage. However, while acknowledging efforts to manage inherent contentions, the focus here is more the moral dilemmas of drones in US targeted assassination programs. When many of the instruments now concerning security and strategic engagements were first conceived, the current trans-state nature of a growing number of contemporary international security concerns, such as the rise in threats from Islamic terrorist groups like al-Qa’ida and Daesh, were not imagined. This has raised some human rights questions. In the last chapter these dilemmas were assessed in regard to torture; this focus is now extended to relationships with drones and how these are perceived socially and politically. Contextual relationships between drone programs and human rights issues, such as the right to a fair trial and/or the right to life can be extended and consequently better understood by noting how their cultural, social and political framing benefits from an expansion of the CE concept.

Using drone strikes to assassinate terrorist suspects risks radicalising whole regions through disproportionate counterterrorism (CT) responses. By developing the concept of CE it can be considered how these disproportionate responses arguably makes it easier

101 for groups like al-Qa’ida and Daesh to radicalise people and recruit more terrorists. As this thesis is concerned with how the use of political and military rhetoric impacts on terrorism and CT discourses (and consequently CE), it is interesting to note that the terroristic and oppressive nature of drone strikes can be effectively concealed by US government and proponent rhetoric (Espinoza and Afxentiou 2018, 298). Uncovering evidence on the US drone program as a CT measure is difficult considering that; “the available data on what it means to operate a drone (where this can influence wider perceptions on the appropriateness and effectiveness of remote warfare as an act of counterterrorism) is highly contradictory” (Bentley 2018, 88). Reporting on drone strikes often focuses on “the conventional wisdom among US foreign policymakers… that drones enable precise strikes, and therefore limit collateral damage” (Blakeley 2018, 321). However, although “the terrorism of the drone programme has been widely reported on, it appears to some an unintentional and unfortunate consequence of the targeting of terrorists, rather than as part of a deliberate project of state terrorism to further US interests” (Espinzoa and Afxentiou 2018, 296).

4.1 Beyond 9/11: The amorality of drones in the so-called ‘war on terror’ “Unmanned aircraft have transformed the way the US wages war, making it possible to gather unprecedented amounts of aerial imagery using nearly undetectable platforms and to strike at targets without putting pilots at risk” (Villasenor 2012). In 2009, Secretary of the USAF Michael Donley replaced the term Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV, also termed Unmanned Aircraft Systems) with Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA). This official change was to emphasise that drone operations are anything but unmanned (Rolfsen 2010). The use of drones in US and allied assassination programs has increased dramatically in recent years, and is often at the forefront of debates on combat capability and international law in countering terrorism (Drake 2011). “The drone, most often represented in some variation of the distinctive form of the Predator or Reaper, has elicited a more vibrant, fervent, frenzied, and confused cultural response than any new military technology since the nuclear bomb” (Michel 2015).

The political utility of drones is in allowing lethal action at little or no risk to the perpetrator. However, this leads to some moral challenges. Drone deployment becomes less of a domestic strategy problem and represents a useful contrast to many

102 conventional warfare options, allowing the drone state to reduce its own casualties, and reduce “the domestic blowback that comes from body bags returning from war” (Kaag and Kreps 2014, 6). The reality however is complex, for “while drones make it easier to kill some bad guys, they also make it easier to go to war” (Benjamin 2012, 146).

Linking discussions on drones back to post-9/11 US torture, an unresolved dilemma involves whether the US decided to end the capture operations of rendition and enhanced interrogation, and resort instead to drone strikes because of torture’s ugly legacy. Mazzetti argues that this was perhaps the single most important reason explaining the CIA’s decision to change tactics from capturing to killing terrorist suspects: “Armed drones and targeted killing in general, offered a new direction for a spy agency that had begun to feel burned by its years in the detention-and-interrogation business” (Mazzetti 2013, 121).

To question the use of drones from a moral as well as legal perspective helps to better understand cumulative extremism between the US and Islamic militants. Moral issues can be discursively tested by analysing views and experiences of jihadis such as local militants affected by the spectre of drone strikes in their own regions, or foreign fighters who may have left safe homes elsewhere to support or engage in violence for groups such as al-Qa’ida and IS. Examining individual and group decisions to radicalise and become active fighters against the US indicates that cumulative extremism is active. Eatwell’s original formulation of the term as being an escalation where “one form of extremism can feed off and magnify other forms” is most often associated with overtly extreme actors noted above, such as violent political activism and a variety of state and military reactions (Eatwell 2006, 205). However, this thesis expands the term cumulative extremism beyond violent conflicts and revenge attacks. By including social, political and media discourse framing of post-9/11 terrorism and counterterrorism, an expansion of the CE concept can help to further develop theories of how rises in post-9/11 extremism may be explained.

One example of how relevant post-9/11 discourses are framed is an online article by Ellie Hall for BuzzFeed News. The article profiles Israfil Yilmaz, a 29-year-old Dutch jihadi and foreign fighter in Syria active on many social media sites such as Twitter, Instagram and Ask.fm for a number of years. Born in Brunei in 1987, Yilmaz maintained

103 chechclear.tumblr.com as a stable and active Tumblr account from early 2014 until its takedown on 20 November 2015. Via social media, the ex-soldier in the Royal Netherlands Army entertained and often responded to questions, while offering considered justifications for his radicalisation to violent Islamic extremism. Yilmaz openly discussed the possibility of being targeted in the so-called war against terrorism, making it clear that he was prepared to die in combat: “Shahadah (martyrdom) is beautiful, I wouldn’t want to get killed by a cowardly drone strike, though.” Adding that he did not want to die at the hands of a “chubby American guy sitting behind a computer screen somewhere in Qatar”. On 14 November 2015, Yilmaz responded to the attacks in Paris on the previous day that killed 130 people: “I remember the day I was picking up heads, limbs and other pieces of dead flesh of innocent Muslims blown to pieces by Coalition air strikes… I prayed to my Lord to punish the Crusaders for their crimes and to take from them what they take from us on a daily basis”. In a tactic aimed to add his post to an accumulation of online terrorist violence and ‘moral’ propaganda, Yilmaz included the hashtag #PrayersForParis on his blog entry (Hall 2015).

Another example of framing US counterterrorism efforts via its drone programs as amoral is found in issue 12 of the Islamic State magazine Rumiyah. An article entitled “A Mujahid’s Memories, from the battle of Mosul” reports a jihadi recollecting that he could barely find a building untouched by coalition bombardment, and fearing that he “might stray and lose my way, and thus the drones – which do not leave the sky for even a minute – might spot me” (Rumiyah 2017, 15). This issue of the IS magazine later mentions drones as part of its own supposed weapons development programme “which Allah has bestowed on the mujahidin” but which has not yet been revealed (Rumiyah 2017, 34).

Beyond international law, the domestic US legal underpinning for drone strikes is the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF), which empowers the use of all necessary and appropriate force in the search for those responsible for 9/11 (Benjamin 2009, 125). Crowley cites a passage from the AUMF referred to by White House spokesman on counterterrorism John Brennan in a speech on 30 April 2012:

That the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on Sept. 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of

104 international terrorism against the US by such nations, organizations or persons (Crowley 2012).

As Crowley notes, it seems peculiar that the central basis for US drone strikes, other than international law permitting self-defence against an imminent attack, remains the AUMF, a law of fewer than 400 words written and approved within three days of 9/11 (Crowley 2012). Benjamin explains the legislation of self-defence against an imminent strike as follows: “Under international law, all nations possess the right to defend themselves against an imminent attack. For instance, if an army is amassing troops along one’s border in clear preparation for an invasion, that nation is legally entitled to act in ‘anticipatory’ self-defense” (Benjamin 2012, 126). A continued reliance on the 2001 AUMF to justify drone strikes indicates that despite the language of US political rhetoric no longer including the term ‘war on terror’, with the Obama Administration putting an end to using the phrase, the ‘war’ itself continues “under a legal basis that remains unchanged – and largely unquestioned” (Crowley 2012).

In Brennan’s argument, nothing in the AUMF restricts the US to territory in Afghanistan when using military force against al-Qa’ida; as a matter of international law, the US is said to be in armed conflict with al-Qa’ida, the Taliban and their associated forces in response to 9/11, and may use force consistent with the right of national self-defence. Brennan notes that in international law nothing bans the US from using drones for this purpose, or prohibits it from using lethal force against its enemies outside of the battlefield, “at least when the country involved consents or is unable or unwilling to take action against the threat” (Crowley 2012; Brennan 2012 in Chesney 2012). Harold Koh, a legal adviser to President Obama, tried to bolster Brennan’s position in stating that the US is legally entitled to use force as part of the right of self-defence, including “lethal operations conducted with the use of unmanned aerial vehicles” (Benjamin 2012, 126). Turning attention to the question of when force can be used, rather than what weapons can be used or how they can be deployed, it was the US itself in the Caroline case (1837) that set an international legal precedent that could still apply to and counter arguments for drone strikes. That is, such an act can only be justified if “the necessity of that self- defense is instant, overwhelming, and leaving no choice of means, and no moment of deliberation” (Miller 2008).

105 From a legal perspective the Caroline precedent and the 2001 AUMF provide interesting themes for arguments about drones. US actions in trying to get around some aspects of international law, risk losing moral high ground the country may have enjoyed over the terrorist organisations it is trying to defeat. There are two main features of international law to critique the use of drones in combat. In countries such as Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia where the US is not at war with the state, but rather with a non-state group such as al-Qa’ida, the use of drones “violates jus ad bellum – the recourse to war” (Kaag and Kreps 2014, 16). The further risk of drones is of violating jus in bello, “law governing conduct in war, because the use of these technologies invites policy makers and military strategists to overstep principles of distinction and proportionality” (Kaag and Kreps 2014, 17).

The US drone program regularly operates, particularly in Pakistan, in situations where it “involves significant civilian participation, which raises questions regarding the status and privileges of persons launching attacks” (Blank 2012, 717). Any legal argument defending US drone strikes should note that “CIA agents or contractors who launch UAV attacks can be subject to prosecution under the domestic law of the countries where the attacks occur and would not be protected by the LOAC principle of combatant immunity” (Blank 2012, 705).

The 2003 US invasion of Iraq, which according to the Bush administration was an act of pre-emptive self-defence, was at the time in violation of international law (Benjamin 2012, 127). Lobbyist Richard Perle, a member of the US defence policy board and adviser to US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, conceded that “international law… would have required us to leave Saddam Hussein alone”. However, President Bush maintained that the US had a “sovereign authority to use force” in order to defeat the perceived threat from Iraq posed by Saddam Hussein (Burkeman and Borger 2003). Hussein was a repressive dictator, but evidence to uphold the Bush government’s position that Iraq had either the intention or the capability to strike at the US homeland did not come to light. Drone strikes rely on an aggressive understanding of the sovereign right to use force pre-emptively. This risks the moral understanding of drone strikes being seen existentially not as an absolute but on a scale of sorts. This scale can then be applied to whatever degree the US feels is required to carry out its current policy

106 thinking in the battle against Islamic terrorism, with this behaviour risking political and social blowback and risking radicalisation against the US and its allies.

4.2 US drone strikes and targeted killings The US drones used to carry out targeted killings against Islamic terrorist groups are mainly Hellfire missile armed General Atomics MQ-1 Predators and MQ-9 Reapers. Deputy Editor at the Council on Foreign Relations Jonathan Masters notes that, “targeted killings are premeditated acts of lethal force employed by states in times of peace or during armed conflict to eliminate specific individuals outside their custody” (Masters 2013). The 2010 UN General Assembly Human Rights Council Report by the Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions, Philip Alston, notes that the term “targeted killing” is not defined under international law and does not fit neatly into any legal framework. This is despite its frequent use following Israel’s acknowledgment in 2000 of their policy to assassinate alleged terrorists in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, (Alston 2010, 4). Methods of targeted killings also include sniper fire, shooting at close range, missiles from helicopters, gunships, the use of car bombs, and poison: “The common element in all these contexts is that lethal force is intentionally and deliberately used, with a degree of premeditation, against an individual or individuals specifically identified in advance by the perpetrator” (Alston 2010, 5). Alston notes that although targeted killings violate the right to life, they may be legal in the exceptional circumstances of armed conflict – in contrast to other terms with which targeted killing is associated, such as “extrajudicial execution”, “summary execution”, and “assassination”, all by definition illegal (Alston 2010, 5).

The US use drones in arenas of armed conflict for targeted killings, for example in Afghanistan and Iraq, where they are conducted primarily by various armed forces. However, following 9/11 a policy was adopted whereby drones engage in targeted killings in territories belonging to states where the US is not officially at war, notably Pakistan and Yemen. This program of ‘black ops’ has reportedly been conducted not by the military but by the CIA, using both Predator and Reaper drones, with reports of Special Forces involvement along with assistance from civilian contractors. The first credible report of a CIA drone killing came on 3 November 2002, when a missile delivered by a Predator drone struck a car in Yemen. The attack killed a high-ranking

107 member of al-Qa’ida, Qaed Senyan al-Harithi, who was allegedly involved in the 12 October 2000 bombing of the US Navy guided-missile destroyer USS Cole (Alston 2010, 7). Some studies challenge the conventional wisdom that drone programs are highly effective, by contrasting claims about their relative efficiency at neutralising terrorist actors with their political effects in the states where they are carried out. As Francis Boyle notes, “Drone strikes corrode the stability and legitimacy of local governments, deepen anti-American sentiment and create new recruits for Islamist networks aiming to overthrow these governments”. Drone strikes have been employed against local enemies of government in states such as Pakistan and Yemen, serving as signals of those governments’ helplessness and even “subservience to the United States”, thereby undermining claims that “these governments can be credible competitors for the loyalties of the population” (Boyle 2013, 3). While he was chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), Imran Khan spoke of “a national depression at the loss of national dignity and self-esteem as well as sovereignty” (Burke 2018).

Boyle considers that some arguments for drones as a counterterrorism measure “are based on dubious counterfactuals that try to measure the costs of drone strikes against the effects of prevented, and entirely hypothetical, enemy attacks”. These gaps in the efficacy of drones as a viable counterterrorism policy support an argument of this thesis that current discourse enables and risks cumulative extremism, thus serving to inspire actors to radicalise and join militant and terrorist conflicts against their own regimes, and against the US and the West. Boyle further considers that “the position of the American foreign policy establishment on drones – that they are an effective tool which minimizes civilian casualties – is based on a highly selective and partial reading of the evidence” (Boyle 2013, 4). Speaking towards Chapter 5 on sensationalist popular media discourse, and how assessment of the morality and ethics of post-9/11 counterterrorism policies is thereby complicated, Boyle argues there are “wide variations in the estimates of ‘militants’ and ‘civilians’ killed”, calling into question “the validity and reliability of the underlying news reports” of drone strikes (Boyle 2013, 6). Effective answers to cost versus consequence questions over US drone policy is thus made more complicated.

Prior to 9/11, the US Ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk had publicly denounced targeted killings of Palestinians by Israel saying, “The United States government is very clearly on record as against targeted assassinations” (cited in Benjamin 2012, 125). The

108 Yemen attack marked a change in policy and in the degree of openness about such attacks. Colonel Daniel Reisner, former head of the Israeli Defense Force Legal Department, noted,

… If you do something for long enough, the world will accept it. The whole of international law is now based on the notion that an act that is forbidden today becomes permissible if executed by enough countries… International law progresses through violations. We invented the targeted assassination thesis and we had to push it. At first there were protrusions that made it hard to insert easily into the legal moulds. Eight years later it is in the center of the bounds of legitimacy” (Feldman and Blau 2009).

Pre-9/11 presumptions of innocence and the right to a fair trial became a legal grey area in this changed world, a view supported by noting transformations in US national security strategy that have occurred alongside the rise of the drone. These shifts are summed up in the US 2011 National Counterterrorism Strategy and 2012 Defense Strategic Guidance documents that “mobilise an amorphous ‘everywhere war’ against vaguely defined affiliates” (Shaw 2013, 551-552).

With concerns about drones operating outside of active battlefields, the so-called ‘war’ against terrorism gives rise to an emerging ‘global battlefield’, in effect allowing the entire planet to be considered “subject to the application of the laws of armed conflict” and the flow-on consequences (Lubell and Derejko 2013, 67). However, to extend International Humanitarian Law (IHL) to the whole of a state or even beyond borders where there is armed conflict in the respect of post-9/11 terrorist threats is potentially dangerous. But limiting IHL to ‘hot-zones’ or the “primary geographical sphere of hostilities” also produces counter-intuitive results and is not supported by existing legal mechanisms or conventional IHL, which depends on the “existence of an armed conflict, [and] which necessitates the manifestation of hostilities” to be then regulated by IHL (Lubell and Derejko 2013, 86).

By following a particular target outside of a ‘hot-zone’, drone strikes do not necessarily extend the legal battlefield in a geographical sense, as “those that occur against legitimate targets within an already existing conflict are by default occurring in an area to which the conflict participation has already spread” (Lubell and Derejko 2013, 87). However, from a human rights perspective, the use of drones for targeted assassinations facilitates some moral abnegation in US policies on terrorism, contributing to the

109 radicalisation of individuals and regions. Some evidence suggests the strategic ineffectiveness of drones as a counterterrorism tool. UN investigations for example claim that drone strikes lead to an increase in the numbers of radicalised young men “seeking revenge”. The UN and many human rights groups maintain that drone strikes in tribal regions of Pakistan invoke local tribal law prescribing “revenge for the loss of a life and that this entrenched tribal tradition [has] given rise to a desire, particularly among young men, to seek revenge for the drone strikes, thus radicalizing a new generation” (Kaag and Kreps 2014, 49-50). The UN Special Rapporteur admitted that reported findings were largely anecdotal, but concluded that drone strikes were “frequently cited as a source of radicalization to violent extremism among younger Pashtun males”. The qualitative evidence linking drone strikes and violent incentives for young men is accepted as persuasive (Kaag and Kreps 2014, 50).

With regard to drone strikes, the “democratically elected prime minister and the president of Pakistan have repeatedly condemned these attacks and have strictly challenged the assertion that they may have been authorised by the Pakistani government”, as reported by the Press Trust of India in 2009 (Aslam 2011, 318). Imran Khan claims that bringing an end to the drone strikes would motivate Pakistani militants to give up their jihadi narrative. During a 2013 meeting with US Secretary of State John Kerry, Khan stressed that US drone attacks were a “violation of international law and counterproductive as they cause collateral damage in terms of increasing terrorism”. That is, strikes link Pakistan to the US ‘war’ on terror, allowing terrorists “to exploit the narrative of Jihad [creating] suicide bombers with their devastating suicide attacks” (The Financial Daily 2013; Burke 2018). In 2012, Khan had asserted that Pakistan’s rulers were “blindly supporting US claims of high precision drone strikes and minimum collateral damage when they are actually aware of details of civilian casualties in tribal areas” (The Financial Daily 2012). Aslam concludes that “benchmarks of legality, legitimacy and prudence” are not met by drone strikes (Aslam 2011, 316).

The research for this thesis identified two distinct types of drone strikes as supported by Benjamin (2012, 127), and the deputy legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Jameel Jaffer, among others. Both types of drone strike are relevant to the discourses on terrorism and radicalisation that thread throughout this work, and to developing an expanded concept of cumulative extremism. The first are ‘personality

110 strikes’, where specific individuals are targeted for assassination after having their name placed on a kill-list as a threat to the US or its allies. Second are ‘signature strikes’, where the presence of a known terrorist suspect is not required, but rather a targeted individual or group has a ‘lifestyle pattern’ that fits that of a militant, according to the vision and intelligence available to a drone operator often thousands of miles away. Such signature strikes in Pakistan and Yemen often result in high rates of bystander casualties (De Luce and McLeary 2016). The lifestyle judgements involved are understandably subjective, and are usually based on parameters governing recommendations by intelligence analysts. These should be of great concern if we consider how casually and subjectively the US defines what constitutes a ‘militant’ and/or terrorist (explained in more detail below). Most drone strikes fall into the ‘signature’ category (Benjamin 2012, 127).

A CIA report of 2008 highlights what is known as the sensor-to-shooter cycle, recognising impacts on the ethical and moral compasses of drone operators as the cycle is reduced to the real-time afforded by the high-tech capabilities of Predator and Reaper drones. The reality for most intelligence professionals is usually hands-off analysis or technical collection of intelligence, rather than the more intimate world of human intelligence (HUMINT) collection, or suspect interrogation. At that more remote end of the collection process, many intelligence analysts might consider that they are “comfortably removed from the manipulation of assets or the direct application of lethal force”. Then Director of the US National Security Agency (NSA) Lieutenant-General Michael Hayden addressed his employees in 2001, noting that their work put “heat, blast, and fragmentation to effect in killing members of Taliban”. Initial cheers from his audience were muted by the recognition that the answer to the sobering question, “Do we do that?” had become a definitive “Yes” (Nolte 2008).

In questioning what constitutes a legitimate terrorist target, Beck and Miner (2013, 837) suggest that recent images of terrorism may be replacing older ideas in the classification schema, although they are reluctant to say whether this is merely due to policy adaptation or events such as 9/11. What constitutes a terrorist and what constitutes terrorism, as argued in chapter 1, is not straightforward. This ambiguity can seem surprising when considered alongside the fact that “placement of a group on the United States Department of State’s Foreign Terrorist Organizations list, for instance, is

111 considered one of the most important counterterrorism policy tools available” (Beck and Miner 2013, 837; Cronin 2003). Cronin refers to what is known as the Foreign Terrorist Organisations (FTO) list, which is used to classify targets in concert with other terrorist lists maintained by the US government, such as the “state sponsors of terrorism” list, the “Specially Designated Terrorists” (SDT) list and the “Specially Designated Global Terrorists” (SDGT) list (Cronin 2003, 3-4). The SDT, SDGT, state sponsors, and (as of October 2002) FTO lists have been brought together in a larger category known as the “Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons” (SDN) list, maintained by the US Office of Foreign Assets Control of the Treasury Department (Cronin 2003, 4). The Bureau of Counterterrorism at the US Department of State (US DoS) notes that, “Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs) are foreign organizations that are designated by the Secretary of State in accordance with section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), as amended. FTO designations play a critical role in our fight against terrorism and are an effective means of curtailing support for terrorist activities and pressuring groups to get out of the terrorism business” (US DoS 2016).

An advantage of these lists is that they allow some legal clarity to be brought to efforts to identify, target and prosecute terrorists. However, Cronin recognises limitations to operating under the constraints of such lists, noting they can be “mechanistic, restrictive and inflexible” (2003, 8). Terrorists are prone to change names and characteristics far more quickly and more often than bureaucracies can react. A further disadvantage is that “such lists are not very effective in dealing with ad hoc activities engaged in by ‘volunteers’, who may not have a clear long-term relationship with an organization. This has become a particular worry with respect to Al Qaeda, for example” (Cronin 2003, 8).

9/11 influenced how and why an organisation or individual comes to be designated as engaging in terrorism. Discussion of this designation process for organisations is outside the scope of this thesis, short of recognising the motives of the US and its allies in classifying individuals and groups as terrorists, as discussed in chapter 1. In the immediate wake of 9/11, the US introduced two new listing mechanisms, and the European Union (EU) drafted its own terrorist designation processes into law. These measures were made with the intent that the US and EU would be able to protect national and international security more efficiently, and act with sanctions, prosecutions

112 and hard military power against those proscribed as engaging in, or supporting acts of terrorism (Beck and Miner 2013, 854; Peers 2003).

Even when US targeted assassination programs kill armed combatants and legitimate terrorist suspects, justifications under international law can still be problematic. To satisfy legislative restrictions, we should question whether US drone strikes are restricted to eliminating international threats. As Benjamin (2012, 127) discusses, many of the Taliban fighters targeted by the US in Pakistan and Afghanistan can be viewed as seeking to rid their homeland of foreign occupying forces, rather than to have been involved in planning or carrying out acts of international terrorism. In Somalia, a similar argument can be made in regard to the targeting of suspected members of the militant group Al-Shabaab, which seeks to create an Islamic state and is primarily engaged in a war against Somalia’s western-backed and unelected government. Although the group is violent, it is not considered to be a threat to the US homeland, as the Obama administration admitted in 2011 (Benjamin 2012, 127-128). These examples help to illustrate how using drones, as part of a post-9/11 US counterterrorism policy, is not clearly explained within the internationally agreed legal instruments governing them.

This thesis argues that the Obama administration’s defence of drone strikes as a regular counterterrorism policy “goes beyond reasonable interpretation of international law governing the use of force”. While it is clear there are other military practices such as conventional air-to-surface bombing, or rocket and missile attacks, that prove to be even less morally acceptable than using drones, “this fact should not be regarded as the legitimating stroke when it comes to drone technologies” (Kaag and Kreps 2014, 79).

More focussed discussions on frontline laws for drones in the so-called ‘war on terror’ go beyond the practical scope of this thesis. Rather than engaging more with the “guiding principles for conducting drone strikes within the letter and spirit of the law of war”, such as those proposed by Vogel (2010, 138), what is broached here includes theoretical normative imperatives and human rights interests such as the right to life, and the right to a fair trial, moral imperatives are covered in the UDHR (UN 1948), and The Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms within the European Convention on Human Rights (Council of Europe 2010) particularly Articles

113 2 and 6 (Council of Europe 2010, 6-9). Targeted assassination programs that suffer from subjective judgements on what constitutes a legal combatant reject these rights.

Concerned with the amorality of policies when seeking effective counterterrorism instruments, these moral conversations are aimed towards enriching knowledge of post- 9/11 counterterrorism discourse, particularly as part of expanding the concept of cumulative extremism. With respect to legal questions over US drone programs, this thesis shares concerns expressed by UN Special Rapporteur Philip Alston: “these Predators are being operated in a framework which may well violate international humanitarian law and international human rights law” (Alston 2009, in Vogel 2010, 101).

4.3 Anwar al-Awlaki: A ‘personality strike’ case study The case of Anwar al-Awlaki, the fundamentalist imam previously discussed in chapter 1 when examining the term radicalisation, illustrates a negative impact of the AUMF on the task of upholding human rights, more specifically the right to a fair trial. For the US government to target US citizens without due process is in stark contrast to what is legally established to protect the rights of its citizens. Constructed by Obama administration officials since 2010, this ‘disposition matrix’ as it is called “contains a list of suspects targeted for elimination across the planet” (Shaw 2013, 536). A US Predator drone fired a Hellfire missile at a car on 30 September 2011 killing two American citizens, al-Awlaki and Samir Khan, editor of Inspire, the English language propaganda magazine for al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). Al-Awlaki had been identified as a target in the CIA assassination program over a year earlier, but Khan was not on any kill-lists and was unavoidable collateral damage according to the US (Benjamin 2012, 130).

In maintaining that hot pursuit drone strikes are legal, that is strikes within a state one is not at war with and where consent for a strike has not been given by that state, the reasoning of the US goes further than making allowances for collateral damage. Following the killings of al-Awlaki and Khan, the US government initially did not publicly bring forward any evidence against al-Awlaki, and the reasons for his being included on a presidential kill-list remained classified. Al-Awlaki was never charged with a crime under US law, and there was no evidence cited to implicate him in acts of terrorism

114 beyond his generally unpopular speeches calling for armed jihad against the West. The US Department of Justice under Obama fought attempts from al-Awlaki’s father to compel a justification of the deaths, with courts siding with the US government “calling the president’s decision to order the assassination of an American citizen, with no due process or explanation as ‘judicially unreviewable’” (Benjamin 2012, 130). This highlights disturbing questions over the legality of placing a citizen of one’s own state on a kill-list. Aside from the context provided by armed conflicts, targeted killings of a US citizen by the US government should be a last resort to interrupt an imminent threat to the lives or security of innocents. Judicial approval is currently required for the US to target one of its citizens overseas for surveillance purposes, but approval is not required for that citizen to be targeted by their own government for assassination (Benjamin 2012, 131).

Anwar al-Awlaki achieved almost mythical status in the narratives of the US media and government in regard to terrorist threats. However, once he had been placed on a kill- list, there was a responsibility to ask how much of a threat he genuinely posed, and what it should take for the government to act against a citizen without recourse to any of the accepted norms of justice and legal protection. There is evidence that al-Awlaki regularly praised attacks on the US after the fact, and that he was in contact with people suspected of planning and of involvement in attacks against the US. However, conclusive evidence has not been publicly presented of al-Awlaki having an operational role in acts of terrorism. In October 2009, the CIA reportedly concluded that it lacked any specific evidence that al-Awlaki threatened the lives of Americans, a threshold for capture-or-kill operations targeting a US citizen. President Obama disagreed with the CIA’s conclusion, and the US government killed Anwar al-Awlaki (Scahill 2013, 360) although he was entitled under US law to a presumption of innocence and a trial by a jury of his peers, even if in absentia. Although he can be considered a traitor to the US as having defected to an enemy, al-Awlaki should still have been subject to constitutional protections requiring the testimony of witnesses, or a confession in open court, in order to be convicted of terrorism (Benjamin 2012, 132).

The ACLU’s Jameel Jaffer notes that the significance of the US court ruling siding with the Obama administration in not compelling the government to release its findings or evidence against al-Awlaki, is that the US can wield an “unreviewable authority to carry out the targeted killing of any American, anywhere, whom the president deems to be a

115 threat to the nation” (cited in Benjamin 2012, 131; ACLU 2010). In reaction to publicity around al-Awlaki’s killing, there were calls from lawmakers, policy experts and ex- government officials for greater transparency in the US drone program. However, two weeks later the CIA mounted another drone strike in Yemen killing nine people, including al-Awlaki’s sixteen-year-old son Abdulrahman. Officials in the US have stated that they were unaware the American teenager was in the targeted group, but it is unclear if such knowledge would have stalled the strike. On hearing the news of his father’s killing, Abdulrahman called his family in Yemen to tell them he was coming home; on the way to his home in Sana’a, the boy was with friends at an open-air café near Azzan in Yemen’s Shabwa province as missiles from a US drone struck (Mazzetti 2013, 310-311). To date no charges have been laid or disciplinary measures taken against those who authorised this strike (Benjamin 2012, 132-133).

4.4 Lifestyle choices: The ‘signature strike’ drone policy Since 9/11, Washington’s high-value targeting campaign has relied on signals intelligence (SIGINT), and is responsible for a high civilian toll, partly due to signature strikes. Ackerman reported in July 2016 that the “most controversial tactic of Barack Obama’s drone strikes has survived an internal review intended to reduce civilian deaths: killing people without knowing who they are”. Senior US military officials defend this controversial practice despite US government admissions that it cannot always know how many innocent civilians it kills. Naureen Shah, a counterterrorism expert with Amnesty International, highlights this point: “The problems with signature strikes are the way over time they assimilate into the norm a process of killing people without knowing exactly who they are” (Ackerman 2016). Recognising this as a lowering of the legal thresholds in order for lethal action to be carried out, Mazzetti notes that “under the rules of so-called signature strikes, decisions about whether to fire missiles from drones could be made based on patterns of activity deemed suspicious” (2013, 290). For example, groups of “military-aged males” moving in and out of suspected militant camps could be construed as legitimate targets, with military age in Pakistan’s tribal areas as low as 15 years old, as well as being something very difficult to judge from “thousands of feet in the air”. Such broad definitions to determine combatants “allowed Obama administration officials to claim that the drone strikes in Pakistan had not killed any

116 civilians”. The logic here is that in areas of known militant activity, any military-aged males could be targeted as enemy fighters (Mazzetti 2013, 290-291).

Put simply, the CIA under President Obama was given blanket approval to carry out missile strikes in allied states, even when CIA targeting analysts were not certain whom they were killing: “What had originally been conceived as a device the United States might use selectively was being abused” (Mazzetti 2013, 319). As head of the CIA unit responsible for finding Osama bin Laden, Richard Blee exclaimed, “In the early days, for our consciences we wanted to know who we were killing before anyone pulled the trigger… Now, we’re lighting these people up all over the place” (cited in Mazzetti 2013, 319). The extension under Obama of previously held powers to exercise lethal force in targeted assassination programs, and a further blurring of legally sanctioned actions allowed by signature strikes, clouds the field of extrajudicial killings. Scahill states that while Obama had campaigned “on a pledge to unilaterally use US force in pursuit of known terrorists, he had kept its scope narrowed to Osama bin Laden and his top deputies”. However, Obama built a system that was more sweeping, such that his kill-list “became a form of ‘pre-crime’ justice in which individuals were considered fair game if they met certain life patterns”. In using signature strikes, the CIA can target people who need not be involved in plots or acts specifically against the US, with their potential to commit future acts considered sufficient justification to kill them (Scahill 2013, 352).

The Bush administration used drones for targeted assassinations between 2002 and 2007, with personality strikes focusing on high-value members of the Taliban and al- Qa’ida. However, in 2008 President Bush authorized signature strikes in Pakistan, known as ‘crowd killing’ and ‘terrorist attack disruption strikes’, which selected targets based solely on “their intelligence signatures – patterns of behavior that are detected through signals intercepts, human sources and aerial surveillance, and that indicate the presence of an important operative or a plot against US interests”. The US has often been accused of considering “all military-aged males in a strike zone as combatants” (Kaag and Kreps 2014, 32; Miller 2012).

In response to criticisms over targeted killing policies, fact sheets were released such as that from the Office of the Press Secretary at the White House (White House OPS), US Policy Standards and Procedures for the Use of Force in Counterterrorism Operations

117 Outside the United States and Areas of Active Hostilities. This document states: “Since his first day in office, President Obama has been clear that the United States will use all available tools of national power to protect the American people from the terrorist threat posed by al-Qa’ida and its associated forces” (White House OPS 2013). However, it is unclear whether the principles outlined in the document of using “lethal force only against a target that poses a continuing, imminent threat to US persons” applies in regard to signature strikes. The definition of continuing, imminent threats is not widely known, but it does not seem to be limited to people who are causing (or capable of causing) harm directly to US citizens. For example, US drones have been reported to employ “double-tap strikes which target individuals who are retrieving victims from a previous strike” (Kaag and Kreps 2014, 32-33). This lack of clarity is not aided by the fact that the Obama administration failed to qualify what signature behaviour warrants a drone attack, nor did they provide any legal justifications for them, to the extent of not responding to Congressional requests for information about signature strikes (Kaag and Kreps 2014, 40).

4.5 A New US assassination legacy: Obama, Trump and beyond Before 2012, Barack Obama and his advisers seldom mentioned the drone program. It was not until several years into his first term of office that the president publicly confirmed his administration’s use of armed drones. Even then, the admission did not take the form of a press conference or a legal brief, but emerged on a Google+ ‘Hangout’ taking questions from the public. Asked about US drone strikes, Obama responded, “I want to make sure that people understand actually drones have not caused a huge number of civilian casualties… For the most part, they have been very precise, precision strikes against al-Qaeda and their affiliates. And we are very careful in terms of how it’s been applied” (Scahill 2013, 515-516). Michael Boyle, a former counterterrorism advisor to the president, however, recognised that one of the reasons the Obama administration was so successful in spinning the collateral damage, or number of civilian deaths caused by drone strikes, was the “use of signature strikes and other systems for categorizing military-aged males as legitimate targets, even if their specific identities were unknown”. Boyle charged that the administration had loosened the standards for selecting targets, a consequence being the targeting of mosques and funeral processions “that kill non-combatants and tear at the social fabric of the regions

118 where they occur” (cited in Scahill 2013, 516). This destruction of the social fabric, as Boyle calls it, provides the conditions for radicalisation, blowback and by extension terrorism, to be viewed through theories of cumulative extremism, both in terms of Eatwell’s 2006 formulation and of the more developed version of the concept introduced by this thesis.

Ackerman (2016) argues that, “Drone strikes, synonymous with Obama in many parts of the world, are a legacy issue for the administration”. Many commentators recognise that “the drone is heralded by the US military as the apex of a targeting logic – accurate, efficient and deadly” (Shaw and Akhter 2012, 1495), and by extending that faith in the technical ability of drones a belief has evolved that using drones brings with it an ability to reduce collateral deaths (Shaw and Akhter 2014, 225-226). In 2010, US State Department Attorney Harold Koh said that “advanced technologies have helped to make our targeting even more precise”, followed in 2012, as noted above, by President Obama calling drone attacks “very precise, precision strikes” (Scahill 2013, 516). Further, in 2013, CIA Director John Brennan argued that targeted killings were ethical, due to the “unprecedented ability of remotely piloted aircraft to precisely target a military objective” (Zenko 2012; Shaw and Akhter 2014, 226). In taking delivery of the MQ-1 Predator drone, the CIA began to run drone programs that would kill its targets rather than capturing terror suspects through counterterrorism intelligence. Shaw and Akhter (2014, 225) also argue that the CIA calculated drone strikes would prove less politically and socially unpopular than torture programs. The agency believed “it would attract less criticism and would generate fewer legal headaches if it began killing rather than jailing terror suspects… Killing by remote control was the antithesis of the dirty, intimate work of interrogation. It somehow seemed cleaner, less personal” (Mazzetti 2013, 121).

There is a clear downside to this shift in US foreign policy, as noted by Scahill (2015): “a preference for assassination rather than capture” leaves the US intelligence services and military with “an inability to extract potentially valuable intelligence from terror suspects”. Further to such loss of intelligence, the use of drone strikes to assassinate targets “also highlight[s] the futility of the war in Afghanistan by showing how the US has poured vast resources into killing local insurgents, in the process exacerbating the very threat the US is seeking to confront”. A central tenet of this thesis is that the US is radicalising and creating future terrorists and supporters of terror, breeding further

119 insecurity in doing so. Following a 2013 study, the Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Task Force (ISR) in the Pentagon recommended capturing and interrogating more suspected terrorists rather than killing them in drone strikes (Scahill 2015). This capture or kill conundrum addresses concerns expressed in chapter 3 on the post-9/11 use of kidnap and torture of terror suspects via CIA black sites and military prisons, and contributes to arguments around human rights issues.

At the close of 2010, more than 200 drone attacks were made by the US on Pakistan, which had been a strong US ally in its so-called ‘war on terror’. In Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), the relationship between the US and Pakistan has evolved to a point where regions can once again be rendered vulnerable to versions of colonial and imperial violence. These deadly situations illustrate how the US uses drones to perform what Shaw and Akhter refer to as “an exception in a far-away nation”, while noting that “these exceptional tools are fast becoming everyday tools” (2012, 1505). This creeping acceptance of the use of such a controversial weapon in the fight against terrorist organisations, with ill-defined collateral damage, raises moral as well as legal questions around how many dead civilians versus militants is politically and socially acceptable in the fight against terrorism. These dilemmas are ignored or at best glossed over to the extent that existing grey areas defining where, when and how drones will be used seem unlikely to be clarified soon.

Conclusion The US values hard power solutions in its so-called ‘war’ against post-9/11 Islamic terrorism, and in particular the strategic and political advantages that come from drones. Following the 9/11 attacks by al-Qa’ida, drone programs under Presidents Bush, Obama and Trump have become an integral and mostly well-accepted element of US counterterrorism policy. Case studies illustrating legal, ethical and moral problems arising from the use of personality and signature drone strikes have been highlighted in this chapter. Targeted assassination programs using drones have replaced earlier programs of rendition and torture seeking to disrupt Islamic terrorist activity against the US and its allies worldwide. However, this default acceptance of a counterterrorism tool seems to override domestic and international laws.

120 This acceptance brings to mind a term coined by Hannah Arendt, the “banality of evil” in Eichmann in Jerusalem (1963): to carry out unspeakable crimes often enough entails a possibility that they come to be accepted as banal. Although technological advances bring benefits in both military and civilian applications, the full functionality and the impact of drones as a counterterrorism policy tool will become more effectively realised when they evolve to operate autonomously. Maintaining any moral authority is certainly difficult when using drones in the post-9/11 conflict against Islamic terrorism. Drones can target individuals and communities where there has been no declaration of war. They have been directed by the US at their own citizens overseas, with no legal recourse available to protections from accepted human rights instruments. The technological advances in drone warfare have enabled targeted assassinations to become an option such that they become close to what can be argued as extrajudicial killings, and the more drones are used the more ‘normal’ this option becomes. In this context, this chapter provides a useful measure in considering how terrorism discourse is being framed between governments, popular news media, society and the terrorists themselves. Extrapolating debates on US drone strikes as an integral element in post- 9/11 counterterrorism policy contributes strongly to expanding the concept of cumulative extremism beyond Roger Eatwell’s original theory, with perceptions culturally, socially and politically becoming part of the wider phenomena impacting on extremist interplay beyond traditional violent state reactions to terrorism.

121 CHAPTER 5 THE MEDIA AS OXYGEN FOR ISLAMIC TERRORISM

Critical analyses of US counterterrorism policies involving torture and drone strikes against groups and individuals suspected of Islamic terrorism illuminate how post-9/11 US politics and counterterrorism policies bear some responsibiilty for the cumulative extremism fuelling the post-9/11 ‘war’ against terrorism. This chapter extends these analyses, examining tendencies by mainstream popular media towards sensationalist publicity of terrorist incidents in acting as an additional factor in the developed concept of cumulative extremism in regard to national and international insecurity. Reports of the impact of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism can often speak more to commercial ratings than to truth. Unreliable reports on the real threats posed by Islamic terrorism, in particular to the West, can serve to prop up community support for US-led reactions, such as torture and drone strikes. Through playing their role in the wider process of CE, these actions can lead to military and intelligence operations outside of international law, involving abnegation of human rights and resulting in continuing spirals of conflict and violence.

Even where terrorism is reported responsibly and accurately, there are arguments to suggest that this contributes to its narratives being delivered on the terrorists’ terms. In a speech to the American Bar Association in 1985, the UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher appealed for a voluntary code of conduct in respect to reporting on terrorism:

We must try to find ways to starve the terrorist and the hijacker of the oxygen of publicity on which they depend. In our societies we do not believe in constraining the media, still less in censorship. But ought we not to ask the media to agree among themselves a voluntary code of conduct, a code under which they would not say or show anything which could assist the terrorists' morale or their cause (Thatcher 1985, 29-30).

Both terrorism and the publicity of terrorism form a harbinger of fear, and this chapter analyses what that fear is potentially able to achieve for the ends of those who practise terror. A central argument here is that to effectively fight against post-9/11 terrorism, we should accurately recognise what terrorism is. Mainstream popular media outputs and popular culture constructions such as film and TV often mislead society as to what constitutes terrorism, and exaggerate the extent of its threat. This is achieved in part by

122 playing on pre-existing social fears and ignorance, and capitalising on social tendencies of “othering”, in this case those existing in contrast to one’s own existential ideas of freedom. Howard Zehr recognises the work of sociologist Nils Christie in speaking of otherness as a social distance and notes, “by creating social distance from the other… we cause harm. Only when the one being punished is socially distant, the other, can we punish so severely. Only by ‘othering’ the ‘enemy’ can we make war” (Zehr 2009).

This chapter introduces perceptions of post-9/11 terrorism in society, and how these are formed, misinformed and influenced by both events and evolving news-cycles. This popular mainstream media output is provided via traditional print, radio and television (TV) media, as well as digital and social media sources. Referencing popular media material involves the use of some non-academic and non-peer reviewed sources, although where possible these are reinforced with academic citations to add analytical legitimacy to the critique of popular media perspectives on terrorism and its effects on society. Case studies are used to analyse how terrorism is addressed in popular culture, movies and books. Although these mediums can portray the scale and reach of terrorism, they can also distort and exaggerate the effects of terror often having an impact on the degree of fear that terrorism can induce. These examples illustrate a truth-value gap between media reports and the less sensational realities of the impact and scope of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism. For the purposes of this thesis, the umbrella term ‘media’ generally represents traditional print, radio and television news coverage (as noted in Nacos et al. 2011, 22). In most instances, traditional media journalists are not required or expected to take partisan or even discernible positions on the news they report, but rather to present and summarise the news and the newsmakers.

The discussions around what we are conditioned to consider as terrorism lead into analyses of how terrorism works, and what it can achieve after the fact, not only directly from its own actions or ability to inflict degrees of physical destruction on infrastructure, communities and individuals, but also in its less immediately tangible power to serve as a spectre. Through the social impacts of its reputation, terrorism can appear more dangerous as a concept than it is as a physical reality, and this chapter discusses how the media has a responsibility to reflect existential reality over misinformed perceptions. This thesis does not suggest that news media should not report on fears, but rather that is should take care to not create or exaggerate them. In developing the concept of

123 cumulative extremism it is important to recognise the way popular news media is not merely a reactive structure, reporting on terrorist events. Rather by engaging in the ‘publicity’ and exposure of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism, the media risks becoming performative, contributing to social perceptions and fears, as through the developed lens of cumulative extremism introduced in this thesis. As Schlag notes, “Performative utterances do not describe or report, but do something. They bring the world they are talking about into being, either intentionally, honestly or accidentally, and thereby possess a transformative power” (Schlag 2018, 5). How the public perceives the risk of terrorism matters, particularly in the aftermath of major incidents of terror where individuals’ risk assessments affect their support for counterterrorism policies (Nacos et al. 2011, 42). This point strongly supports an expansion to the CE concept, recognising that social and cultural discourse feeds political action. Further, Nacos et al. note effective examples of popular news media responses act as performative utterances, where reports produce a disproportionate ‘reality’ and news both covers and magnifies terrorist threats. A rise in the US national terror alert from yellow (elevated risk) to orange (high risk) was reported by CBS Evening News on 20 May 2003 despite “no concrete information pointing to any imminent terror attack anywhere in the US”. This was accompanied by talk of possible attacks being “very imminent” and “something big that is going to happen in the next two or three days”, Ten days later the same news program devoted a mere 43 words in two sentences to the level being lowered, as opposed to 642 words reporting on the earlier “imminent” threat (Nacos et al. 2011, 37- 38).

PART 1: TERRORISM ACCORDING TO MAINSTREAM MEDIA Terrorism attracts a high level of attention in the cycle of news, which together with its consequent treatment by popular culture contributes disproportionately to the reactive policies of the US. Nacos et al. note, “The press coverage in the months and years after 9/11 was at odds with the concept of news-as-public-good but was consistent with the imperatives of news-as-commodity” (2011, 58-59). Marginal representations by the Western media concerning potential examples of terrorism are particularly problematic when seeking to understand what is happening and why. There can be ‘blowback’ on both sides of the conflict, from growing numbers of disaffected and marginalised Muslims leaning towards support for organisations such as IS, to angry far-right wing

124 and anti-immigration lobbies taking much of Europe, the US and Australia into damaging foreign and domestic policy decisions.

In most countries where there is respect for freedom of the press, the print, radio and TV media are subject to ethical principles and standards designed to afford those charged with reporting news and current affairs the opportunity to do so within a framework of self-monitoring and self-correction. The American Society of News Editors (ASNE 2018), like other organisations promoting fair and principled journalism, provides a statement to protect freedom of expression, while maintaining professional responsibilities “to serve the general welfare by informing the people and enabling them to make judgments on the issues of the time” (ASNE 2018, Art.1). The ASNE Statement of Principles explains common values such as independence, truth and accuracy, impartiality, and fair play as they pertain to responsibly reporting on news and newsmakers.

Reporting on immigration, multiculturalism and terrorism is often sensationalistic. As an example, six dead at multiple crime scenes involving street gangs is a bad night in many urban centres in the US. However, in cities such as Chicago or New York this may not get any column inches in the international or even the local media. Six dead at multiple crime scenes involving a Muslim gunman or a suicide bomber however is valuable fuel for worldwide news outlets. Considering that much of the currency of terrorism is to create fear among the populations of their enemies, a part of the propaganda work of terrorism is often accomplished by zealous popular media reports. Abrahams (2008, 78) argues that “terrorists are political utility maximizers; people use terrorism when the expected political gains minus the expected costs outweigh the net expected benefits of alternative forms of protest”. Accepting Abrahams’ point, it would be a mistake to assume that terrorism is a policy of last resort, as much evidence suggests that “terrorism is not a strategy of last resort and that terrorist groups reflexively eschew potentially promising nonviolent political alternatives” (Abrahams 2008, 81).

Nacos et al. argue, “Well versed in the psychology of fear, terrorists know that violent incidents and the mere threat of more attacks in the aftermath of major ones can accomplish one of their primary goals: namely to heighten fear and anxiety among their target populations” (2011, 34): this phenomenon supports developing the concept of CE,

125 especially considered in concert with understanding how media can become a terrorist’s weapon of choice (Nacos et al. 2011, 34-35; Hoskin and O’Loughlin 2007, x). An example of the presentation of terrorism in Australia helps illustrate media coverage and its limitations. This chapter begins with an incident concerning Man Haron Monis, a refugee from Iran, who held up a café in central Sydney in 2014.

5.1. Man Haron Monis: Terrorist or deranged criminal? According to a report in The Australian, the Lindt café siege in Sydney on 15-16 December 2014, in which two hostages were killed, was Australia’s biggest domestic terror incident since the rise of Islamic State. This case highlights a media propensity to report and publicise certain incidents as terrorism, despite evidence and expert opinion to suggest that it may not in fact fit the definition at all, and in fact may prove unhelpful from a security point of view to consider it in those terms. As noted in the introduction to this chapter, such examples can meet priorities other than a duty to report the truth.

The crisis often referred to as the Sydney siege or Lindt Café siege, occurred when the lone gunman held ten customers and eight employees hostage in a café at Martin Place in the central business district of Sydney, Australia. Police initially treated the event as a terrorist attack, while some media mistook a flag used by Monis as the IS black standard. Monis demanded that an IS flag be brought to him and requested to speak to the Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott on live radio. Neither request was met. Abbott described Monis as having indicated a "political motivation”, however, the final assessment was that the gunman was a mix of extremism, mental disturbance and criminality. The siege led to a 16-hour standoff before a shot was heard inside the café, and New South Wales state police officers moved in to end the siege. Monis shot dead hostage Tori Johnson, and a stray police bullet killed hostage Katrina Dawson in the raid. The attacker Man Haron Monis was also killed.

Higgins (2016) reports that the police commander in charge of the Lindt siege “accepted from the start” that the siege “was an ongoing act of terrorism inspired by Islamic State”. This incident highlights growing difficulties in differentiating between genuine acts of terrorism and incidents involving violent attacks where mental health is an overriding factor. Aly (2014) notes that it can be a mistake on a number of levels to call

126 attackers such as Man Haron Monis a terrorist. The siege certainly brought to attention a real threat from attacks by self-starting terrorists or lone actors. However, Aly recognises that from Monis’ criminal history, including “accessory to murder charges, 22 counts of aggravated sexual assault and 14 counts of aggravated indecent assault”, along with “extreme acts such as sending ‘grossly offensive’ letters to the families of Australian soldiers killed in Afghanistan… Monis was at the very least unstable”. Prior history suggested that he was not acting on behalf of a global jihadist ideology, although it is unclear whether media were aware of this on the day. Monis considered himself a cleric, although he was without any formal qualifications. Aly explains that “Monis’s demands – one for an Isis [sic] flag and another to speak to the prime minister – as well as his continuous use of social media during the siege, indicate that he was not carrying out this violence in the name of a cause but for his own selfish purposes” (Aly 2014).

Throughout the siege, police referred to Monis as a “lone gunman”, and despite the police commander in charge calling the incident an “act of terrorism inspired by Islamic State” (Higgins 2016), authorities refused to be drawn further by the media to use the word terrorist for Monis himself. Had Monis been publically acknowledged as a terrorist acting for, rather than inspired by, Islamic State, this may have given him what he wanted: recognition, infamy and worldwide media attention. It would also feed claims by IS that this hostage taking demonstrated a capability to bring their brand of terrorism to Australia. IS had previously claimed that the actions of Abdul Numan Haider, a young Australian man who stabbed two police officers before being shot dead in Melbourne, was a display of their capacity to inspire terrorism across the world, and they adopted Haider as a martyr killed in the course of their mission. Man Haron Monis was born in Iran as a Shi’a Muslim, only converting to Sunni Islam a matter of weeks prior to the Lindt café siege, and he was not accepted by the local Sunni community. This short window between his apparent conversion and the attack does not serve as an effective example that he was fully and genuinely radicalised. Extremism played a role, and his prior history indicated that Monis was a violent man, but Islam only “gave him a way to justify and frame his violence”, an excuse for violent tendencies rather than being the motivation behind them (Aly 2014).

Jessica Kidd reports criminologist Professor Clarke Jones telling the inquest into the Sydney siege that he believed Monis was acting through a need to belong. Monis had

127 tried to become a member of the Rebels Outlaw Motorcycle Club in the months prior to the siege; Jones told the inquest, “I wonder if they had accepted his membership, whether we would be here today”. Professor Jones conjectured that Monis claimed his attack in Australia was on behalf of IS because “he saw Islamic State as the one organisation that might accept him” (cited in Kidd 2015). Others have agreed that Monis' mental state played a significant role in the attack. Islamic extremism and counterterrorism expert Professor Greg Barton said that in comparison to other self- starting terrorists, such as the Norwegian gunman Anders Behring Breivik or the US Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, Monis was not found to be consistent in articulation of a manifesto or position. He conceded that Monis suffered from mental health issues and was the type of person IS would seek to exploit. National security expert Professor Rodger Shanahan further told the inquest that “Monis would have been under considerable stress in the days before the siege when he lost a High Court application for leave to challenge his conviction for sending offensive letters to the families of dead Australian soldiers”, thereby backing up theories that this siege had more to do with mental health than it did with terrorism. Both factors could be at play, and evidence has been shown that IS/Daesh make use of people with mental health issues. Shanahan said Monis’ court loss, combined with possible schizophrenia and the fact that he faced criminal charges of sexual assault and being an accessory to the murder of his ex-wife, would have “piled up” (Kidd 2015).

Division 101 of the Criminal Code Act 1995 (Australian Government 2014), states that an act of terrorism or the threat of such an act is done with two intentions. Davis notes that “Firstly it must be carried out to advance a political, religious or ideological cause. Secondly, the intention must be to coerce or influence through intimidation a government, the public or a section of the public” (Australian Government 2014, Division 101; Davis 2015). This definition does not require a terrorist to be a member of a group, nor does it require us to consider the mental health of the perpetrator. That Monis did not have any direct contact with Islamic State is irrelevant for such purposes as long as he can be shown to have had a “political, religious or ideological” motive. However, Davis (2015) records counterterrorism and radicalisation expert Kate Barrelle stating at the Lindt siege inquest that she did not believe Monis had acted like a terrorist during the siege, and attributed his behaviour to poor mental health.

128 In Australia, acts that constitute terrorism, such as hostage taking, murder etc. may also fall into the category of criminal acts, and in Australian law it is motive that mainly distinguishes terrorism from other crimes. As Davis adds, we are left with the problem of not being able to determine motive with certainty. However, if violence in the pursuit of a “political or ideological cause is not at the heart of a definition of terrorism”, then it is even harder for the law to distinguish terrorism from other criminal acts (Davis 2015). An answer to this, and why seeking an answer is important, is covered in chapter 1. As noted in that discussion, once the tag has been applied it opens up different reactions, socially, politically and perhaps most importantly legally, as to what can be done in response to a crime and/or person that has been termed as terrorism or a terrorist.

The case study of Man Haron Monis is useful in showing media inconsistencies in reporting terrorism, especially when the incident is complicated further by issues of mental health and motives more usually associated with traditional violent crime. The following section considers problems associated with labelling attackers evil and/or mentally ill, and how this complicates classifications of terrorism.

5.2. Terrorism sells: Issues of evil versus mental health Australia’s ABC News journalist Lily Mayers (2016) provides an example of print media being overly keen to run with the motivation that if it smells like terrorism then it must be good news fodder. Ihsas Khan was charged with committing a terrorist attack and attempted murder after stabbing Wayne Greenhalgh at a reserve in Sydney’s southwest on 10 September 2016. Police said the victim and Khan were not known to each other, and Australia’s ABC News said that it was understood the attacker “is known to the local community for his religious beliefs”. A large knife was seized for forensic examination and Khan was taken into custody and questioned by the New South Wales Counter Terrorism Command. Before any motive or allegiance by Khan to any proscribed terrorist organisations was known, NSW Deputy Police Commissioner Catherine Burn stated, “We will be alleging before court that this was an act inspired by ISIS, it was a deliberate act, it resulted in a person receiving extremely serious injuries” (cited by Mayers 2016). Koubaridis (2016) reported that local police had been told about Khan’s behaviour, but that they did not consider it enough of a threat to constitute a national security risk or to bring it to the attention of federal agencies. Ihsas Khan had been

129 brought to the attention of local police after he allegedly cut a Vietnam veteran’s Australian flag, with media reporting that court documents allege he had told police he hated Australians because of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. However, all charges were dismissed under the Mental Health Act, and Khan was ordered to take medication (Koubaridis 2016).

Examples of such crimes and their coverage by mainstream media highlight eagerness by the media to categorise such incidents prematurely. Through a developed view of CE, this can be seen to contribute to feelings of fear in society, and incorrect assumptions as to the extent of threats faced from Islamic extremism, at the expense of understanding other crimes and mental health issues.

5.3 Selling fear: Are you scared yet? In the case of the US public, Glassner (2004, 819) makes misperceptions of fear clear by opening his argument with a question: “Americans live in perhaps the safest time in human history, so how has it come about that there are so many fears and scares in the air, and so many of them are unfounded?” He notes that the media’s role in this overreaction cannot be discounted. “Between 1990 and 1998, the murder rate in the United States decreased by 20%. During that same period, the number of stories about murder on network newscasts increased by 600 percent” (Glassner 2004, 820). However, successful fearmongering employs more than just volume; with media and politicians normalising errors in reasoning by narrative techniques.

Glassner notes that perhaps most common among these is a tendency to identify isolated incidents as trends, such as the scares about youth violence in the US from the mid-1990s through to 2001, a period during which the US experienced a steep decline in youth crime. After year upon year of comforting statistics on the issue, the numbers were reframed as a “lull before the storm”, as in a 1995 Newsweek headline. Even President Bill Clinton reflected this view in his 1997 State of the Union address: “We know we’ve got about six years to turn this juvenile crime thing around, or our country is going to be living in chaos”. When Clinton spoke, violent crime had fallen by 9.2% from the previous year. The US was not living in chaos six years later although bipartisan fearmongering by the political establishment and the mainstream US media had a

130 striking effect on the public’s perception of the problem. During the latter half of the 1990s, adults in the US estimated that people aged under-18 committed around half of the country’s violent crimes. The actual figure was 13% (Glassner 2004, 820).

Other examples of isolated incidents cast as trends by the US media include the aftermath of shooting sprees in late 1997 by a 16-year-old in Mississippi and by a 14- year-old in Kentucky which left five of their classmates dead and 12 others wounded. Geraldo Rivera claimed this as evidence of an “epidemic of seemingly depraved adolescent murders”. When a psychologist on US TV’s NBC program Today suggested parents could reassure their children that school shootings are very rare, following the murder of four students and their teacher by an 11-year-old and a 13-year-old in Arkansas, the show’s reporter Ann Curry interjected, “But this is the fourth case since October” (cited in Glassner 2004, 821). Media commentary on gun crimes highlights a tendency to prioritise fear and misperception over truths, a tactic that is also used in regard to terrorism. In fact, in regard to terrorism these misrepresentations become more dangerous, disseminating fear whether it is justified or not taps directly into an expanded formulation of cumulative extremism.

Another tactic used by tabloid media to manipulate public perceptions on issues of fear and security is misdirection. For example, political and public discourse on the Columbine school shootings of 20 April 1999 is often employed to direct attention away from real trends and dangers confronting millions of US school children daily, such as the lack of health insurance, inadequate diet and deteriorating schools. Following the Columbine shootings, the US media concentrated on topics to do with the Internet, video games, violent movies and music rather than on gun control, or on mental health and distress among young people (Glassner 2004, 822-823; Lamb 2008).

All three techniques of fearmongering – depiction of isolated incidents as trends, and misdirection as discussed above, and the repetition and recycling of the issues we are being told to be afraid of – are identifiable in discourse on both potential and actual terrorist attacks. These techniques are especially evident since 9/11 in media and political comparisons of relative risks. Glassner (2004, 823) recognises that in 2001, “as a result of 9/11, the number of deaths from terrorism in the US was arguably the highest in the nation's history”. However, even during that landmark year, the danger from

131 terrorism relative to other hazards was still very low. Figures published by the US State Department indicate that the number of deaths from terrorist attacks worldwide in 2001 was 3,547, with 9/11 in the US being responsible for over 75% of these. In the same year almost three times that number died from gun-related homicides and five times as many from alcohol-related motor vehicle accidents in the US alone (Glassner 2004, 823).

Glassner recognises a narrative shift, noting that “If in the wake of the school shootings, products of popular American culture such as Marilyn Manson recordings, rap music, computer games, and action films were routinely cited as pathogens or causes of the decline, more recently, in stories about the attacks on September 11, 2001, and the war on terrorism, those products occupy a very different place” (Glassner 2004, 824). US popular culture is referenced this time not as an infectious agent that is turning its children into murderers, but as a feature of society that is wrongly reviled by its enemies. In making this suggestion, Glassner does not seek to imply that the mainstream media, TV news and print news magazines in particular, have stopped exaggerating minor dangers using the previously discussed tactics of misdirection, treating isolated incidents as trends, and repetition. Rather, Glassner argues that some of the topics have retreated from the public conscience, especially when they do not fit the prevailing narratives that drive media. Stories of violence in schools have been less common since 9/11. Indeed, in the period immediately following 9/11, media coverage of infrequent dangers of all sorts became rare in comparison to the period before that. In the months just prior to 9/11, Glassner maintains, it was difficult to turn on TV news bulletins without hearing about shark attacks or the abduction of intern Chandra Levy. However, following 9/11, coverage of those dangers mostly disappeared from the news (Glassner 2004, 824-825), but this shift had little to do with sharks suddenly becoming fearful of coming close to shore. This is relevant to fears of terrorism in that there is often a disconnect between the facts of what is going on in the world, and society’s perceptions, due in part to what gets reported and how this news is managed by the media.

In Australia, a Lowy Institute poll on 16 June 2015 found that of eight potential risks to the country’s national security, Australians ranked terrorism-related threats first, second and third. 69% of those surveyed agreed that, “the emergence of Islamic State in Iraq

132 and Syria is a high risk to Australia’s security in the next ten years”. Terrorist attacks on Australians while overseas were second, with 55% considering there was a high risk of attacks, while 53% considered homegrown terrorism in Australia a high risk to Australia’s national security in the next ten years. 69% of respondents supported Australian participation in military action against IS in Iraq, even though 55% of them said they believed that this participation was likely to increase the risk of terrorism to Australia, while only 20% considered that participation in the conflict against IS would make Australia safer from terrorism in the future (Oliver 2015).

Australians’ concerns and perceptions of terrorism appear to be driving a broad acceptance of involvement in hard power military action against Islamic terrorism, despite the fact that so few think this military action makes Australia or Australians any safer from terrorist acts in the future. Risks of conflict in the Oceanic region rank far lower in threat perceptions, with a mere 20% seeing military conflict between the US and China in Asia as a high risk. Other maritime disputes between China and its neighbours are seen as high risk by only 26% of Australians, according to the 2015 Lowy Institute report. It is against this fear of rising insecurity and the risk of terrorism, that the Australian government’s metadata retention laws gained the support of a clear majority of its population. When asked about “legislation that requires Australian telecommunication companies to retain data about communications such as phone calls, emails and internet usage, but not their content”, 63% of Australians agreed that this was “justified as part of the effort to combat terrorism and protect national security”. Only one-third said it “goes too far in violating citizens’ privacy and is therefore not justified”. Dr Michael Fullilove, Executive Director of the Lowy Institute, notes that Australians seem prepared to accept some intrusions on their privacy in the interests of fighting the so-called war against terrorism and in order to feel that their national security is better protected (Oliver 2015).

In a 2006 essay entitled ‘The Writer in a Time of Terror’, Frank Moorhouse raised the issue of ensuing anti-terrorism legislation (as noted by O’Reilly and Vernay 2009, 5). Moorhouse is considered the first Australian writer to expose the changes to Australian sentiment on security post-9/11, arguing that although intrusive intelligence gathering and surveillance have been commonplace since the creation of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) by the 1949 Labor government, it is since 9/11 that

133 there has been an increased and in part irrational concern with matters of national security. This has resulted in what Moorhouse calls an “authoritarian mindset” that impinges on both civic and individual liberties (Moorhouse 2006, 58). O’Reilly and Vernay recognise that “There is not much citizens can do about this situation: security, which requires transparency and information tampering, is invariably gained at the expense of privacy and personal freedom”. They highlight that fears over national security “have reached a new level in Australian culture since 9/11 and the Bali Bombings” and it should be added since the 2014 rise of Islamic State. It is however not a new phenomenon: “Australian history stretching back into the histories of the British colonies that later became Australian states, is crammed with a vast array of fears and anxieties, many of which are evident in various forms of cultural production from the past two centuries, including folk songs, ballads, poetry, drama, fiction, visual art, and film” (O’Reilly and Vernay 2009, 5).

The 2015 Lowy Institute study shows that in Australia the national fear of terrorism is far above that related to many other pressing world issues, including the global financial crisis and climate change, as well as being of more public concern than other domestic threats to society including falling standards in health, rises in domestic violence and rising unemployment. With many more Australians dying from domestic violence than from terrorism, University of Melbourne professor Cathy Humphreys argues that it is “absolutely critical” that “the government starts to pay domestic violence the same level of attention we pay national security concerns” (Jennings-Edquist 2015).

In an address at the 21st World Media Conference in Washington DC in 2004, an ex- advisor to former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, John O’Sullivan proves to be victim to the irrational level of fear created by 9/11:

No one I imagine will dispute that we are living in a time of global crisis. We are, after all, less than one mile away from the site of the Pentagon, where one of the four hijacked planes crashed on September 11. Nor am I exaggerating when I say that every Washingtonian has at the back of his mind the likelihood that this city will be the target of another attack, perhaps an attack with a stolen weapon of mass destruction, at some unknown point in the future (O’Sullivan 2004, 69).

This perspective indicates how the reporting and dissemination of terrorism news can overstate reality and, albeit inadvertently, serve the purposes of terrorism. Whether or not this overstatement was an example of political opportunism is not known, in his role

134 as a former editor of the National Review O’Sullivan should be aware the media plays its role supporting extensions of the fear that terrorism reeks on Western society, via a developed concept of cumulative extremism.

Since 9/11, Islamic extremists have planned and carried out smaller lethal assaults in the US, while explaining their motives via online manifestoes and/or social media postings. A breakdown of extremist ideologies behind many of these smaller attacks is however striking. Shane notes that since 9/11 there have been nearly twice as many people killed by white supremacists, anti-government activists and other non-Muslim extremists as by Islamic terrorism. According to a count by Washington-based research centre New America, between 9/11 and June 2015 48 people were murdered by extremists who are not Muslim compared with 26 by self-proclaimed Islamic terrorists. The killing of nine African-Americans in a Charleston church in June 2015, with an avowed white supremacist being charged with their murders, was “a particularly savage case” (Shane 2015). Shane notes that this was only “the latest in a string of lethal attacks by people espousing racial hatred, hostility to government and theories such as those of the sovereign citizen movement, which denies the legitimacy of most statutory law”. Non- Muslim terrorism has taken the lives of police officers, members of racial or religious minorities and random civilians. Non-Muslim extremists carried out 19 such attacks since 9/11 up to June 2015, according to a count by David Sterman, a New America program associate, and overseen by terrorism expert Peter Bergen. By comparison, there were a total of seven lethal attacks by Islamic terrorists in the same period (Shane 2015; Sterman and Bergen 2015).

If such numbers are new to the US public, they are more familiar to their police officers. A 2015 survey asked 382 police and sheriff’s departments across the US to rank the top three threats from violent extremism in their jurisdiction. About 74% included antigovernment violence, while only 39% listed al-Qa’ida-inspired violence, according to researchers Charles Kurzman at the University of North Carolina, and David Schanzer at Duke University. To put it in the simplest terms, Dr Kurzman noted, “Law enforcement agencies around the country have told us the threat from Muslim extremists is not as great as the threat from right-wing extremists” (cited in Shane 2015). John G Horgan, a terrorism researcher at the University of Massachusetts, argued that the “mismatch between public perceptions and actual cases had become steadily more obvious to

135 scholars”, with there being “an acceptance now of the idea that the threat from jihadi terrorism in the United States has been overblown”. There is also a belief that threats of right-wing anti-government violence have been underestimated. Counting cases of terrorism can be a subjective exercise, relying as this thesis has indicated on shifting definitions and judgments as to what counts as terrorism as opposed to violent crime. For example, a man in Chapel Hill in North Carolina charged with fatally shooting three Muslim neighbours had posted angry critiques of religion, and had a long history of outbursts over parking issues. The New America research centre did not include this attack as an act of terrorism in their count (Shane 2015).

Similarly, there are mass murders where no ideological motive is evident, as at a Colorado movie theatre and a Connecticut elementary school in 2012. The criteria used by New America and many other research groups excludes these attacks, which have cost more in loss of human lives than other incidents that are more clearly tied to an ideology (Sterman and Bergen 2015). Other killings by non-Muslims that many experts would consider as terrorism have drawn fleeting media coverage, never really sticking in the public conscience. However, if we revisit some of the attacks, it is puzzling as to why this should be so. In 2012 Wade Michael Page, a member of the white supremacist group the Northern Hammerskins, entered a Sikh temple in Wisconsin and opened fire, killing six people and seriously wounding three others. This seems a clear example of a terrorist attack, in not only the scale of the attack but in its after-effects of spreading insecurity. In another case in June 2014, Jerad and Amanda Miller, a married couple with radical anti-government views, walked into a Las Vegas pizza restaurant and fatally shot two police officers. On the bodies of the dead officers the Millers left a swastika, a flag inscribed with the slogan “Don’t tread on me” and a note saying, “This is the start of the revolution.” They then went on to kill a third person in a nearby Walmart store (Shane 2015). These examples demonstrate that even if thorough research is done into the numbers of casualties from terrorism, these can remain inaccurate due to variances in what the relevant reporting bodies consider to be terrorism, versus violent crime. The case of the Millers illustrates a further problem in that even if an attack has a political motive and aims to be considered an act of terrorism, the media may still decide not to report it as such.

As is also the case with Islamic terrorism plots, there have been many close calls where

136 non-Muslim terrorism has been foiled, or where no fatalities occurred. Shane relates that in November 2014 in Austin Texas, Larry McQuilliams fired more than 100 rounds at government buildings, including the Police Headquarters and the Mexican Consulate. He hit no one, and McQuilliams was later killed by a police officer before he could detonate propane cylinders he brought to the scene. “Some Muslim advocates complain that when the perpetrator of an attack is not Muslim, news media commentators quickly focus on the question of mental illness”. In the case of non-Muslims, much of mainstream US media attempts to identify some psychological traits that may have pushed an attacker over the edge. Abdul Cader Asmal, a retired physician and a spokesman for the Muslim community in Boston argues, “if it’s a Muslim, the assumption is that they must have done it because of their religion” (Shane 2015).

On several occasions while President Obama was in office, efforts by some US government agencies to conduct research on right-wing extremism ran into resistance from the Republican Party, suspecting an attempted smear of conservative positions. A 2009 report by the US Department of Homeland Security, warning that an ailing economy along with the election of the first black US president could prompt a violent reaction from white supremacy groups and individuals, was withdrawn due to such conservative criticism. The report’s main author, Daryl Johnson, argued that the Department of Homeland Security was responsible for “gutting” the staffing for this type of research. William Braniff, executive director of the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism at the University of Maryland, claims the overstated fears of jihadist violence reflect US memories of 9/11 and “the daunting scale of sectarian conflict overseas and wariness of a strain of Islam that seems alien to many Americans”. Braniff noted that we “understand white supremacists”, but that we “don’t really feel like we understand Al Qaeda, which seems too complex and foreign to grasp” (Shane 2015). It seems that a lack of knowledge about Islam and of Middle Eastern politics can be more crucial in forming our picture of terror than meeting the parameters of a well-established and successful definition of terrorism, a term that should be uniform in its application regardless of creed.

Contention over distorted and biased perceptions of terrorism existed before 9/11 and may have been equally as subjective as they are now. The April 1995 truck bombing that destroyed the federal building in Oklahoma City is one such example of media responses

137 to political violence as crime and/or terrorism. The bombing killed 168 people, including 19 children, and remains the second deadliest terrorist attack in US history after 9/11. Early media speculation about the attack went to air on the assumption that it had been carried out by Islamic terrorists. However, the arrest of Timothy McVeigh, a white anti- government extremist put an end to such premature theories. “If there’s one lesson we seem to have forgotten 20 years after Oklahoma City, it’s that extremist violence comes in all shapes and sizes,” remarks Dr Horgan, “And very often, it comes from someplace you’re least suspecting” (cited in Shane 2015).

5.4 Terrorism in TV and cinema Mainstream popular news media reports of terrorism affect public ideas of political violence and fundamentalism. However as noted, this chapter also considers other media branches and their treatment of the subject. Increasingly in mainstream political science disciplines, popular culture is no longer considered unworthy of serious research, and to that end the idea of drawing on television and movies is not constrained to the margins of terrorism research. TV and movies on terrorism sometimes follow the lives of particular terrorists, both real and imagined, showing their mental state and how they arrived at being a terrorist. Others focus on individuals and agents charged with catching and stopping those responsible for terrorism. Some filmmakers narrow their scope further, portraying intense and realistic accounts of certain terrorist incidents. A comprehensive list of terrorist TV dramas and movies can act as a picture of domestic and international politically motivated violence, although how accurate and successful they are at reflecting the reality is unclear. A constant problem is that perceptions by the public, the media and policy makers, if left to be shaped by Hollywood, run the danger of misreading the complexity and the reality of radicalisation and terrorism, and how governments and societies should respond to these subjects.

Engert and Spencer (2009, 87) note that realist assumptions have mostly dominated in movies about international politics. Similarly, movies tend to only deal with certain things while they almost totally neglect other important issues of international politics. For example, Gregg notes that war films tend “to be about male bonding, heroism under fire, or the physical and psychological costs of combat, and they rarely explore the

138 causes of war or its consequences for world politics”. It seems that conflict sells, especially over subjects such as cooperation. Movies on terrorism focus more on sensational, romanticised or exciting subjects within the wider field such as war and violence. It can be argued that many movies are not suited for researching international political events in that they oversimplify and/or revise history so as to give a distorted view of reality. Many terrorism movies from Hollywood or European cinema are also prone to “be vulnerable to the charge of Western bias” (Gregg 1999, 134).

For examples of Western bias we only have to look at what gets made, rather than dissect any specific movies. Successful terrorism movie franchises such as James Bond 007, and the Jason Bourne films based on the books by Robert Ludlum, tend to conform to the aphorism that history is written by the victor. The next section briefly discusses the movie Zero Dark Thirty (Bigelow 2012) which promotes a virtual resounding victory for the West. However, as Maass states, with the cinema version of this story we are “getting the myth of history before getting the actual history” (Maass 2012).

Historical figures and events are often remodelled, edited or even reinvented to fit the plot of a movie, and more often than not “Hollywood gets it all wrong” (Engert and Spencer 2009, 88). Of course the movie industry is understandably more involved in entertainment than “in the business of manufacturing historical documents” (Giglio 2002, 55) and to a large extent films are a necessary simplification and condensation of events no matter how complex and intricate the storyline may be (Berenson 1996, 514). Movies generally express a clear and distinct viewpoint no matter how hard they try to present themselves as being objective accounts (O'Meara 1976, 216). A rare deviation from the norm perhaps being Oliver Stone's award-winning movie JFK, the story of the assassination of President Kennedy, considered by Engert and Spencer to stand as a “prominent example of a highly acclaimed movie persuasively narrating a ‘correct history’. Yet, they maintain that providing the audience with high quality, accurate historical information is not the primary aim of such films”. That is, “popular films are made for entertainment and financial success at the box office”. Specifically they consider that terrorism as portrayed in film, as an issue of international politics, has been neglected (Engert and Spencer 2009, 89). This neglect clearly disappeared when 9/11 heightened the public’s fascination with terrorism, fuelled by mounting fear and paranoia, and somewhat understandably in the name of entertainment inspired a new

139 wave of films. US president George Bush’s “‘war on terror,’ surely driven as much by the US strategy to reconfigure the Middle East as by the events of 9/11, serves as the perfect backdrop for film industry productions of violent high-tech spectacles, now a major staple of a media culture” (Boggs and Pollard 2006, 335-336).

One of the earliest movies dealing with terrorism was Alfred Hitchcock's Sabotage in 1936, a version of Joseph Conrad's 1907 novel The Secret Agent (Davies 2003). In his 1987 book The Age of Terrorism Walter Laqueur examined any potential of gaining insight into terrorism from films. However, he remained sceptical about the genre and believed that terrorism had little future in the film industry, although this was 14 years prior to 9/11. In balance Crafton (2013, 41) recognises that the “practices of creative non-fiction, new historicism, and counter-history, like the image-based filmmakers, demonstrate the efficacy of embellished facts to convey the truth about their subject, while the just-the-facts school is willing to forego drama if it would distort the historical events”. There are many recent examples where filmmakers have practiced this new historicism without calling it that, such as Argo (Ben Affleck 2012), Zero Dark Thirty (Kathryn Bigelow 2012), and Lincoln (Steven Spielberg 2012), all being regularly referenced for misrepresenting their historical muse. Perhaps this should be expected in the visual arts accepting that directors and producers have more interest in drama and storytelling than in accurate chronology or causality (Crafton 2013, 41).

That recent political and dramatic tropes converged on post-9/11 Islamic terrorism should not be surprising, terrorism as has been discussed is very much a spectacle, and 9/11 massively reconfigured the international geopolitical landscape with the US and allied responses becoming an enduring motif. Movie audiences in the 1980s and 1990s were generally presented with caricatured bearded Muslim terrorists keen to blow something up. Many examples exist with scant regard for truth or subtlety such as in 1987’s The Living Daylights, or 1994’s True Lies. However, 9/11 with its worldwide coverage and imagery brought a stark and more terrifying reality to the subject, with the help of the Internet and the rise of groups such as al-Qa’ida and then later Daesh/IS.

The TV drama The State that first aired in the UK and Australia in August 2017 and later in the US in September 2017 helps illustrate an evolution of the portrayal of Islamic terrorism by Hollywood. The show reveals some closing of the subjective disconnect

140 between terrorism portrayed as drama and its reality. However, aside from the Islamic State’s own releases on the Internet nothing can yet fully reflect the truth of a group as successful in its brutality and terror as Daesh/IS. Patrikarakos reports in an article for the BBC that The State “succeeds as a gripping and highly realistic account of life under IS but fails at the human level” nothing that, “in this account of the most articulate terror group in modern history too much is left unsaid” (Patrikarakos 2017). This perhaps demonstrates that although there is an evolution towards more real-life accuracy and truth in dramatic representations of terrorism, there is still an acceptance for entertainment value to override absolute reality.

5.5 The example of Zero Dark Thirty An example of what the film and literature versions of an event portray, as opposed to what have been reported as the facts, can be found in Kathryn Bigelow’s 2012 movie on the killing of Osama bin Laden, Zero Dark Thirty. To assume that bin Laden’s death was as portrayed in the book No Easy Day or in Bigelow’s movie leaves a very noticeable flaw, known as a dead check. Allegations in the book and movie are that after bin Laden was shot through a doorway then found lying on the floor in spasm, he was shot again to ensure that he was dead (Cerone 2013, 50). However, under international humanitarian law or the Laws of Armed Conflict (LOAC), it is a crime to target those who are so seriously wounded as to be hors de combat (ICRC 2002, 14.1).

Referencing Seymour Hersh’s 2015 London Review of Books article, Noah Feldman explored the question of lawful killing in the case of bin Laden, and how this does not align with the cleaned-up versions of Hollywood and some of the more conservative media and literature on the subject. Feldman notes calls for further legal justification of bin Laden’s killing following news that the terrorist was in fact unarmed at the time of his shooting, and as such the actions of the US Navy Seals involved in the assault on bin Laden’s Abbottabad compound could be deemed to be outside of provisions regarding proportionality. Cerone (2013, 50) states, “Assuming bin Laden was a civilian, there is agreement that a civilian may be targeted when he or she directly participates in hostilities. However, there is disagreement about what conduct constitutes direct participation in hostilities, and over the duration for which the person remains targetable”. Noting reports that “bin Laden was shot first in the body, disabling him,

141 then in the head to make sure he was dead”, Feldman explains that “the second shot or shots sound uncomfortably like a coup de grace – which would be illegal, as the first shots would’ve rendered bin Laden out of combat under the laws of war”. The argument of the US government became that the dead check shot to the head was legal as it was believed bin Laden may have had a button on his person to detonate a suicide vest or a remotely triggered bomb, and that body shots alone would not necessarily have guaranteed the safety of the US forces mounting the assault. Feldman explains that if so, this could have been deemed to be “proportionate to the amount of force needed to defeat the enemy while preserving the safety of the US troops”. However, he considers that although this sounds tenuous, “Nevertheless, it furnished the fig leaf the Barack Obama administration needed so that the president didn't find himself bragging about a killing that was unlawful even under the US interpretation of the laws of war” (Feldman 2015).

Hersh’s account of events in which he cites both named and unnamed sources departs from events widely portrayed in mainstream media and film, and raises important legal questions. Hersh argues that the US was aware bin Laden was being held in the Abbottabad compound as a prisoner of Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), and also knew that bin Laden’s ISI guards would not be at the compound at the time of their assault; Feldman expands that the US knew with a high degree of confidence that “there would be no guns in the compound and no resistance” (Feldman 2015). Hersh reports that, “The compound was not an armed enclave – no machine guns around, because it was under ISI control” (Hersh 2015). If the US were aware that bin Laden was effectively a prisoner both unarmed and unprotected, killing him would certainly violate the laws of war. Making matters worse, Hersh reports that bin Laden was at that point also thought to be an invalid (ICRC 2002, 12 and 14; ICRC 2017, Rule 47; Hersh 2015).

A further difference in Hersh’s understanding of events is the claim that killing bin Laden, rather than taking him hostage, was a condition set by senior Pakistani generals in allowing the mission to go ahead, as neither the Pakistanis nor the Saudis wanted bin Laden to be interrogated. If the US agreed in advance to kill a captive bin Laden, then the mission takes on a new form and becomes a targeted and premeditated extrajudicial killing: a situation that although contentious can be argued to be legal under US interpretations of the laws of war such as with an armed drone strike, that is, as long as

142 Osama bin Laden could be shown to be a combatant and not a prisoner of the Pakistani ISI (Feldman 2015; ICRC 2017, Rule 47). An omission in the Zero Dark Thirty movie version of events is the gist of Feldman’s discussion and Hersh’s reported version of the actual killing itself. Feldman notes that in Hersh’s account, a US Navy Sea Air and Land team (US Navy SEALs) was taken directly by an ISI officer to Osama bin Laden’s room within the compound, whereupon the operatives opened fire immediately, effectively executing an unarmed bin Laden (Crafton 2013, 41; Hersh 2015).

Many people, Feldman included, have posed the uncomfortable question does anyone care whether killing Osama bin Laden was lawful? According to a former Navy SEAL, “Each one of us, when we do these missions, say to ourselves, ‘Let’s face it. We’re going to commit a murder”. Feldman expands this ethical and moral dilemma in wondering if “there are circumstances where breaking the laws of war is morally justifiable”. The US nuclear bombings of Japan in August 1945 are difficult to justify given the targeting of innocents and massive collateral damage. However, Feldman believes many Americans would still believe that Truman was right to use nuclear weapons to in effect “shorten World War II and save countless American lives” (Feldman 2015). The context of terrorism illustrates to an extent a propensity to sometimes accept a suspension or wilful abnegation of our morality, especially when the cost of absolute morals appears to be just as unsavoury or worse. Moral dilemmas exist in just war, so why should they not be part of counterterrorism, as reflected in experiments such as ticking bomb scenarios, or for that matter real-life acceptance of torture and targeted assassination programs. Through not considering the extended costs to our moral authority on society as a whole, to somehow avoid being morally absolute in specific cases may prove to be a normative part of humanity to avoid potentially worse scenarios and even great losses of life.

PART 2: WHAT TERRORISM DOES TO SOCIETY “In 1956, the Algerian political activist and revolutionary Ramdane Abane wondered aloud if it was better to kill 10 enemies in a remote gully ‘when no one will talk of it’ or ‘a single man in Algiers, which will be noted the next day’ by audiences in distant countries who could influence policymakers” (Burke 2016). This question represents a crucial distinction between a soldier and a terrorist, between a legal combatant and a

143 violent extremist. It speaks to definitions of terrorism, of what society thinks terrorism is, and what terrorism does. It refers to acts of violence not just against victims of that violence, but in affront to a system, and social, cultural or religious structures represented by victims of violence. This distinction between the violence of the soldier and the violence of the terrorist allows us to consider that those who support or carry out acts of terror are not indicative of a disease in society, but are representative of a symptom of political desperation and lack of imagination.

5.6 More than violence: This is the news Terrorism does more than just kill or seek to kill its victims. In fact, killing can be considered incidental to its primary aims. The following passage illustrates an important link between terrorism and how through violence it is able to abuse and manipulate the traditional news media. In this context, terrorism is a political process that sets out to create media content aimed at achieving a political outcome.

On the eve of the 9/11 attacks, Osama bin Laden left Kabul and headed south-east [sic] to a remote valley in eastern Afghanistan. Among the small convoy of vehicles in which he travelled was a ‘media truck’ that had been prepared on his orders a few months earlier. A young follower had managed to equip a minivan with satellite television receivers and radio antennae to monitor broadcasts. Bin Laden’s aim was to follow news coverage of the operation in the US as the planned strikes unfolded (Burke 2016).

Like many commentators on international relations and security, Burke and Sattin recognise that Osama bin Laden was not attacking the World Trade Centre to kill as many Americans as possible, but more “because he was failing to attract attention for his pronouncements” (Sattin 2015). On 9/11 this would change dramatically, and bin Laden was eager to ensure it would be reported extensively, and monitored the reactions worldwide as the events unfolded. Discussing Burke’s The New Threat from Islamic Militancy (2015), Sattin recognises the way bin Laden and al-Qa’ida now come across as old-fashioned, especially when compared with Islamic State and their leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who upon capturing the Iraqi city of Mosul in June 2014 “moved the millennial clash of civilisations into another dimension”. Sattin says that bin Laden “had looked with longing at what he saw as the golden age of the long-departed caliphate”, while al-Baghdadi went straight to the endpoint declaring that “Allah had

144 chosen him to be the new caliph”. Al-Baghdadi’s publicists for IS uploaded video of his speech immediately after he had spoken (Sattin 2015).

The new threat in Burke’s title is not merely the savagery of trading in and raping women and girls captured during the conflict, or the beheading of hostages across the Middle East and North Africa. It is also in the random attacks in Western countries, such as the murder of the UK soldier Lee Rigby in Woolwich, the attacks on the Paris offices of magazine Charlie Hebdo, and many others, showcasing the brutally effective nature of terrorism in achieving the mass publicity it needs to exist. The new threat is evident in our heightened awareness of the possibility or probability of such violence. Bin Laden and al-Qa’ida expressed their criticism of what they considered to be foreign subjugation of Muslims, and specifically with the US having such a presence in holy sanctuaries in Mecca and Medina. Al-Baghdadi and IS on the other hand seem to have existential problems with non-Muslims generally (Sattin 2015; Burke 2015; Burke 2016).

Osama bin Laden understood the importance of the media as an integral part of the process of terrorism. During the war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan in the 1980s, bin Laden funded and organised the propaganda efforts of the Afghan mujahideen. He constructed a public image by inviting selected filmmakers to accompany him on his trips to the frontlines of battle. From 1991 to 1996 in Sudan, bin Laden ordered fellow Saudi Khalid al-Fawwaz to establish a media office in London. However, verbose and tedious written statements such as bin Laden’s 1996 declaration of war with the US, Message from Osama bin Laden to his Muslim brothers in the whole world and especially in the Arabian Peninsula: Declaration of jihad against the Americans occupying the Land of the Two Holy Mosques (Saudi Arabia); expel the heretics from the Arabian Peninsula, attracted little in the way of Western attention. Issued weeks after the al-Qa’ida leader had returned to Afghanistan, this call to jihad was intended to rally the masses of the Umma, the global Muslim community. As an exercise in marketing bin Laden’s message, it failed (bin Laden 1996). However, by the end of the 1990s new opportunities had arrived, with local-language satellite TV channels spreading across the Muslim world allowing audiences to watch content not vetted by government officials. The networks became extremely popular, with Al Jazeera leading the way. These TV channels broadcasted images of violence against Muslims in places such as Gaza, Kosovo

145 and Chechnya, bringing lively and controversial televised debates into homes, coffee shops and offices around the world.

Bin Laden understood the potential of these new satellite and cable networks. Despite the Taliban having prohibited communication with international audiences bin Laden gave a series of choreographed press conferences to invited global and local media in Afghanistan. His efforts were primarily directed at channels broadcasting to the Islamic world, with a regular stream of videoed statements being couriered to Al Jazeera’s offices in Islamabad. The coverage of bin Laden’s rambling presentations was however still determined by editors, who made similar decisions wherever they were based; bin Laden’s messages were mostly broadcast as short excerpts, some being delayed for weeks or months while others were not deemed newsworthy at all. An al-Qa’ida courier interviewed in Pakistan just weeks after 9/11 demonstrated bin Laden’s continued frustration at not being able to communicate his message on his own terms to the widest possible audience: “Every time I took a new tape, he told me how important my mission was, and how this time, the Muslims of the world would finally listen, and how I must absolutely deliver the tape to the right people” (Burke 2016).

Contrary to popular belief, bin Laden was not operating from caves during this period but with his extended family and associates in a series of compounds, barracks and camps. While at the camps bin Laden’s presence played a vital role, as they offered training facilities attracting hundreds of radicalised supporters as potential al-Qa’ida recruits. The 9/11 attacks on the US brought bin Laden success in capturing global attention, and in real time. Bin Laden was reliant on his media van in eastern Afghanistan, and only able to hear reports of the attacks in the US via the BBC World Service. Images of the 9/11 attacks were played and replayed, and it was clear that no terrorist before him had attained the menacing power to communicate with the world so effectively (Burke 2016).

Other terrorists were also catching on to the cyber revolution as a way of disseminating their messages, and becoming effective in their own right at making new media methods work for them. When Islamic fundamentalists seized the Iraqi city of Fallujah late in 2003, they set up terrorist training camps, bunkers, communications centres, ammunition silos, prisons – and at least one TV studio (Burke 2016). This studio was well

146 equipped with video cameras and editing equipment to expand on the messages the terrorists wanted to convey, without having to wait on the deadlines of Western-based media editors. US Marines discovered the studio when Fallujah was recaptured a year later, and on a blood-spattered wall hung a banner of the local affiliate of al-Qa’ida; this group was led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. “A former street thug from Jordan in his mid- 40s”, al-Zarqawi had no time for the intellectualism of older al-Qa’ida leaders, to whom he felt he owed only a nominal allegiance, instead he built his reputation on a combination of proven organisational ability and savagery. This image was to extend and increase the power of his brand of terrorism and amplify the fear and reputation that is such a crucial part of the terrorism arsenal. Al-Zarqawi was one of the first extremists to properly recognise and successfully exploit the digital revolution, marking a dramatic shift in the way many terrorists were to operate in the future (Burke 2016).

Immediate use was made of the availability of cheap portable cameras and editing software, requiring only basic skills to create professional looking media content. The messages of terrorism were becoming easier to both produce and access and there was no longer a need for expensive equipment, stacks of blank tapes and bulky editing suites. Also becoming redundant were the networks of couriers previously needed to physically deliver the terrorist’s media content to broadcasters. The terrorists were no longer restricted to producing content that would appeal to foreign news editors but had the freedom to plan and create their own productions, to speak directly to exactly who they wanted to, broadcasting their shows courtesy of the Internet. This information revolution had grown to mean the public need no longer just hear “about” terrorists, but could in fact hear directly from them. The remote training camps that bin Laden had created to train his followers to carry out spectacular and horrific attacks were no longer the only choice for getting the terrorist’s message to desired audiences, or indeed the world at large. Groups such as al-Zarqawi’s operated with a much less vulnerable and much more mobile infrastructure (Burke 2016).

The digital media revolution also meant that al-Zarqawi and his fellow insurgents no longer needed to worry about what might be considered too gruesome to be broadcast on TV. In May 2004 al-Zarqawi produced a clip showing the beheading of Nicholas Berg, a US contractor who had been working in Iraq. The footage was uploaded to a militant website; the cited figure of over half a million downloads in 24 hours may be an

147 exaggeration, but it is nonetheless clear that al-Zarqawi’s footage reached a much larger audience than any comparable material had up to that date, such as the murder of the US journalist Daniel Pearl in Pakistan in 2002. Without being delivered to a single media organisation this video made al-Zarqawi, who had until then been viewed largely as a marginal figure, one of the world’s most prominent and feared Islamic terrorists (Burke 2016).

The next shift in this media revolution was the wide availability of smartphones. First to exploit them effectively were not jihadis but secular, pro-democracy activists involved in what is known as the Arab Spring. As protesters in places such as Tunisia and Egypt were deposing authoritarian rule, the significance of new technology was becoming more obvious to the militants. Burke notes that a former extremist involved in the murder of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat on 6 October 1981 told a reporter in Cairo almost 30 years later that “if there had been Facebook, the assassination of the Egyptian premier would not have been necessary”. The logic was simple: if social media had existed as an alternative and less risky means of mobilising support and sending a message to their enemies, then there would not have been a need to assassinate Sadat, whose murder was carried out during a military parade in front of TV cameras, with the objective of sparking an uprising (Burke 2016).

Perhaps the most notable Islamic extremist group to exploit the digital revolution has been Islamic State. Towards the end of 2011, IS was sending footage of the executions of Iraqi government soldiers and police to the smartphones of the victims’ colleagues and relatives. These multimedia messages had a predictably devastating effect on their recipients’ will to keep fighting against IS. Other releases, such as a series of short films including The Clashing of the Swords, also began to circulate. During this period IS along with other groups began to encourage individuals to act alone, and began to effectively franchise lone wolf or self-starting terrorism, with IS/Daesh inviting attackers to claim they were soldiers of the Islamic State. This strategy known by some analysts as leaderless jihad is based partly on theories developed by the independent militant strategist Abu Musab al-Suri. According to Burke, al-Suri’s adage was that extremist activists needed “principles, not organisations” and “should be empowered to act as individuals, guided by texts they could find online, without necessarily belonging to any one group” (Burke 2016).

148

The attempted murder of British MP Stephen Timms by a student Roshonara Choudry in 2010, and the killing by British-born Muslim converts Michael Adebowale and Michael Adebolajo of off-duty soldier Lee Rigby in 2013, are two examples of self-starting terror attacks. None of the attackers in these incidents were officially linked to any terrorist organisation. Burke notes in this context, “Even the men who killed 12 people in Paris in January 2015, in attacks on the offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and a Jewish supermarket, had only tenuous links with established groups” (Burke 2016). The Paris attacker Amedy Coulibaly, believed to have converted to Islam while in prison for armed robbery, received a retrospective “endorsement from the Islamic State” following the attack, demonstrating the group’s willingness to publicise their cause at little or no cost to themselves. The 2013 bombing of the Boston Marathon by brothers Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was not directly connected with any terrorist organisation, despite striking a high-profile target with the intent to cause mass casualties. In Woolwich in London, Lee Rigby’s killers had a prepared statement that they “read to members of the public passing the scene of the attack”. Some members of that public of course had smartphones. One passerby recorded sickening images of Rigby’s murder, showing the bloodied hands of one of the terrorists while he was preaching about the “inequities of western foreign policy and apologising that women and children had been forced to witness his violence”. These images made front-page news and were broadcast on TV. Adebowale and Adebolajo, like the Paris attackers, did not make any provision for capturing images of their operations, as they did not need to. Knowing instead that they could rely on the ubiquity of phone cameras, and the public’s appetite for sharing the images they produce to do the job for them (Burke 2016).

“Beyond the visible attack on the lives of people and buildings and planes, terrorism is an effort to destroy the social, emotional, and economic fabric of our communities”. A fundamental aim of the terror process is to create fear, and through that fear to inspire the political ends of the terrorist. As noted earlier in this chapter, victims of terrorist attacks are not limited to those killed or physically injured, but extend to include communities that lose loved ones or experience the horror of the events, and beyond to anyone whose behaviour is affected by the fear or worry created by even the idea that there may be an attack in the future. Threats of future attacks serve to perpetuate and

149 exacerbate the psychological impact of earlier terrorism, and create persistent elements of terror in communities (Sederer et al. 2003, 8).

It is easy to demonstrate a symbiotic relationship between terrorism and the media. Terrorist attacks can be seen as a form of communication by violent extremists, and the media then plays a part in that extremism cumulatively, being used as the platform for disseminating terrorism’s ideologies. Traditional media takes benefit from terrorism as reports of terrorist attacks increase newspaper sales as well as the numbers of TV viewers for news and commentary shows that cover the attacks. This becomes a perversely common-interest exercise, where both the media and terrorists feed on gruesome and violent events, and where both parties willingly adjust their reactions according to the actions of the other (Rohner and Frey 2007).

5.7 An aftermath to terrorism: Fear and loathing In his conference address cited in part 1 of this chapter, O’Sullivan complains about “the mass migration of people over frontiers, both legal and illegal, and the consequent spread of ethnic diasporas in all parts of the world” as he views globalisation and mass immigration as the first two components of his “global crisis”. The third component of O’Sullivan’s crisis theory is one he claims took us by surprise, when on 11 September 2001 religion became a much more powerful force in people's lives. Surely linking religion and terrorism at this late stage was not much of a surprise, although it can be accepted the events of 9/11 took the issue to unprecedented levels. O’Sullivan claims “Since the collapse of the great secular philosophies of Nazism and communism, people all over the world have returned to the faiths of their fathers, and they have embraced them in a much more thoroughgoing way”. He notes one result of this behaviour is that within Islam a radical fundamentalist sect has in effect declared war upon the non- Muslim world. O’Sullivan claims the final component of his global crisis theory has gone unnoticed by most people because it is gradual and consists of several different trends, those being the extensions of power and influence from transnational organisations (O’Sullivan 2004, 71-72).

Taking his components collectively, O’Sullivan argues that a three-way struggle faces post-9/11 societies. The first is the so-called war on terrorism waged by the US and its

150 allies against groups like IS, al-Qa’ida and their sympathisers. The second is “between nation-states and national governments on the one hand and the new structure of transnational organizations and rules on the other”, the purpose of which is to determine whether the world will continue to be run by independent states cooperating in traditional ways, or by “a new structure of global governance in which the main actors will be bodies like the UN, the World Trade Organization, the International Criminal Court, the European Union and so on”. In a somewhat oversimplified ‘clash of civilisations’ style scenario, O’Sullivan lets his fears surmise that bin Laden represented the pre-modern world, that the US and other nation-states represent the modern world, and that the UN, the EU and others represent the post-modern world (O’Sullivan 2004, 71-72).

Davies (2003, 225) highlights a view on terrorism that fits with arguments here concerning a developed view of cumulative extremism in discussing “a new breed of terrorist [that] has emerged”. He argues that “many of the radical Islamic groups in order to co-ordinate their attacks… are also prepared to accept the retaliation levied on them by the West”, recognising that this acceptance of the Western response rarely harms a terrorist organisation “but kills instead many innocent people”. This has been discussed elsewhere in this thesis with analysis of what makes post-9/11 Islamic terrorism part of a cumulative whole, pushing Western media, social and hard power responses to become involved, leading to blowback and a cumulative radicalisation creating a new supply of willing terrorists to fight for a violent fundamentalist versions of Islam. This capitalises on media sensationalism when discussing and reporting terrorism and conflict, as Armoudian notes when highlighting “how mass media have exacerbated conflicts in other specific regions, including Israel and Palestine” (Armoudian 2016, 138). This exacerbation fits exactly the developed concept of CE as put forward by this thesis.

As an academic window on the mainstream media’s treatment of violent conflict within a political framework, Armoudian’s contribution is very helpful. The mainstream media in its various forms is a powerful tool, and in the wrong hands and/or under the control of dictatorial regimes or administrations is also very dangerous, as is illustrated in its use by Islamic terrorism. A dehumanisation of others exercised to sensational effect to sell media has marked many conflicts, and “these messages, particularly when disseminated

151 through mass media, can fuel lethal violence or other human rights abuses” (Armoudian 2015, 361).

This method of reporting and selling news without respect for its impact on the social problems that it covers is especially problematic. Norwegian sociologist and mathematician Johan Galtung, considered a principal founder of the discipline of peace and conflict studies, explains that during conflicts many journalists tend to focus on the most violent events and reinforce existing sensational identities, further demarcating an us from them (Galtung 1998).

Terrorism seeks to persuade, induce or coerce with its messages, regardless of whether that is to radicalise and attract support or to engender fear throughout society as a means to its goals. Communication of terrorism’s aims in a post-9/11 context involves a willing media, and/or the means to self-publish such as via the Internet. As one of the arguments of this thesis is to include sensationalist media representations of the issues and events as partly responsible for the apparent rise in post-9/11 terrorism’s perceived threat to society, it is important to acknowledge what is referred to in psychology and social sciences as persuasion theory. More often concerned with the psychology of advertising, persuasion theory nonetheless has some relevance in noting how terrorism aims to situate fear in the aftermath of its more violent and tangible actions against our social and political order. Persuasion is “human communication designed to influence the autonomous judgements and actions of others… to alter the way others think, feel, or act” (Simons et al. 2001, 7).

Groups such as al-Qa’ida and IS/Daesh have been able to capitalise on the new media opportunities of the Internet, and a certain demise of the conventional mass media, especially in terms of the decline of investigative reporting by mainstream press. This change in news coverage has seen a common practice of embedding journalists within military units, and even their use as policy propaganda in terms of how foes are portrayed. Also at play is the struggle for a continued freedom of the press, which compared with what we once knew, is a struggle society may be losing (Armoudian 2016, 139). These factors can manipulate mainstream media into playing a part in cumulative extremism and tend towards serving terrorism’s ends, increasing its

152 perceived power and spectre through increased social fears of Islamic terrorism via al- Qai’da and IS-inspired cells and self-starting individual terrorists.

Conclusion Discussions in this chapter could further by analyse some of the effects of terrorism on public views and policies regarding matters such as nationalism, immigration and racism. These are issues that are close to discussions in the second part of chapter 2 looking at restrictions on human rights, and then later discussions on moral abnegation and/or the acceptance of costs to Western moral authority in counterterrorism policies such as interrogational torture and drones. News and popular culture representations of what society perceives as terrorism influence cultural and ethnic relations, contributing towards radicalisation and disaffection of communities within broader populations, particularly the young and socially disenfranchised. The discussions in this chapter around real-life case studies of radicalisation have opened up these analyses critically. Along with how we come to fear, and how we process that fear of terrorism, arguments on perception versus reality contribute to academic discussions of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and its effects. One of the most important of these cumulative effects is radicalisation, and this thesis opens up the responsibility for this to go beyond the traditionally accepted protagonists. Beyond even the hard power Western reactions to 9/11 with foreign policy shifts to interrogational torture and drone programs. These conversations on developing the cumulative extremism concept are clearly extended to include us in the West to a greater extent than before, to take on board an overtly sensationalist media, and the public that devours it and seems to accept its narratives. The following chapter moving into discussions on social media and the Internet takes these ideas even further still.

153 CHAPTER 6 ISLAMIC TERRORISM AND THE INTERNET

This chapter analyses contributions to distorted perceptions of post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and overstatements of its threat through digital media via the Internet and social media platforms. A continuing argument of this thesis, around the development of the concept of cumulative extremism, considers theories that could reposition or reapportion responsibility for post-9/11 Islamic terrorism. Alongside extremists themselves, and the disproportionate, morally and legally questionable reactions to violent Islamic extremism by the US, there exists an arguably overtly sensationalist media environment. Media can mould social perceptions on the extent of the threat from Islamic terrorism, to a point at which society becomes prepared to accept costs to its human rights. These costs are in terms of counterterrorism policies including kidnapping, torture and extrajudicial assassinations being state-sanctioned, and undertaken without warrant or in some cases, evidence of just cause.

In understanding post-9/11 Islamic extremism, we need to confront an existential modernity in the fight by groups such as IS/Daesh in communicating via the Internet and social media. The fight and the messages are modern in both a technologically successful and brand-savvy position. To counter this increasing threat the US and its allies need to effectively engage with IS/Daesh and its supporters on social and political levels, not merely via realist tactics such as hard power military and strategic strength.

Arguably the most volatile conflict in the world in recent years has been in Iraq and Syria involving Islamic State, which capitalised on the destruction and chaos of the Syrian civil war and a continuing inadequacy of Iraqi security forces following the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq in 2011. After initial gains such as taking control of the Syrian city of Raqqa and the Iraqi city of Mosul, IS/Daesh found itself in an increasingly difficult position in the face of a growing array of political, ethnic and cultural enemies, but it continues to contribute to a dangerous and unpredictable social and political situation in the region. IS/Daesh bound its diverse territories together as a single, coherent theatre, acting as a modern feudal lord requiring tribute from its vassals or subordinate tenants. However, some elements of internal autonomy often allowed in suzerain arrangements

154 are noticeably lacking in this example. In addition to focusing on the combatants inside the Syria-Iraq warzones, effective countermeasures in this conflict need to consider the machinations, negotiations and political and social aims of state actors outside the immediate region, such as the Islamic Republic of Iran, Russia, the Gulf states, and the US and its allies. With the immediacy and saturation of news afforded by the Internet, modern terrorism provides the power of global capacity for many disenfranchised people.

Through its reign of terror IS/Daesh attempted to build statehood, and in large areas of territory under its control achieved a version of this, with the laws following strict interpretations of Sharia. The law within its territories is governed by the Islamic hadiths and Qur’an as they stood around 650CE, a translation of Islamic law as both a religious and political system. However, Western governments should not rely on a picture of Islamic State as some kind of medieval executive for there are many ambiguities in what constitutes an IS/Daesh jihadi. Many members and supporters of Islamic State have developed a mastery of 21st century publicity and communications, using advances in social media and technology to do more than spin their religious and political ideologies for Western consumption. They engage these avenues of communication not only as social and political tools but also as weapons of information and propaganda in a holy war against those considered as apostates and unbelievers or ‘kafir’.

As noted by Pelletier et al. (2016, 873), IS/Daesh subscribes to a radical position based on an ultra-extremist faction of Salafi/Wahhabi Islam within the Hanbali Sunni juristic tradition. Yet this ultra-fundamentalist organisation needs the support of other Muslims to fulfil its strategic objectives, which is achieved by their skilful use of social media. Western society risks being poorly equipped to counter Islamic terrorist threats online and to secular, peaceful and democratic societies around the world. The discussion in chapter 2 on the global reach of Islamic terrorism has noted some of these impacts, and how they influence international and domestic issues such as nationalism, immigration and social cohesiveness in multi-cultural societies.

This chapter discusses how post-9/11 Islamic extremism has been effective in making use of the Internet and its social media platforms to promote its objectives and successes and divert from its failures, and how digital media campaigns calling for

155 violent jihadi ideologies have been so successful in radicalising and recruiting individuals and communities to fundamentalist positions, attracting support for Islamic statehood and terrorist enterprises worldwide. Case studies are used of some of those involved in creating and disseminating extremist ideas and material online, as well as to discuss outcomes. These range from instigators of physical terrorism and how this is then represented in social media, to people using the Internet and social media to self- radicalise. Further there are discussions on victims and how their stories are represented on the Internet.

Terrorist radicalisation discourse can be reviewed via online jihadi blogs and in e- magazines such as al-Qa’ida’s Inspire, or Islamic State’s Rumiyah and Dabiq among others. Developments beyond what is presented here such as thematic analyses mapping the content and discourse of extremist e-magazines can help to understand possible impacts of narrative upon rises in Islamic terrorism. Research has previously been undertaken to better understand the messages, structure and evolution of Islamic extremist media, notably by Droogan and Peattie (2017; 2018). Perhaps this mapping can offer further opportunities in understanding wider cultural, social and political factors considered within a developed concept of CE. Droogan and Peatties’s thematic network analyses, as they note, are “applicable to all forms of textual terrorist literature across all periods of time” and “researchers may benefit from employing [thematic mapping] in broader comparisons of terrorist narratives across different networks, regions, and times” (Droogan and Peattie 2018, 32).

However, qualitative research using thematic analyses of texts conducted primarily within English language forums does have limitations. Text analyses of terrorist e- magazines such as Rumiyah, Inspire and Dabiq cannot be considered the whole picture when assessing how readers react to Islamist propaganda as part of a developed cumulative extremism concept. Although composed in English, these terrorist e- magazines rely extensively on “Romanised Arabic, theological argumentation and a prerequisite knowledge of ancient Islamic history”. The composition of Islamist propaganda such as Dabiq “is dense, often relatively impenetrable and even archaic in its use of language… articles are long-winded, laborious to read, and heavily focused on justifying the group’s actions and religious legitimacy. These factors render vast sections… inaccessible to a casual Western audience” (Droogan and Peattie 2017, 617).

156 Thematic mapping research can examine “how a narrative is conveyed, but not [necessarily] how it is received”, leaving opportunities for future research to “examine how magazines like Inspire are read, not just how they are written”. That is, it would be fruitful to “explore Inspire from the perspective of its readers, seeking to determine how the pervasiveness of themes translates in relation to reader receptivity”. Also, in the context of post-9/11 Islamic terrorist propaganda, research assessing the cultural and social impact of extremist images and videos would also be useful in developing the CE concept further, as these visual presentations play a pivotal role in al-Qa’ida and IS/Daesh propaganda (Droogan and Peattie 2018, 31).

Discussing the early online presence of Samir Khan who created Inspire in 2010 after becoming a key figure in AQAP and as responsible for a great deal of English-language online jihadi propaganda, Zelin argues that such blogs and e-magazines promoted “some of the most important figures in the American jihadi movement” and considers “the media architecture of the American online jihadi community, an Internet incubator for radicalization” (Zelin 2011; Droogan and Peattie 2018). Developing the concept of CE such as is argued for in this thesis can mean effectively recognising and addressing the danger of characters such as Khan with their “ability to connect disparate groups online and facilitate information not necessarily readily available in English”, treating them as contributing CE factors in rising post-9/11 extremism (Zelin 2011).

6.1 The power of the Internet: “Don’t hear about us, hear from us”

“Is it better to persuade an adversary to lay down his weapon and to desert, defect or surrender than it is to blow his head off?” (Taylor 2003, 313)

As Hoffman notes, Islamic State has “positioned itself at the forefront of yet another revolution in terrorist communications” (2017, 231). Messages from IS/Daesh via the Internet have a number of purposes: to radicalise and recruit, to advertise successes and deflect their losses, and to create and spread a fear of the organisation itself. Although this chapter mostly concerns radicalisation through the Internet, terrorism through spreading fear in society that precedes organisations such as IS also speaks to the need of a developed CE concept. In this thesis, Islamic State is recognised for its role as a terrorist organisation above its efforts to be seen as a legitimate state builder politically.

157 In mid-2014, IS/Daesh established the Al-Hayat Media Center to target Western audiences and produce output in English, German, Russian and French, covering and publicising its activities. There now exists a variety of social and conventional media content generating publicity for IS/Daesh and its aims, serving to inspire and radicalise marginalised Muslims into joining the violent jihad of Islamic State (Gertz 2014).

The French scholar of Islam, Olivier Roy argued that “Muslims in the West can often experience a trauma of ‘deterritorialization’”, feeling estranged from their native lands. To address this “anomie and alienation, young Muslims, in particular, find solace in a new, purified Islam and attach themselves to a ‘virtual ummah’” through access to the Internet, a disaffection that actors such as al-Zarqawi could tap into to enlist young Muslims to the jihadist cause (Michael 2007, 345). The Internet and social media sites and applications such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter provide anyone with a connection easy and immediate access to a large volume of texts and media supporting and refining interests, conspiracies or quests for knowledge. As well as for those seeking to preach, lobby or inform, regardless of their motives, it allows access to almost instant publishing and a global audience. The web has become a ‘place’, where ideas, rumours, opinions and even outright lies can be passed off as fact, and can mutate before anyone has a chance to check them for truth and accuracy. The US election campaign of 2016 and the 2016 UK Brexit campaign by ‘Leave’ groups have cemented for some lobbyists the usefulness of employing lies as what have come to be known as post-truths, known by some right-wing spin doctors as ‘alternative facts’.

In January 2017, Counsellor to President Trump Kellyanne Conway pleaded, “You can't give [Trump] the benefit of the doubt on this, and he's telling you what was in his heart? You always want to go by what’s come out of his mouth rather than look at what’s in his heart”. She said this in defence of Trump’s behaviour and free use of ‘post-truths’ in the 2016 campaign (Blake 2017). Sismondo observes, “Whether in the echo chambers of social or older media, we might be just as concerned with the (truth-era) power to direct attention as we are with fake news. Both play into instrumental and behaviourist approaches to politics (and other arenas), treating voters as people to be manipulated rather than as people to be convinced”. This manipulation of individuals and communities can be witnessed in both traditional and social media use by groups ranging from the White House to IS/Daesh in publicising and lobbying for support for

158 their various positions. On social media and Internet news sites, as well as in traditional media outlets, alternative facts often sit alongside accurate reports, such that “many people are concerned that we may be entering a post-truth era” (Sismondo 2017, 4).

When thinking of weapons in the so-called war with Islamic terrorism, many people might have initially pictured an AK-47 assault rifle, a hijacked airliner full of hostages, or perhaps an armed drone. But in this 21st century conflict, the weapons of Islamic terrorists are as much about publicity intent on engaging marginalised young men and women via social media, as about violent acts in pursuit of a fundamentalist religious and political ideology. Townsend and Helm (2014) observe: “The confrontation between the west and Islamic State will, like all military campaigns, be influenced by who wins the propaganda war for hearts and minds, and Islamic State’s online army – dubbed ‘the new disseminators’ by radicalisation experts – are providing crucial backup to the brutal Isis operatives in the field”. The use of information and imagery on the Internet appeals both to disaffected Muslims in Western states, notably the ancestors of wider eastern and Middle Eastern Diasporas, and to new converts to extremist Islam. These messages are conveyed with the aim of its appeal evolving into radicalisation and beyond, into tangible support and/or active physical involvement in violent jihad. Anne Aly argues, “For the majority of young people becoming radicalised, there are a variety of root causes, including access to radicalising influences on the Internet”. She notes, “so far Australia has been slow in responding to the need for deradicalisation and prevention programmes” (Aly 2014). Among messages that prove successful in terrorising the West and gaining political capital around the world are ideas of a temporal Camp Jihad and online jihadi ‘universities’, along with the struggle to enshrine Islamic State’s self- declared caliphate offering its followers a spiritual home, adventure in the name of Allah, a sense of belonging and a strong identity without the marginalisation perhaps previously encountered at home.

An example of this transition involves a radicalised Western student, known as Jihadi John, and details how he evolved from living a mainstream Western life in the UK, to becoming an infamous, feared and central character in what is effectively a digital branding and advertising campaign for IS/Daesh. The following section introduces the power that IS/Daesh has been able to tap into with the help of Internet technologies.

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6.2 Jihadi John: Executioner, content creator and radicaliser A construction that could not have existed without the developed cumulative extremism contribution of Western media is the case of the man dubbed Jihadi John (Mohammed Emwazi), a British man who committed a series of recorded murders in the name of jihad after leaving the UK to first join Jabhat al-Nusra or the al-Nusra Front, and eventually IS/Daesh in Syria (Barrett 2015). This case is particularly useful as an example of someone whose personal radicalisation may have been enabled by the Internet, but more importantly, in the context of this chapter, as someone who became a prolific creator of content for the Islamic State presence online, allowing that presence to spread globally on social media and Internet blogs with striking ferocity. Videos produced specifically for the Internet featuring Jihadi John succeeded in disseminating IS/Daesh messages, the group’s wider mission, and feeding a visceral and barbaric fear of the organisation worldwide.

Many commentators on post-9/11 counterterrorism attribute much of the responsibility for radicalising people to heavy-handed Western foreign policies, and domestic treatment of their own Muslim communities by state agencies, which in effect pushes young Muslims and recent converts into the influence of extremist Salafi or Wahhabi groomers. CAGE UK, an independent advocacy group working to empower communities affected by the so-called war against terrorism, claimed that as a young London-based computer science student, Mohammed Emwazi was harassed by the UK Security Service (MI5) to such an extent that he joined IS/Daesh in Syria and adopted the Jihadi John identity. Emwazi revealed his hatred of the UK intelligence community and security services in a series of emails in 2010 to the freelance security correspondent and journalist Robert Verkaik. Emwazi was born in Kuwait, coming to the UK at the age of six and living in West London until 2012. According to the emails with Verkaik, he often complained that his life was being monitored and controlled by MI5. He wrote that he had even considered suicide because he felt like a “dead man walking”, especially after coming face to face with a man he believed worked for the UK Security Service (Dearden and Peachey 2015).

The French journalist Didier François, who was held hostage by IS/Daesh, described Emwazi as a man “who hit and tortured without the slightest restraint”. Emwazi claimed

160 many victims as an IS/Daseh executioner and spokesman to the English-speaking world. After the Pentagon confirmed that a drone strike had successfully targeted the vehicle in which Emwazi was travelling on 12 November 2015, François who was by then working for French radio station Europe 1, stated that Emwazi had “been one of the jailers in charge of 19 western hostages taken by Isis in Syria in 2013”. “He was most probably one of the worst” of the group of four British gaolers: “Between us, we called them the Beatles because we didn’t know their names. There was Paul, Ringo and George; Emwazi had the name John. He was the tallest, the calmest, but also the most determined, without the slightest scruple” (Tran et al. 2015).

The following case studies recognise the contribution of Emwazi in creating custom social media content to serve the needs of IS/Daesh. To simply critically analyse various forms of media and their treatment of post-9/11 terrorism without recognising how this content was created by jihadis would be to miss an important aspect of this discussion dealing with extending CE via the publicity of terrorism and its contribution towards radicalisation.

Majid Freeman, a 27-year-old humanitarian aid worker from the UK who was in the convoy with British aid worker Alan Henning when he was captured by IS/Daesh militants in December 2013, said he had mixed feelings about Emwazi’s demise: “I won’t be shedding any tears for him, but the fact is that I – along with many of the family members of those taken hostage – wanted him to be captured alive and put on trial as a war criminal”. Freeman raised the question that if the US knew where Emwazi was and were able to successfully target him for assassination by drone, they could have chosen to capture him as when bringing to justice other IS/Daesh fighters in rescuing prisoners from an Iraqi jail (Tran et al. 2015). Freeman revealed that former Guantánamo detainee Moazzam Begg and CAGE UK had offered to appeal to Henning’s captors, and were making efforts to secure his release before his death at the hands of Emwazi. Freeman accused the UK government of having blocked these efforts:

Moazzam Begg had been successful before in getting hostages released. All the other hostages were killed after one week, but because of the appeals, Alan’s murder was delayed, which gave the family some hope that Alan would be released. But the British military intervention into Syria is what sealed Alan’s fate. Alan didn’t have to die. The government has a lot of questions to answer (Tran et al. 2015).

161 Henning’s nephew tweeted that he had “mixed feelings” about the news of Emwazi’s reported death, and a friend said that, “there would be no closure for Henning’s family even if Emwazi had been killed”. Louise Woodward-Styles, the organiser of a vigil for Henning following his capture, maintained that she would have preferred that Emwazi had been captured and returned to the UK alive, to stand trial:

I don’t think there will be closure, particularly for Alan’s family and close friends. His body wasn’t returned home and from that aspect it was something they had to deal with privately. For them to say that Jihadi John has been killed doesn’t mean anything. It is something that the government can say they have done successfully… Alan has gone and nothing will bring him back. I’m slightly sceptical about the target being successful. We don’t trust the government when it comes to the war. Drones are not the answer, nor is bombing innocent people. I would rather him be brought back to face justice” (Tran et al. 2015).

Henning had travelled to Syria to assist in the delivery of aid, after being touched by the plight of orphaned children. Kidnapped from Turkey into Syria in December 2013, he was then held hostage for ten months before being beheaded, his execution captured on video, as part of Emwazi’s contribution to the IS/Daesh media effort. Henning’s abduction was only made public in September 2014, following his appearance at the end of another execution video being threatened with death unless the UK stopped their bombing campaign against Islamic State. Despite worldwide appeals and pleas for mercy from his family as well as from members of the local Muslim community, IS/Daesh released the video of Henning’s murder in October 2014. Henning’s daughter found out about his graphic murder when she saw photographs of it on social media (Culzac 2014; Tran et al. 2015).

The Chief Executive of the Ramadhan Foundation, Mohammed Shafiq, said that the reported killing of Jihadi John was “a significant moment in the fight to get justice for David Haines, Alan Henning and all the victims of this evil man”. However, he noted that capturing Emwazi alive would have been preferable:

The Ramadhan Foundation joins the victims… and their families in preferring him to have been captured alive so he would have seen justice in a court of law but understand why this wasn’t possible. Extrajudicial killing over justice in a court of law should not become the norm in the fight against terrorism (Tran et al. 2015).

Bethany Haines, the daughter of murdered British aid worker David Cawthorne Haines, also spoke of her sense of relief that Emwazi had been killed. However, for many

162 relatives and friends of IS/Daesh victims, this brutal form of terrorism extends beyond those captured, and those left behind often have no closure. As much as Emwazi’s death may offer comfort, the families are faced with painful questions as to why the terrorists chose this method of political violence, and whether it makes any difference in the overall conflict (Chan and De Freytas-Tamura 2015).

Discussing such brutal tactics attempts to establish some crude motive for the actions of terrorists, in seeking guarantees of publicity and creating news content. As noted in chapter 5, much of the popular news media feeds on violence and sensationalism to maintain its relevance. As well as creating front-page headlines, and extending fearful reputations as an enemy of Western occupiers, content such as that made by Emwazi was tailor-made for Internet users to disseminate in a world not restricted by editors, or by censorship. As Hoffman explains, IS/Daesh “has thus been remarkably effective in its use of these social media to speak to a global audience, thereby completely bypassing and thwarting the traditional media from misinterpreting or otherwise distorting its core message”. He notes a common IS/Daesh mantra “Don’t hear about us, hear from us” (Hoffman 2017, 232).

Junko Ishido, the mother of Japanese journalist Kenji Goto who, after his capture during the attempted rescue of another Japanese man Haruna Yukawa, is believed to have been murdered by Emwazi, echoed her son’s peace-loving attitude in comments she made to the Japanese public broadcaster Nippon Hōsō Kyōkai (NHK): “I only wish there will be no more conflicts like these in this world, as my son had hoped to see peace prevail around the world.” Goto was featured in an IS/Daesh beheading video released on 31 January 2015, one week after the video of Yukawa’s murder at the hands of Emwazi. Goto had gone to Syria in late October 2014 and was captured by IS/Daesh fighters soon after his arrival (Tran et al. 2015).

The parents of US journalist James Foley who was murdered most likely by Emwazi, and whose beheading video was uploaded to YouTube on 19 August 2014, made a statement saying it was little solace to learn of the IS/Daesh executioner’s death: “[Mohammed Emwazi’s] death does not bring Jim back. If only so much effort had been given to finding and rescuing Jim and the other hostages who were subsequently murdered by Isis, they might be alive today”. Foley’s mother Diane revealed that it

163 saddened her that “here in America we’re celebrating the killing of this deranged, pathetic young man.” She believed that in different circumstances, her son might have tried to befriend and help Emwazi: “Jim would have been devastated with the whole thing”, adding, “Jim was a peacemaker”. As a close friend of yet another of Emwazi’s hostages, aid worker Abdul-Rahman, formerly known as Peter Kassig, who was beheaded in November 2014, the journalist Sulome Anderson said, “I won’t be crying if this idiot is dead, [however] it seems to me that this is a publicity stunt designed to distract from the fact that the men who really killed my friend are just as actively evil as they’ve been for years, and US policy in Syria is in dire need of reassessment” (Tran et al. 2015).

The reactions by friends and family of the victims of IS/Daesh executions to the death of one of the main protagonists, prove interesting when considering an expanded concept of CE as being impacted by wider cultural and social phenomena than that of Eatwell’s original formulation. The assassination by drone strike has already to an extent become an unchallenged counterterrorism policy in legal and/or moral terms, although many expressed concerns over justice being better served through capture than by Emwazi’s killing. In some sections of media and society questions may arise of reports of Emwazi’s death as perhaps celebrating revenge for actions rather than consequence.

6.3 Roshonara Choudry: A case study of a radicalised woman On 14 May 2010, university student Roshonara Choudry attempted to murder her local Member of Parliament Stephen Timms because of his public support for the Iraq war. Her radicalisation from English Literature student to terrorist occurred in less than six months. The daughter of Bangladeshi immigrants to the UK, Choudry was keen to learn more about her religion, and her Internet searches led her to the US-based website Revolution Muslim (since closed) and to the extremist writings and lectures of Anwar al- Awlaki on YouTube. Choudry downloaded al-Awlaki’s entire set of presentations, approximately 100 hours of video, and later stated that it was al-Awlaki who taught her that “we shouldn’t allow the people who oppress us to get away with it”. Videos of another jihadi preacher Sheikh Abdullah Azzam convinced Choudry that “even women are supposed to fight”. By the time she had finished watching al-Awlaki’s sermons in late April 2010, Choudry decided to act without any real-world jihadi associates or physical

164 support. She stabbed Timms twice before being disarmed, and was sentenced to life imprisonment. Timms survived the assault despite suffering what were described as potentially life-threatening wounds to his abdomen (Kean and Hamilton 2012).

Self-radicalised individuals illustrate the significance of Internet social media sites in radicalisation, and their usefulness to terrorists and extremist preachers in disseminating sermons, videos, articles and images. The Internet allows extremist preachers with very little equipment to propagate ideologies and teachings as rallying calls for holy war against apostates and disbelievers, not just in the Middle East, but globally. Material can be handpicked appealing to communities and individuals vulnerable to radicalisation. This indicates an evolution of information flowing constantly into homes and workplaces, without censorship and open for exploitation by terrorists, as well as anyone extolling ‘post-truths’ or ‘alternative facts’. These factors tie into radicalisation, as a self-starting enterprise, extending the global reach of terrorism.

6.4 Your caliphate needs you: The pull to violent extremism Dearden and Peachey (2015) discuss emails between Mohammed Emwazi and the journalist Robert Verkaik as examples of a marginalised and disaffected young man being pushed towards radicalism, where he decides to not only support but to personally commit to violence in the name of a proscribed terrorist group and its cultural, social, political and religious goals. This illuminates part of the ‘push’ factor view of radicalisation, and indicates how someone can take emotional and physical steps to becoming a terrorist. In addition to ‘push radicalisation’, ‘pull radicalisation’ can take place, where extremist groups and/or hate preachers mentor or groom vulnerable Muslims towards violent jihad by indoctrination with fundamentalist interpretations of Islam. This suggests there may be theological, devotedly religious and cultural ‘pull’ factors from fundamentalist Islam itself. The extremists in these cases demonstrate a faith that is commonly argued to legitimise an out-dated version of humanity and human rights, and in the case of violent jihad, a faith whose fundamentalists are prepared to willingly support and engage in deadly violence against non-combatants and innocents in the pursuit of their ideologies. It is sensible to consider that both push and pull factors towards Islamic radicalisation and terrorism are at play, and that many radicalisation case studies do not exhibit actions taken from single motives.

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Daniel notes, “When we say that justice, righteousness and religion are one and inseparable in all warfare, physical or spiritual, and that a just war (if there be such a thing) must be holy, these are the conclusions of Islam and Christianity alike” (1958, 390). Extremists who choose violent jihad feel safe in a belief that this is forgiven within their faith, and that their actions manage to circumvent passages in many holy books forbidding violence and promoting peace between followers of particular religions and non-believers. The radicalised fundamentalist position contributes to views of Islam by many non-Muslims and even moderates within Islam that it is a religion overdue for some version of reform to better reflect its moderate positions, and the views of the majority of its believers in the 21st century.

Islam’s extremist Salafi and Wahhabi proponents are currently those most usually considered as the public view of Islamic terrorism, particularly in the rise of IS/Daesh as a primary enemy of the West. There is some general public support for this idea of a so- called war against post-9/11 Islamic terrorism as an ongoing blight to Western states. A simplistic but accessible guide to the most extreme groups practising violent Islamic extremism was published in the UK tabloid newspaper The Mirror stating that, “[ISIS] has emerged from radical Sunni jihadists in Iraq who fought under the banner ‘al-Qaeda in Iraq’. Their goal since being founded in 2004 is to create a hardline Islamic state crossing over the borders of Syria and Iraq”. This tabloid synopsis is not an academic source, but it speaks to a very general public understanding of, and position on, terrorism and Islam. More academic research suggests that many jihadis are not simply drawn to organisations such as al-Qa’ida and Daesh by their Islamist politics, nor are they necessarily attracted to aligning themselves with Islamic terrorism via fundamentalist understandings of the religion. Rather for many followers their extreme faith becomes part of a personal quest for meaning and belonging, a desire to be involved with views and examples of social behaviour and respect perceived as lacking from Western society. These radicalised men and women experience an existential form of alienation, rather than tangibly cultural, social or political, which pushes them to fundamentalist extremes in Islam (Parry 2014).

Some commentators claim that the current commander to the faithful for IS/Daesh, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, “was only radicalised while in US custody”. Noting this, Parry argues

166 that “it is more likely al-Baghdadi was an Islamic fundamentalist before the US and Britain invaded Iraq”. However, this raises questions as to when and to what extent the IS/Daesh leader, a self-declared caliph and the public face of Islamic State, may have been reactive to push and/or pull radicalisation. As noted in chapter 2, Islamic State evolved from al-Qa’ida in Iraq, the group that pledged its allegiance to al-Qa’ida in 2004. Under Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s leadership IS/Daesh has since late 2013 been engaged in campaigns to gain control over parts of Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Lebanon, Israel and Jordan and to unite these areas into a caliphate that would then be governed under Sharia. Violently and publicly active for the most part in northern Iraq and Syria, the group has run a sophisticated social media campaign in an effort to spread fear, attract funding and recruit new members. However, in addition to the more usual low-resolution recruitment and training videos of earlier groups, notably al-Qa’ida, IS/Daesh became infamous for slick production values and more glamorous and socially accessible content, made possible by smartphones. It has however not been an entirely smooth rise to power, even within the world of jihadi terrorist organisations; for example, a 2013 announcement by al-Baghdadi of a merger between IS/Daesh and the al-Nusra Front, was rejected by the leaders of both Jabhat al-Nusra and al-Qa’ida (Parry 2014; Ingram 2016).

As to the content of IS/Daesh releases over the Internet, the rousing calls that were such a part of al-Qa’ida’s uploads can still be found, but these rallies to a fundamentalist cause are now often joined by a variety of other websites and social network posts, such as the now suspended Twitter account ISIL Cats. This account was notorious for showing softer images of IS/Daesh fighters at home in domestic situations, feeding or playing with pet cats, often against a backdrop of hard-core weaponry. However, the propaganda released by IS/Daesh since late 2015 provides a case study of how a group in politico-military decline uses social messaging to coax friends and foes into fixating upon and exaggerating their strengths while ignoring, dismissing or reframing their failures (Ingram 2016).

Online open source searches illustrate shifting updates from the frontlines of a retreating but still brutal conflict. The initial advances of Islamic State, aided by power vacuums following the US withdrawal from Iraq, and in regions of Syria left vulnerable by the civil war, can be followed in posts on a range of social media networks such as

167 Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube, as well as through the release of official IS/Daesh magazines online such as Dabiq, Rumiyah and Constantinople. Supporters and active fighters of IS/Daesh add updates and propaganda on social media accounts in real-time. These social media strategies and surges in posts in various languages cannot be explained as merely an organic groundswell of support. The group intelligently developed its online following, renewing posts and online identities to evade censorship and provide a regular flow of information to the Internet. This has involved creating and exchanging official accounts and the use of third parties to disseminate live updates and images from its campaign. Part of the core of the IS/Daesh media arm until mid-2014 was an Android smartphone application called “The Dawn of Glad Tidings”. According to UK television network ITV, “to download the app… users [were] asked for a lot of personal data including access to modifying or deleting the contents of your USB storage” and to be allowed access to the user’s Wi-Fi connections. “The Dawn” then automatically posted tweets to the user’s personal Twitter account. Launched in April 2014, the app was available through the Google Play store until removed by Google in June 2014. The tweets selected by IS/Daesh social media operatives were staggered to evade detection by Twitter's anti-spam algorithms. Joseph Carter of the London-based International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation (ICSR) notes that IS/Daesh has done a lot of work on branding to look like an effective and desirable fighting force to possible recruits: "Westerners are now mainly going to Isis instead of other groups – part of that might be down to the group's more lax standards on who they accept but also a product of them being so prolific on social media" (Hussein 2014).

Beyond intimidating their opponents, key objectives for jihadi groups such as IS/Daesh are attracting financial donations and physical recruits to the frontline of fighting, particularly disenfranchised second and third generation Muslim migrants in Western countries. Andrew Phillips points out that IS/Daesh consider Muslim migrants to the West as “high priority potential recruits”. Phillips notes, “social media appeals to jihadists for the same reason it appeals to non-violent political parties and other social movements: it provides cheap, global platforms that enable non-state actors to reach out to geographically dispersed global constituencies while refining their message to tap into local grievances” (cited in Powell 2014).

Social media analyst JM Berger, who specialises in understanding the Internet’s use for

168 extremist agendas, notes that IS/Daesh has deployed a coordinated and effective social campaign:

There's a new jihadist recruiter on the Internet. Based in San Francisco and backed by a multi-million dollar bankroll, the recruiter orchestrates thousands of introductions every day, connecting people at risk of radicalization with extremist clerics and terrorist propagandists – even facilitating online meetings with hardcore Al-Qa’ida members. The recruiter is Twitter, and it’s shaking up the world of online radicalization in ways both large and small (Berger 2013).

As spokesman Abu Bakr al-Janabi told Vice News, IS/Daesh admits to a comprehensive and calculated social media presence: “There are different types of ISIS divisions on social media: the ISIS official media account, which publishes all its video releases, ISIS province accounts, which publish live feed info and pictures, the ISIS mujahideen accounts, where fighters talk about their experience and daily life, and ISIS supporters, who counter Western, Shia, and tyrants' propaganda and lies” (Speri 2014).

Open source searches uncover that as with Twitter users the world over, IS/Daesh members and supporters frequent other social media platforms to share pictures of their daily lives through portrait ‘selfies’ and everyday food and lifestyle pictures, mixed in among graphic images from frontline war. IS/Daesh supporters use in-app vintage filters and up-to-date editing software, reinforcing what they want to be viewed as contemporary and relevant messages. This extends to sharing graphic photos and videos of victims such as the “Message to America” video of US freelance journalist James Foley being executed by Jihadi John, and photos of mass beheadings of Shi’a Muslims in Syria and Iraq, through to those involved in the fighting sharing experiences on blogs and posting images of everyday life from the frontlines. Posts range from the gory to the mundane, even seeking to attract people to state-building efforts with pictures of kittens tagged ‘meowjihadeen’ for example in the ‘Islamic State of Cat’. The IS/Daesh social media presence is in stark contrast with its portrayal as medieval religious extremists, discordance yet to be fully addressed by some Western interests in this conflict.

6.5 Rumiyah and the call to violent jihad Rumiyah is the digital Islamic State magazine published in English, Turkish and French, the first issue of which is discussed by Ingram for the Australian Institute of International

169 Affairs (AIIA) in September 2016. Much of Rumiyah’s content is translated from the group’s primary Arabic newsletter, suggesting it is an attempt to more efficiently disseminate to multilingual audiences what IS/Daesh considers to be relevant conflict news. It is unclear whether this is part of an expanding or contracting ISIS propaganda strategy. If Rumiyah augments long-running titles such as the English language magazine Dabiq or Daesh’s Turkish Constantinople magazine, it will expand IS/Daesh propaganda output, in response to the group’s territorial losses. However, if Rumiyah turns out to replace earlier publications, this suggests that IS/Daesh is downsizing to a more resource, time and energy-efficient propaganda strategy.

Rumiyah’s first edition included a feature that up to mid-2016 had been a regular segment in Dabiq magazine, entitled “Among the Believers are Men: Abu Mansur al- Muhajir”. It focused on the life and death of Australian jihadi, Ezzit Raad, who was known in the Islamic community by his Arabic name Abu Mansur al-Muhajir. It is telling that the article is designed to appeal both with specificity to a local audience, in this case an Australian one, while also speaking to a worldwide readership. The article includes many of the trademark IS/Daesh approaches to propaganda, first a narrative designed to exacerbate its audiences’ perceptions of the ongoing crisis, yet simultaneously to inspire and empower them to take action. It portrays Raad and other IS/Daesh fighters as ordinary believers who have abandoned everything for an “extraordinary cosmic struggle”, as in this passage from Rumiyah celebrating Raad as a warrior: “He would race his brothers towards martyrdom, though many of them beat him to it” (Rumiyah 2016, 16). The article calls on Australian supporters of IS/Daesh to kill non-believers: “kill them on the streets of Brunswick, Broadmeadows, Bankstown, and Bondi. Kill them at the MCG, the SCG, the Opera House, and even in their backyards”. Rumiyah’s portrayal of Australia’s domestic war on terrorism is insightful, as a myopic focus of counterterrorism efforts against Australian Muslim communities, fusing hard and soft strategies, and enabled by unprecedented legislation from the Australian government. The article’s understanding of these dynamics finds resonance with many audiences globally, and yet also aims specifically to inspire disaffected Australian Muslims (Ingram 2016; Rumiyah 2016, 17).

When secular governments attempt to implement ideology-centric counterterrorism approaches, they often use Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) programs, tending

170 towards prescribing moderate examples of Islam typically championed by selected moderate Muslim community figures. The programs often end up acting as catalysts for, rather than buffers against, radicalisation. Ingram complains that “Such strategies tend to not only undermine the credibility of those moderates involved in the program as government lackeys but more broadly discredits anyone advocating such an interpretation as champions of a ‘government Islam’”. Implementing such strategies can give veracity to, rather than counteract, dangerous and militant Islamist messages, resulting in a cycle of compounding negative returns. It allows militant narratives warning of a version of Islam as “government-sanctioned” to gather increasing resonance, while moderate voices lacking in the public forum and yet essential to countering extremism are left to lose credibility and legitimacy (Ingram 2016).

Such articles in Rumiyah indicate that Australian CVE initiatives are not a new phenomenon, but are pre-dated by well-disseminated Islamist warnings of such initiatives. Anwar al-Awlaki is referenced in the Rumiyah article, and identified as a significant influence upon Islamist-inspired Muslims and recent converts to Islam in the West. Al-Awlaki inspires independent actors to operate on behalf of IS/Daesh and al- Qa’ida without any tangible material support or contact with either organisation, and warned of Western CVE strategies in a 2008 lecture entitled “The Battle of Hearts and Minds”. The Rumiyah message to Australians offers an insight into the role played by Australian Muslims in IS/Daesh, and demonstrates the skill of propagandists operating within the Islamic State mission (Ingram 2016; Rumiyah 2016, 14-17).

Calls in publications such as Rumiyah for individual Muslims to self-radicalise and carry out self-starting terrorist attacks have increased via the Internet. A 2014 report by the UK Parliament Intelligence and Security Committee (UK ISC) examined ‘lone wolf’ terrorism in contrast to organised groups, applying the category to individuals such as the killers of Lee Rigby. In studying the intelligence relating to Rigby’s murder, the committee noted that individuals who contact other extremists seeking inspiration and encouragement, but who then go on to plan their own attack, should be recognised as self-starting terrorists rather than as lone actors: “While the Committee recognises that MI5 must have a framework to manage and prioritise its operations, it needs to ensure that this framework is flexible enough to deal with the increasing threat posed by ‘self- starting terrorists’” (UK ISC 2014, 82).

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Although the plots of self-starting terrorists are often less sophisticated than attacks coordinated by al-Qa’ida, their independence can offer fewer opportunities for detection by law enforcement and intelligence agencies. The UK ISC recommends that intelligence agencies ensure their prioritisation framework “is sufficiently flexible to deal with the threat from individuals as well as networks”. The Committee has expressed concern that there is a potential gap in regard to individuals on whom there is corroborated intelligence but who are not part of a larger and more visible terrorist network (UK ISC 2014, 82, 168; Rumiyah 2016).

6.6. John Cantlie, a curious case study: Don’t shoot the messenger The case of British photojournalist John Cantlie who has been a hostage of Islamic State since 2012 illustrates another tactic used by the organisation to first attract sympathy, and then radicalise to their cause. Reports for Al Jazeera suggest that rather than appearing as a passive and captive object, Cantlie emerged as a media asset for IS/Daesh to exploit in pursuit of its aims. Footage recorded against a backdrop of streets in Mosul in Iraq and released online in February 2016 was the first sighting of Cantlie for over a year, but the seventh episode in an IS/Daesh video series titled “Lend Me Your Ears”. As episodes have progressed, an increasingly unenthusiastic and ever thinner Cantlie is shown speaking standard IS/Daesh rhetoric about their nobility, and how ineffective and corrupt their enemies are by comparison. In episode 7 Cantlie appears to bemoan the waste of over US$5 billion spent bombing what he calls innocuous Islamic State “media kiosks”. Hostages are powerful currency in this conflict and while the executions of many have achieved global headlines, the kidnap ransoms of others have been used to generate income. John Cantlie has so far fitted neither scenario (Denselow 2016).

Cantlie has a unique niche within IS/Daesh’s plans. His profile as a legitimate Western journalist and his ability to deliver Western-style news segments have meant that he has become a communications asset to IS/Daesh, whose image in the West is a key factor for recruitment and retention. The imprisonment of Cantlie is portrayed as something of a tactical advantage. As a point of difference from the videos and photographs of executions, the Cantlie series is suitable for wider sharing, and can therefore be found relatively easily online embedded within open source updates on what is happening to

172 him. Whether or not his messages can be believed is almost irrelevant, because in the role of attracting support they define a narrative and provide publicity. This places Cantlie as a vulnerable actor in the middle of a war that as a reporter he set out only to observe (Denselow 2016).

By July 2017 there were intermittent but unreliable reports of Cantlie’s death in Mosul, however as of January 2019 no confirmation of Cantlie’s death has been received. The example of John Cantlie speaks to the unconventional methods of IS/Daesh in their pro- extremist and radical presence online, and although his episodes are not entirely successful or even believable, they do signal how the scope of the Internet can prove problematic when trying to counter extremist narratives online. The story of John Cantlie also of course betrays the brutal and dehumanising nature of IS/Daesh tactics beyond conventional torture and execution of their enemies.

6.7 The problem with the Internet Putting aside matters of censorship and free speech, how Western governments can control the role of social media and the Internet in radicalisation remains unclear. Former UK Foreign Secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind has said: “You can do lots of things, but you can’t eliminate it. The technology is so diffuse and it can be so anonymised that you can plug one hole and it will just pop elsewhere”. Although conceding social media can be useful to intelligence agencies, Rifkind believes any virtues as an intelligence source are outweighed by social media’s effectiveness to groups like Islamic State: “I think there is no doubt that we would want to close down all this material if it was technically possible” (quoted in Townsend and Helm 2014).

Following the 2013 killing of Lee Rigby, the UK ISC investigated what was known about the two men who carried out the attack, by British intelligence agencies the Security Service (MI5), the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6/SIS), and the UK Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ). The report from the UK ISC investigation attempted to address issues relating to the role of social media in radicalisation and consequent violent acts. The conclusion was that “Engagement with extremist media should be taken extremely seriously. For example, Inspire magazine provides advice and guidance to individuals on how to commit terrorist attacks in the UK. In most cases,

173 engaging with extremist media such as Inspire should be sufficient grounds to justify intrusive action” (UK ISC 2014, 167). Findings such as this provide further support for the extension of the cumulative extremism concept provided here. Post-9/11 terrorism trends and the evolving role of traditional media along with the Internet, make it imperative to consider phenomena well beyond Eatwell’s original 2006 formulation of upward spirals of violence.

A European Parliament report by the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs on the “prevention of radicalisation and recruitment of European citizens by terrorist organisations”, released on 3 November 2015, recommended that “every Member State should set up a special unit tasked with flagging illegal content on the internet and with facilitating the detection and removal of such content” (Dati 2015, III, 21). Haras Rafiq of the Quilliam Foundation notes that prior to the release of these reports, earlier inertia on these matters encouraged radicalisation, “by allowing extremist ideology to be disseminated widely on social media” (Townsend and Helm 2014). Although seeming to be supportive of addressing radical content, these recommendations have run into opposition on grounds of limiting free speech.

Attempting to delete extremists from social media would yield the benefit of removing a propaganda advantage from the terrorist arsenal, although perhaps driving them further into the deep web and making them more difficult to track. Twitter crackdowns on the accounts of Islamic extremists have seen many account holders move towards a social media project called Diaspora, “a decentralised network with data stored on private servers which cannot be controlled by a single administrator”. This migration means that even the creators of Diaspora are not able to remove extremists. Director of the Centre for the Analysis of Social Media at Demos Jamie Bartlett envisages situations where IS/Daesh uses social media for propaganda but ensures that identities are obscured via proxy servers and anonymous browsers. This can be achieved by continually shifting information to sites such as Diaspora in tandem with effective encryption systems (cited in Townsend and Helm 2014).

For Western governments to disrupt self-radicalisation via the Internet, their agencies need to address extremist disseminators online, as well as funding more traditional physical counter-radicalisation measures through cooperative and intelligent

174 engagement with local Muslim communities. One example of how social media is being monitored by hard power actors in counterterrorism and counter-radicalisation is the 2015 killing of UK citizen Junaid Hussain by the US, following his use of Twitter to plot terrorist attacks. Twitter has been deleting accounts linked to terrorists since mid-2015. Like most social media websites, Twitter is free, international, and allows anyone with Internet access to sign up for an account and post largely as they please, making it an effective recruitment tool for terrorist organisations. Building confidence in its anti- terror policies, the US-based company has expanded its specialist teams in the US and Ireland tasked with monitoring extremist content. Reliant on a mixture of technology and human judgment, the teams comb through thousands of suspect accounts. However, IS/Daesh employs automated accounts also referred to as bots, such as “The Dawn of Glad Tidings”, to mass-produce extremist rhetoric. It is possible for these automated accounts to sometimes be caught with web tools used to fight spam. While Twitter and other technology companies are policing content promoting violent extremism, it is only recently that they have been willing to discuss the details of their policies and procedures.

It can be difficult to reconcile the complex and political nature of judgments in removing messages with the value of free speech and open debate. The procedure to remove content requires specialists to judge individual tweets and accounts, “including to what degree a message is euphoric, controversial or extremist”. Twitter has pushed back against the idea that online technology can invent a formula that automatically spots violent content online: “There is no magic algorithm for identifying terrorist content on the Internet… Global online platforms are forced to make challenging judgement calls based on very limited information and guidance” (Yadron 2016).

Western politicians apply pressure on technology firms to engage more actively in the fight against Islamic extremism. Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg has suggested that posting-anti-IS content on Facebook could to an extent stem IS/Daesh propaganda. In a meeting with US national security officials, Sandberg and other technology executives discussed using an algorithm to automatically flag extremist content. Google executives have discussed ideas to force IS/Daesh supporters and members out of the public Internet altogether (Yadron 2016).

175 Wars are affected to a great extent by who wins the propaganda battle for the “hearts and minds” of those involved. With its ‘new disseminators’ IS/Daesh has been prolific in this area, alongside fighters in Syria and Iraq, radicalised self-starting terrorists globally, and creators of Internet content such as ‘Message to America’ and other execution videos. Islamic State’s use of YouTube to launch its video of the beheading murder of James Foley was perhaps the most devastating social media post up to that point, in a conflict now regularly punctuated by videos and still images of torture and murder. The video was clearly edited and its high production values transformed Daesh’s credentials to that of a polished social media operator. Bartlett identifies “a counter-culture, anti- establishment sentiment that manifested itself in ‘jihadi cool’”; in which IS/Daesh sympathisers harnessed the “immediacy and reach of social media to ensure its image is instantly and globally recognisable… These are young men in their twenties who have grown up with all this stuff” (quoted in Townsend and Helm 2014).

Researchers at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation (ICSR) at King’s College London have tracked the extent to which the Syrian civil war and ensuing conflicts have been attracting foreign fighters. Over a period of 12 months, researchers at the ICSR analysed the social media profiles of 190 Western and European foreign fighters in the region. The majority were from the UK, many fighting for IS/Daesh. The ICSR also observed who was advising and instructing foreign fighters. The research team uncovered 18,223 unique users, those following foreign fighters and in turn those who were followed on Twitter, along with almost 15,000 tweets, 1,186 hashtags and 1,969 web links. Prolific Tweeters such as ‘Balochi’ were classified as disseminators or individuals who although not officially linked to a terrorist organisation were nonetheless influential in spreading support for foreign fighters, as well as helping to recruit them. By August 2014, almost 3,000 European or Western foreign fighters were believed to have travelled to the northern areas of Syria and Iraq. Balochi shared thoughts with his 2,690 followers on Twitter. Sent from Pakistan but written in English, his messages on “the US genocide of Muslims” referenced former al-Qa’ida leader bin Laden. The ICSR considers the disseminators as crucial to the mood and morale of foreign IS/Daesh fighters who rely on Twitter feeds for an overview of the jihad, to know what is going on elsewhere, to learn the mood back home, to be made aware of the distribution of real-time battles in the region, and to celebrate the passing of their ‘brothers’ into martyrdom (Townsend and Helm 2014).

176

Director of the ICSR Peter Neumann notes that a “really novel thing about this conflict is the role of social media, the recruitment of foreign fighters” (quoted by Townsend and Helm 2014), adding that the disseminators themselves are not necessarily located in Iraq or Syria, but have appointed themselves as an official spokesman of IS/Daesh. The two most popular sites used by disseminators have been Twitter and a Latvian-based site Ask.FM, where users anonymously direct questions at one another. A current jihadi based in Syria or Iraq would intermittently appear on these sites, allowing potential fighters to ask questions, from what should they pack to what the weather is like. One of the most influential Twitter posters for foreign fighters was Shami Witness, a social media user whose popularity grew in tandem with the territorial expansion of Islamic State, an increase according to some experts that coincided with his evolution from anti- Assad activist in the Syrian civil war to vocal supporter of IS/Daesh. Neumann claims that this political evolution has implications for Western security: “You might have a wannabe foreign fighter sitting at home in Portsmouth and he can simply reach out to Shami Witness. He plays a role linking wannabes with foreign fighters” (Townsend and Helm 2014).

This ease of recruitment presents authorities with a moral as well as social and political dilemma, as aside from closing down social networks altogether they are restricted in preventing social networks from acting as conduits to extremism. A fundamental virtue of social media is its ability to spread information so quickly and seemingly so irretrievably that within moments of the James Foley execution video, say, being uploaded it was simply too late to take it down. IS/Daesh would have known attempts would be made to delete it, but also that such attempts would be futile. In London’s New Scotland Yard, the headquarters of the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS), the response was a prompt but blunt warning that anyone posting links to the video could be breaking the law by spreading extremist material. It is unclear how many people, if any, were ever found guilty of a criminal offence in relation to linking to the Foley video. In a typical week the Metropolitan Police Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit (CTIRU), which assesses violent extremist material online, removes around 1,100 pieces of content assessed to breach terror legislation; they do this by contacting the relevant Internet hosting company. Of this content around 800 pieces are related to the conflicts in Syria and Iraq. Twitter blocked dozens of IS/Daesh-related accounts following the

177 Foley video release, but in most cases individuals whose accounts were suspended quickly reappeared elsewhere, or new accounts were opened on smaller social networks with posts taken up and used by others to feed Twitter content (Townsend and Helm 2014).

A cursory sweep across Twitter exposes layers of foreign fighters, friends, supporters and pretenders. It is understandable that the police want to close them down and arrest those responsible; however, this can be in conflict with the intelligence services who are more interested in keeping them in play, tracking their followers and better understanding their networks. A 2012 report by the Bipartisan Policy Center, a Washington-based political think tank co-chaired by the former chairs of the US 9/11 commission Thomas Kean and Lee Hamilton, argues against the removal or censorship of such material on the Internet, so as to allow intelligence agencies to effectively follow the flow of information between violent extremists (Kean and Hamilton 2012).

The ICSR compiled a database tracking 70 Western women, just under half of whom were UK citizens, who had settled inside Islamic State territory and whose posts on social media illustrated daily life inside the Syrian city of Raqqa, the caliphate’s self- proclaimed capital. These accounts revealed how dozens of women are mourning dead husbands lost in battle. They also serve to expose inaugural fault lines of dissent that Western intelligence feels must be exploited if the caliphate is to be effectively dismantled (Townsend and Helm 2014). Melanie Smith, an ISCR Research Fellow, notes, “There’s been some grumblings recently. Some of the British women have been complaining because it’s the depths of winter and there’s no electricity. The water’s been so cold they can’t do their washing and their kids are getting sick.” Shiraz Maher, senior fellow at the ICSR, orchestrated discussions with 50 foreign fighters in Syria primarily through Facebook and Twitter, and claims, “From an intelligence perspective, social media allows us to gauge their mood and gives opportunities to perhaps create or exploit dissent. Before social media you would have needed to have recruited spies” (Townsend 2015).

The shootings at the offices of Charlie Hebdo in Paris on 7 January 2015 prompted then UK Prime Minister David Cameron to propose giving UK intelligence services “the power to break the encrypted communications of suspected terrorists”. Cameron supported

178 the reintroduction of the ‘snoopers’ charter’, a draft communications data bill proposed by then UK Home Secretary Theresa May, which would have required Internet service providers (ISPs) and mobile phone companies to maintain records of users’ browsing activity, emails, phone calls and text messages (Townsend 2015).

However, Professor Neumann argues that blanket surveillance would not be effective without the skills to decode the information acquired by such surveillance powers. The ICSR has produced a valuable repository of online data, all from open sources, which the UK security services are keen to learn and to replicate. The ICSR however refuses to hand over data to the intelligence agencies, with Neumann adding that the databases were compiled using legal means without hacking or even using fake online profiles: “We are using information that is openly accessible to anyone who wants to look. Over the years we’ve become quite clever, but none of what we’re doing involves hacking and obviously we do not have special powers granted to us by the authorities.” Neumann, who is also a senior adviser on foreign fighters to the UN Security Council, advocates a more focussed approach to gathering intelligence rather than a reliance on mass surveillance techniques: “I feel, for example, the NSA [United States National Security Agency] collects everything but doesn’t often have the capacity to make sense of it. We have a much more limited amount of material, but we’re able to exploit that to maximum effect.” The centre has become so effective at penetrating networks of Western IS/Daesh recruits that Neumann believes that if he had a bigger team two years ago, they would have been able to “expose the identity of the British extremist linked to the deaths of six westerners”. The ICSR was adamant only that the media was wrong to rush to name Jihadi John as Londoner Abdel-Majed Abdel Bary. Supporting Neumann’s point, and as noted earlier in this chapter, Jihadi John’s identity was later revealed as Mohammed Emwazi. Following the online footprint of a jihadi is becoming increasingly difficult. With fewer IS/Daesh fighters overtly on social media than before, Neumann claims that, “The era of everyone talking freely has been tempered. They are more careful, while Facebook and Twitter are more proactive at taking material down – from both ends the information is getting a little bit narrower” (Townsend 2015).

Another observation of the Internet’s role in radicalisation explains that for participants in an Australian study into community and radicalisation, “the internet and a variety of social media sites were seen as dynamic, fluid spaces in which radicalisation as a social

179 process can be either reinforced or alternatively hampered by the way in which users of internet and social media shape and direct flows of information, opinion and perspective”. From a cultural and social position, the dynamics of the Internet and other new media revolve around inter-related themes including a broader perception that radicalisation and the Internet are both driven by social interactions and that such forums can play a significant role in incubating radicalisation, to the point where it blends into extremism and violence through forms of closed and immersive virtual community-building. For those involved in a study into community and radicalisation, the sophisticated format and presentation of contemporary extremist Internet content and messaging can easily disguise the crudeness of the content, and “many younger people in particular were not seen as being sufficiently critical or skilled to make this distinction”. Moreover, “the Internet was seen as a way of providing access to and platforms and followers for radical leaders who had been ostracised by moderate or mainstream communities who sought to minimise their interpersonal contact with communities more generally” (Tahiri and Grossman 2013, 95).

The Internet was regarded by most participants in the study as reinforcing existing views rather than creating new ones, and in this sense it was not considered an initial primary driver of radicalisation. However, the Internet was perceived as a critical facilitator in relation to making it simpler for the socially maladapted to be able to learn a sense of community, and to research about radicalisation and violent Islamic extremism privately and conveniently without having to interact face to face. This was a concern for those worried about rises in homegrown extremism, along with increased focuses by extremist groups on self-starting terrorists, “encouraging acts of terrorism on home soil rather than having to travel overseas for training or to participate in international conflicts and hot-spots” (Tahiri and Grossman 2013, 96).

The dominant view of government stakeholders and community leaders is that attempting to censor or control social media is futile, and that the attempt could be counter-productive by increasing the desirability of the restricted material, and endangering rights and freedoms, as acknowledged in chapter 2 discussing human rights in a counterterrorism context. Participants in the Australian study holding the view that limits on rights in the name of increased security are an unacceptable trade-off tended to place high value on democratic freedoms and were wary of giving too much power to

180 the government, “citing China or other non-democratic states’ tight control of the internet as a negative example”. A minority of participants felt that some form of “surveillance, moderation or control of the internet was needed to counter or limit radicalisation and extremism, and that government should play an active role in exploring and implementing such options”. In this view, the “value of democratic rights and freedom of expression was … counter-balanced by the need to protect communities from external and internal threats to safety” (Tahiri and Grossman 2013, 94 and 97).

In a 2015 Security Weekly report for Stratfor Global Intelligence, Stewart focuses on threats by grassroots jihadists, “practicing the leaderless resistance model of terrorism” to threaten the West. In An Online University of Terrorism, he attempted to place the threat into an appropriate perspective. Self-starting terrorism is now the most likely type of terrorist event, especially in countries such as Australia. However, grassroots operatives are often quite limited in their terrorist tradecraft; Stewart states that, “it is a rare individual who is capable of pulling off a spectacular terrorist attack alone” (Stewart 2015). Because of this, jihadist inspirers have urged grassroots terrorists in the West to focus on “conducting simple attacks within their capabilities rather than more complex attacks”. For example, Al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) instructed jihadists to “build a bomb in the kitchen of your mom”, and IS/Daesh urged self-starting terrorists to conduct attacks with rocks, knives, cars, their hands or poison.

This latter example of inspiring self-starting attacks is particularly noticeable in Rumiyah. In its first issue an article entitled “The Kafir’s Blood is Halal for You. So Shed It” is devoted to a call to arms by localised Western supporters of Islamic terrorism in the Dar al-Kufr (lands of the unbelievers):

Muslims currently living in Dar al-Kufr must be reminded that the blood of the disbelievers is halal, and killing them is a form of worship to Allah, the Lord, King, and God of mankind. This includes the businessman riding to work in a taxicab, the young adults (post-pubescent “children”) engaged in sports activities in the park, and the old man waiting in line to buy a sandwich. Indeed, even the blood of the kafir street vendor selling flowers to those passing by is halal to shed – and striking terror into the hearts of all disbelievers is a Muslim’s duty (Rumiyah 2016, 36).

Limitations in terrorism tradecraft could lead to the rise of more homegrown cells, leveraging the talents of more than one person in planning and executing terrorist

181 attacks. Stewart baulks at this point, noting, “even then, most grassroots cells still lack the type of sophisticated terrorist tradecraft that would enable them to conduct a truly spectacular attack”. However, as the history of IS/Daesh suggests, jihadis are early adopters of technology, and the West should note that IS/Daesh supporters have used technology to address the problem of training and equipping grassroots cells and solo assailants, an unfortunate product of the Internet’s social reach. Terrorist organisations such as AQAP attempt to surmount these skills gaps, or what Stewart calls tradecraft dilemmas, by publishing pictorial guides for making different bombs and bomb components. A regular feature of Inspire, “Open Source Jihad”, disseminates step-by- step instructions, which have been linked to a number of plots and attacks both thwarted and successful in their execution, including the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing (Stewart 2015).

The massive global increase in communications technology gives rise to what Stewart calls an “online university of jihad”. Stewart believes that terrorists will begin using these same tools to teach their followers on the dark web, creating places where “master terrorists can meet and instruct grassroots terrorists over heavily encrypted videoconference lines”, similar to the tutorial articles in Inspire Magazine, but “live and interactive” (Stewart 2015). This power and opportunity provided by the Internet for possible future terrorist incidents and threats illustrates one example of a necessity for developing and extending the concept of cumulative extremism to inform the study of and any debates on apportioning responsibility for post-9/11 Islamic terrorism.

Conclusion This chapter has discussed individuals who became terrorists after their views were formed, incubated or enhanced via various social media formats over the Internet. It has discussed victims and the terrorists who have followed through from radicalising to Islamic extremism on to active engagement in terrorist acts. The impact of social media on incidents of Islamic terrorism since 9/11 greatly supports a need to expand the concept of cumulative extremism beyond the original 2006 formulation by Roger Eatwell, in order to account for wider cultural, social and political factors as shaping the nature and outcomes of extremist interactions. Radicalisation to support and commit Islamic terrorism has increased massively and perhaps irreversibly via the Internet. Case

182 studies highlight the flexibility and logistic immediacy for disseminating and receiving terrorist propaganda, inspiration and training over the Internet. IS/Daesh has used social media and Internet applications with deadly efficiency, providing opportunities to those operating globally to avoid capture, to radicalise and to recruit with a new and dangerous efficacy. This effective use of wider social phenomena must be brought into any future understanding of cumulative extremism, and has a place in any discussions aimed to inform debates and contribute to academic knowledge on possible apportioning of responsibility for post-9/11 Islamic terrorism.

The Internet’s massive communications networks bring many responsibilities. Removal and/or censorship of digital content is often problematic if not impossible, as it relates to issues concerning morality, ethics and human rights, themes expanded on in earlier chapters, as well as free speech, a concept which although very valid generally extends beyond the scope of this thesis. To fight this continuing conflict, the so-called ‘war on terror’ needs governments and communities worldwide to engage in more than just military exercises and conventional battles. Soft power, conflicts of ideas, and evolving efforts to oppose social, religious and cultural injustice, prejudice and ignorance should be included in efforts to counter post-9/11 Islamic terrorism. With the Internet and social media acting as a cyber-battlefield, a global fight against groups like IS/Daesh, al- Qa’ida and their associates should include a continuous struggle to win the hearts and minds of those at risk of radicalising, despite the difficulties in maintaining the freedoms of the Internet and its growing interconnection of shared information and ideas. It is Islam, both via global support and when it is seen existentially as a region, “where the struggle for hearts and minds must be waged and won if the struggle against terrorism is to succeed. The front line in the struggle is not in Afghanistan. It is in the Islamic states where modernizing governments are threatened by a traditionalist backlash” (Howard 2002, 13).

183 CONCLUSION

At its simplest, this thesis argues for the concept of cumulative extremism to be expanded beyond Roger Eatwell’s 2006 formulation, which was limited in scope to upward spirals of violence from extremist interactions, between movements and countermovements. A developed view of CE includes more complex phenomena such as wider cultural, social and political impacts from popular media and society, essentially non-violent aspects of politics, policies and publicity that have an impact our society via post-9/11 terrorism and its countermovements. To go beyond the purely political, and to include social and cultural constructs in informing debates on apportioning responsibility for post-9/11 Islamic terrorism may at first appear a form of as appeasement. Those responsible for the planning and hijacking of the planes on 9/11 were correctly identified as acting on behalf of al-Qa’ida and its leader at the time, Osama bin Laden. Those responsible for protecting and providing training for Islamic terrorists were also identified, attacked and driven from power in Afghanistan. However, the battle against terrorism continues more than 17 years later.

Unforeseen circumstances following the initial US and allied responses to 9/11 have resulted in the insecurity of civil war across the Middle East, bringing regime change, population displacement and massive refugee flows, mostly within the region but to a lesser extent globally. A power vacuum following the US withdrawal from Iraq heralded a new wave of even more brutal and public terrorist attacks, with IS/Daesh in plain sight declaring its Islamic State caliphate in parts of Syria and Iraq, and calling on Muslims worldwide to commit to violent jihad against enemies to the IS/Daesh ideology and mission. In short the terrorists of IS/Daesh, al-Qa’ida and their associates are responsible for rises in Islamic terrorism, but no one is winning this so-called war and perhaps the whole situation needs reappraisal, something that an expansion of the CE concept could provide some clarity to do.

This thesis argues strongly that there are layers of responsibility for continuing post-9/11 Islamic terrorism. Arguably the primary responsibility currently belongs to Abu Bakr al- Baghdadi, the Islamic State movement, and its members, associates and supporters across the world. Al-Qa’ida remains a serious threat in its various and franchised forms in many parts of the world, with many splinter groups pledging allegiance to the core,

184 and joining an international and violent jihad against the West. New frontiers and organisations for Islamic terrorism have formed in parts of the Middle East, Africa, Asia and South-East Asia, and self-starting terrorists across the world are being radicalised and supported by proscribed Islamic terrorist groups and individuals. Terrorist attacks globally indicate that these calls are being heard by marginalised and disaffected Muslims and being acted on, often evading timely detection by intelligence agencies.

However, this thesis favours arguments that terrorism does not bear all of the responsibility for the insecurity on which it thrives. The post-9/11 US and allied political rhetoric of a so-called ‘war on terror’, and the accompanying foreign policies have led to abnegations of moral authority by US-led programs of torture and assassinations, even extrajudicial killings. Further, the mainstream news media’s overtly sensationalist publicity of and commentary on post-9/11 Islamic terrorism, and of the international and domestic instruments that seek to tackle it, have increased extremism on both sides, uncovering a wider shared responsibility. Western states bear greater responsibility here than is usually conceded, not just through foreign policies in the Middle East, but via their willing engagement with the terrorists in a developed cumulative extremism on a number of levels. The actions of US governments and its allies since 9/11, and their continuing legal impunity, continue to inform our counterterrorism policies.

This thesis introduces an apparent willingness by the US to suspend or reconfigure its moral position against post-9/11 Islamic terrorism, and questions popular media analyses to better clarify terrorism’s power. It discusses how social perceptions can be manipulated via the Internet and social media, noting how the Internet effectively allows anyone with a smartphone and a computer to become producer, publisher and disseminator of “news content” and preacher of extremism or counter-extremism.

State and social behaviour collides with international law, human rights, and our moral and ethical principles, where societies can be encouraged by their own executives to suspend a moral authority in the name of increased security. It has meant being prepared to partition commitments to human rights, and accept policies that regardless of any proven efficacy have been shown to issue in torture and armed drone strikes on innocent civilians in the so-called ‘war on terror’. To continue these policies risks

185 blowback and further terrorist recruitment where since 9/11 we have been already called upon to maintain heightened political and social vigilance in what appears to be an open-ended conflict.

A continuation of the work in this thesis could seek to inform debates exploring alternative measures available as effective engagements against post-9/11 Islamic terrorism. Questions exist over whether current UN instruments could be improved to produce better results for peace and security. Research could extend to examine increased inclusion of aid and education schemes through Hearts and Minds operations at international and community levels, becoming examples of cooperation with mainstream Islam rather than conflict in striving for the best ways to fight or disrupt violent extremism, noting however, that Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) programs that prescribe moderate versions of Islam arguably end up as catalysts for radicalisation. Perceptions of interrogational torture and drone programs should be subject to universal challenges, even if their use is excused. The use of torture and drones should be met with both moral and legal questions as well as questioning whether the programs slow or stop Islamic radicalisation and terrorism, particularly with regard to principles of proportionality.

The politics inherent in debates on how to fight post-9/11 Islamic terrorism are blurred to an increasing extent in the US, where despite his election promises, President Obama failed to close the controversial US detention facility at Guantánamo Bay, and Donald Trump ran his presidential campaign with discriminatory rhetoric and blatant attempts to marginalise Muslim communities.

The politics, policies and publicity in the fight against post-9/11 Islamic terrorism should be continually reassessed to help reduce or prevent radicalisation and increase efficacy in addressing terrorism’s causes. Debates on how international law and our understandings of morality have adapted as we are challenged by violent extremism, new counterterrorism policies, media output and evolving risks to our security need to be developed further, and expanding the concept of cumulative extremism is an important part of these developments. Many of the current counterterrorism processes are at odds with human rights goals, allowing morality to be questioned without a balanced utilitarian focus on how to best protect society against future incidents of

186 terrorism. Through engaging with questions on how society’s morality has been adapted such that it accepts costs to its traditional authority, this thesis assembles a broad variety of conversations on post-9/11 Islamic terrorism, policy and society. These intertwined conversations are designed to become part of a global narrative that can successfully reflect important human rights and security positions in the 21st century.

Cumulative extremism, beyond its initial formulation as explained by Eatwell in 2006, has been shown throughout this thesis to be a concept that can benefit critical terrorism research to better inform academic debates on issues surrounding post-9/11 Islamic terrorism and its US-led responses. Through an expanded understanding and development of the CE concept to include wider cultural, social and political phenomena as impacting on extremist interactions, the developed view helps to explain continuing evolution of terrorist trends and apparent rises in Islamic radicalisation and perceived increases in threats from Islamic terrorism.

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