Wednesday, June 23, 2004
Terrorism Data
The last few days have seen extended discussion of the U. S. State Department's report on terrorism in 2003. The first version that came out showed an improvement in terms of the number of incidents and casualties. Now a corrected report shows that the number of significant incidents and the number wounded was much greater in 2003 than 2002, while the number of fatalities has gone down to 625. However, a closer reading of the information now available suggests that the report is not very meaningful. For example, anyone killed in Iraq or Afghanistan fighting the bad guys is not considered a victim of terrorism (even though the Bush Administration argues, and to some degree correctly, that large numbers of terrorists have now come to Iraq to fight us — thereby depleting, of course, their numbers elsewhere). Since the report is on "international terrorism", it ignores terrorism that is national in character. U.S. law prohibits including in the figures the killing of people by people who are citizens of the same country. Therefore, most of the terrorism in Chechnya is presumably not included. The terrorism of the Tamils in Sri Lanka should not on this basis have been included.
Seeing these statistics as significant derives in part from the mistaken idea of a generalized "war on terror". For America today, the important issue is the war against al-Qaida, understood as an extremely loosely organized movement directing its attacks against Americans, non-Muslims, or other perceived "enemies". Losses on both sides in this war should be regularly toted up. Saudis killed in Saudi Arabia as well as foreigners killed there by persons saying they are part of al-Qaida should be added to the totals. The persons killed in Spain in the recent attack on trains should be added. All those killed in Afghanistan on either side should be added somewhere to the terrorism statistics, while Iraq should be considered a separate issue for the time being, with none of the casualties there seen as terrorist. If a foreigner is killed by a suicide bomb in Israel it is regrettable, but events there should be considered those of another war regardless of the nationality of the victims. (Statistically, the Israeli-Palestine conflict a strange case, since suicide bombings are recorded but revenge attacks against the bombers are not.) Considering the wars in Chechnya and elsewhere in Russia and the former USSR should be added to the picture, although just how will be difficult to determine. Since it is in the interest of the Russians and the Central Asian governments to call all their enemies al-Qaida, getting the right totals will be difficult. All of this discussion shows the extreme difficulty of distinguishing guerilla war, reprisals, police actions, and terrorism in mixed situations.
The last few days have seen extended discussion of the U. S. State Department's report on terrorism in 2003. The first version that came out showed an improvement in terms of the number of incidents and casualties. Now a corrected report shows that the number of significant incidents and the number wounded was much greater in 2003 than 2002, while the number of fatalities has gone down to 625. However, a closer reading of the information now available suggests that the report is not very meaningful. For example, anyone killed in Iraq or Afghanistan fighting the bad guys is not considered a victim of terrorism (even though the Bush Administration argues, and to some degree correctly, that large numbers of terrorists have now come to Iraq to fight us — thereby depleting, of course, their numbers elsewhere). Since the report is on "international terrorism", it ignores terrorism that is national in character. U.S. law prohibits including in the figures the killing of people by people who are citizens of the same country. Therefore, most of the terrorism in Chechnya is presumably not included. The terrorism of the Tamils in Sri Lanka should not on this basis have been included.
Seeing these statistics as significant derives in part from the mistaken idea of a generalized "war on terror". For America today, the important issue is the war against al-Qaida, understood as an extremely loosely organized movement directing its attacks against Americans, non-Muslims, or other perceived "enemies". Losses on both sides in this war should be regularly toted up. Saudis killed in Saudi Arabia as well as foreigners killed there by persons saying they are part of al-Qaida should be added to the totals. The persons killed in Spain in the recent attack on trains should be added. All those killed in Afghanistan on either side should be added somewhere to the terrorism statistics, while Iraq should be considered a separate issue for the time being, with none of the casualties there seen as terrorist. If a foreigner is killed by a suicide bomb in Israel it is regrettable, but events there should be considered those of another war regardless of the nationality of the victims. (Statistically, the Israeli-Palestine conflict a strange case, since suicide bombings are recorded but revenge attacks against the bombers are not.) Considering the wars in Chechnya and elsewhere in Russia and the former USSR should be added to the picture, although just how will be difficult to determine. Since it is in the interest of the Russians and the Central Asian governments to call all their enemies al-Qaida, getting the right totals will be difficult. All of this discussion shows the extreme difficulty of distinguishing guerilla war, reprisals, police actions, and terrorism in mixed situations.
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