UC Berkeley UC Berkeley Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title States and Terrorist Groups that Collaborate: Strong Bonds, Sensitive Transfers and the Issue of Control Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/5fn3z0jp Author Klein, Robyn W. Publication Date 2011 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California States and Terrorist Groups that Collaborate: Strong Bonds, Sensitive Transfers and the Issue of Control By Robyn W. Klein A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science in the Graduate Division of the University of California, Berkeley Committee in charge: Professor Steven Weber, Chair Professor Ron Hassner Professor Neil Fligstein Spring 2011 ! Abstract States and Terrorist Groups that Collaborate: Strong Bonds, Sensitive Transfers and the Issue of Control by Robyn W. Klein Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science University of California, Berkeley Professor Steven Weber, Chair Cooperative relationships between states and terrorist groups have remained a constant source of concern for policymakers since the 1970s, but especially over recent years as the potential for high consequence transfers of state support to terrorists emerged as a primary focus of attention and a justification for war. Strangely though, despite their prominent place on the international political landscape, little real understanding exists about these relationships or state decision-making regarding allocations of support. Using documents captured in Afghanistan and Iraq since 2001, interviews, and other historical evidence, this dissertation addresses this significant gap in knowledge, providing important new understanding of the dynamics that shape state relationships with, and resource transfers to, terrorist groups. The simple yet powerful insight this dissertation research uncovers is that the quality of support states are willing to provide to terrorist groups increases as the degree of control that states maintain over terrorist groups—or in rare cases, that terrorist groups maintain over states—increases. For states, control is the mechanism that narrows the gap between how a state wants a terrorist group to behave and what the terrorist group actually does. Control, however, is not inherent, cheap, or easy for states to acquire. This means that states face critical trade-offs when deciding how much control to seek. By highlighting those trade-offs and the key variables that cause control to rise and fall, this study provides an important new window into the often opaque relationships between these actors and states’ calculus for allocating different levels of support to individual terrorist groups. This research fills an important gap in the scholarly literature. It also holds enormous practical value for national security analysts and policymakers. Rather than treat cooperative relationships between states and terrorist groups in either a sui generis or homogeneous fashion, it creates a theoretical framework that can be used to parse the actual threat posed by specific relationships, including by identifying some of the circumstances that could produce high consequence state transfers of support. In addition, these findings suggest a number of principles that can be employed to enhance the effectiveness of international efforts to diminish the threat of high consequence terrorism. 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter One: Introduction 1 Chapter Two: Towards a Theoretical Synthesis 11 Chapter Three: Iran’s Relationships with Terrorist Groups 40 Chapter Four: Pakistan’s Relationships with Terrorist Groups 72 Chapter Five: Conclusions and Policy Recommendations 97 Bibliography 108 i CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION Following the deadly terrorist strikes on September 11, 2001, attention increasingly focused on the possibility that international terrorist groups with the support of a sympathetic state could produce even more spectacular terror attacks in the future, including attacks involving advanced chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear (CBRN) weapons. In his 2002 State of the Union address, U.S. President George W. Bush made his view of the primacy of this threat clear, stating that, by seeking CBRN weapons of mass destruction (WMD), regimes in states such as Iraq, Iran, and North Korea “pose a grave and growing danger. They could provide these arms to terrorists, giving them the means to match their hatred.”1 Perhaps thankfully, no credible evidence has emerged over these decades suggesting that any state has provided CBRN WMD support to a terrorist group. The potential for states to become a pathway for terrorists’ acquisition of such advanced tools of warfare certainly remains a significant concern for national security practitioners, however. The key question then is, under what conditions would a state willingly provide a terrorist group with sensitive technology transfers? This study seeks to develop new insight on this important question, approaching this as a problem in strategic decision-making that confronts the state. The puzzle at the core of this research is the variation in the quality of support individual states provide to different terrorist groups. To illustrate, Iran has cultivated relationships with numerous terrorist groups since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, including the Lebanese Hizballah, Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ). These three groups, which represent the most consistent recipients of Iranian support over past decades, each share Iran’s desire to eliminate the State of Israel, diminish Western influence in the Middle East, and generally speaking, establish governments across the region ruled according to shari’ah (Islamic law). Hizballah and PIJ also were born embracing Khomeinism and the notion that Iran is the rightful leader of the international Islamist movement, even though members of PIJ are from the Sunni Islamic denomination while Hizballah, like Iran, is comprised mainly of Shi’a Muslims.2 Yet despite these similarities, the quality of support Iran has provided to these groups is not equal. Iran, for instance, has provided a full spectrum of support to Hizballah, including massive funding and logistical support, high- tech training, and a variety of weaponry and other equipment, including sensitive advanced technologies. Iran’s transfer of its technically advanced Ababil model unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) by 2004, in fact, has contributed to Hizballah’s emergence as the most well armed terrorist organization on the planet. However, neither PIJ nor Hamas has received the same range of support as Hizballah, although Hamas’s support has been growing in important respects in recent years, whereas PIJ’s has not. Given then that Iran seems to share a set of broad goals with these groups, this study seeks to understand what explains Iran’s different approach to them, particularly the variation in its policies regarding allocating support from one group to the next. Why, for example, has Iran’s support for Hizballah remained consistent and increasing in quality over the years, while its support for Hamas and PIJ has fluctuated in important respects, even becoming conditioned on 1 President George W. Bush, State of the Union Address, 29 January 2002. 2 The two major sects in Islam—the Sunni and Shi’a—differ in various respects, but perhaps most importantly in their historic view of who serves as the rightful leader of Islam. 1 outcome performance at some junctures? Furthermore, why is Iran willing to provide sensitive technology to Hizballah, especially considering this type of transfer to terrorist groups has been extremely rare historically? This study shows that gaining traction on these issues requires exploration of a distinct unit of analysis that has received little systematic attention to date: the relationship between a state and a terrorist group it supports. Indeed, I use the analytical lens offered by principal-agent theory to unlock the “black box” of these relationships and to reveal the complex dynamics that shape them and ultimately influence state decision-making regarding its allocations of support. In fact, this research shows that these relationships share many of the fundamental features found in licit relationships involving a principal and an agent. These include the challenges that states, the principals in this study, face when delegating to terrorist groups, their agents, and the strategies states may employ in an effort to enhance their control and minimize agency costs, meaning the losses arising when terrorists pursue their own goals and interests rather than those of a state supporter. The simple yet powerful insight that emerges from this research is that the degree of control states exercise over terrorist groups—or in rare cases, that terrorist groups exercise over states—is an important influence on state decision-making regarding the quality of support to provide. Control refers to the ability to direct or influence, and in this study is understood as the mechanism that narrows the gap between how a state wants a terrorist group to behave and what the terrorist group actually does. In turn, by demonstrating how control varies predictably according to certain identifiable factors, this research provides an important new window into these often-opaque relationships and states’ calculus for allocating support. Besides filling an important gap in the international security studies literature, these findings hold