AS VIOLENCE SPREADS, IS U.S. NEXT?

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000303060003-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 22, 2010
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: September 14, 1981
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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ARTICLE
ON PAGE
APPEARED U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT
3__ Z - 14 September 1981
Interview With Brian Jenkins, Expert on Terrorism
s Violence
spreads, Is
U.S. Next?
This country seems to enjoy rare immunity
from the kind of terrorism that plagues
Europe, the Mideast, Latin America.
But a leading authority now sees new
trends that could change the picture.
Q Mr. Jenkins, is terrorism worldwide increasing or declining?
A It's growing. I can say that with confidence. At the
Rand Corporation, we maintain a chronology of internation-
al terrorism that goes back to 1968. There are peaks and val-
leys, but the overall trajectory from 1968 through 1980 is up.
Our findings coincide with the separate chronologies main-
tained by the CIA and other intelligence organizations.
Terrorism also is becoming more violent in the sense that
there is a greater willingness on the part of the terrorist to
kill-perhaps also a greater willingness to be killed. Our sta-
tistics at Rand show that in 1970 more than one person was
killed in only 4.8 percent of all terrorist incidents. With a few
minor dips, that figure has gone up steadily and reached 10.3
percent in 1979. It was close to that level in 1980.
Q How do you explain the apparent immunity of the United
States from the kind of terrorism that is widespread elsewhere?
A The perception that we have been relatively immune
to terrorism in this country is not entirely accurate. If we
look at the countries that have suffered most from terror-
ism over the past 10 years, we find the United States in the
top 10 in terms of the number of terrorist incidents.
One reason why we tend not to notice this is that the vast
majority of politically motivated terrorist activity in this
country is directed at property, not people. If we were to
count only incidents with victims, we would drop down
somewhat. Still, we've had approximately 80 politically mo-
tivated killings in this country in the past decade-for exam-
ple, people assassinated by right-wing Cuban groups or
killed in bomb blasts by Puerto Rican separatists. Another
reason for the perception of relatively little terrorism is that
we have had few terrorist spectaculars. Finally, we tend not
to notice terrorist violence because it is overwhelmed by the
volume of ordinary violent crime in this country. When you
have about 20,000 criminal homicides in a year, it's awfully
hard to notice 80 political murders in a decade.
Q But why Is there so little of the sustained, organized terror-
ism that plagues Spain, France, Italy and other countries?
A We lack the basis for it. Ideological or ethnic conflict is
Jenkins, '39,w rs director of the
Rand ' Corporation program on
.political violence..He joined the
California think'tank'in'1968,af
ter ._ serving in the ,, U.S. Army
Special Forces4n the Domini 'a
zcan Republic and Vietnam.
CONT ED
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the engine that drives the sustained levels of terrorism in the
European countries. The United States, to be sure, has nu-
merous ethnic minorities. But we don't have geographic
concentrations of ethnic minorities with their own unique
history and territorial demands.
We have no equivalent of the Basque provinces, Brittany,
Sardinia or Corsica-with a single exception: Puerto Rico.
And it's noteworthy that Puerto Rican separatism is the most
persistent source of political violence in this country and
probably our biggest terrorist problem right now.
Similarly, the United States has escaped the major ideolog-
ical contests that divided many European and Asian coun-
tries in the 20th century. Marxism or fascism-indeed,
ideology of any kind-has never really taken root in the
United States. We just don't have ideological divisions,
which are an important factor behind terrorism elsewhere.
Q Why haven't protest groups like the Weather Underground
or Black Panthers survived as terrorist movements?
A Some credit is owed to the American political system,
which has an enormous co-optive capacity. I mean that in
the best sense of the word. It can incorporate an enormous
diversity within its political parties and still preserve the co-
hesiveness of the political system.
Look at the history of protest movements in America-the
Wobblies of the Industrial Workers of the World at the turn
of the century, the Black Panthers and Black Liberation
Army of the civil-rights movement, the various anti-Viet-
nam War groups. You find that the political system co-opted
the grievances of the broader movement and, in many cases,
co-opted the best of their leaders. This means that the politi-
cal system robbed the terrorists of a constituency.
Q Does this mean that the danger of a major outbreak of
terrorism In this country In the future can be ruled out?
A No, because some fundamental changes may be taking
place in American society in the long run that would imper-
il that co-optive capacity. Some of those engines of terror-
ism that didn't exist here in the past could emerge. One
would be a major shift in people's perception of the
economy.
Q How could that give rise to terrorism?
A It has always been a part of American lore that wealth
is virtually unlimited. If not enough people have a big
enough slice of the pie, the solution is to make the pie
bigger. We could have strong ideological divisions if people
instead perceived that the pie is finite-that if one person
gets a bigger slice, another gets a smaller slice.
Bitter fights could erupt over how to divide the pie, and
that could lead to ideological conflict and potentially to
violence. There is a second phenomenon that could provide
an engine for terrorism. That is the atomization of Ameri-
can politics.
Q What do you mean by that?
A I'm talking about single-issue
politics as contrasted to an overall
anticapitalist or nihilist philosophy,
for example. Whatever the focus-
nuclear power, antinuclear power;
for the dam, against the dam; envi-
ronmentalists versus developers;
right to life versus the right of
choice-single-issue politics tend to
rob the system of its enormous co-
optive capacity.
Already we've seen some willing-
ness among some single-issue move-
ments to break the law, although so
far not to the extent of doing serious
violence to either people or proper-
ty. I wouldn't put their actions in
Terrorism
the realm of terrorist violence, however. That would be a
gross exaggeration.
Q So, it's a big leap from the kind of protests that single-
issue groups have staged in the U.S. to the large-scale terrorism
occurring elsewhere in the world-
A It's a breathtaking leap if you compare what the vari-
ous "cause people" in this country have done or contem-
plated with the terrorism practiced by the Red Brigades in
Europe. However, the leap is not so breathtaking if you
realize that most terrorism in the world consists primarily
of what terrorists call "armed propaganda"-token acts of
violence, little bombs detonated more for publicity than
destruction.
Also, you should realize that terrorists rarely enlist or
represent large portions of the population. At its peak, West
Germany's Baader-Meinhof gang had perhaps 50 to 60
members. The Japanese Red Army, for all the troubles it
has caused the world, has between 30 and 40 activists.
We're talking about very small numbers.
Q Why haven't International terrorist groups staged spectac-
ular Incidents In this country as they have done in so many other
countries-such as the raid on the Olympic Village In Munich?
A The fact is, Americans abroad are the most prominent
targets of terrorism. American citizens or facilities are in-
volved in about a third of all of the episodes that take place
internationally. Why not in the United States? Geographic
convenience is part of the answer. It's simple for German
terrorists to cross the border into Austria when the heat is
on in Germany. But it's quite another matter to go all the
way over to the United States. There also are bureaucratic
obstacles. Visas are needed to enter the United States but
not to cross most borders in Western Europe.
Familiarity is another factor. Palestinian terrorists and
others connected with them operate in Europe because
many of their members went to school there and they are
familiar with European cities and the population. For ex-
ample, there are comparatively large groups of Arabs in
Europe, some of whom provide support and also a kind of
concealment for Palestinian terrorists. The same is true for
Turks and Armenians. Finally, many terrorists have a dif-
ferent attitude toward the United States from that toward
That Strikes...
Worldwide Number of
Terrorist Incidents
other countries.
Q In what sense?
A Even though they may be anti-
American in their rhetoric and see
Americans as the source of most of the
evil in the world, some terrorist
groups-particularly the Palestinians?
seem also to believe that this country is
able to solve the world's problems.
They believe that we actually have
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r
Antiwar protesters in U.S. did not become terrorists because
"political system co-opted grievances, best of their leaders."
the power to solve the very problems they accuse us of caus-
ing. So they seek to influence this country and, therefore, re-
frain from actions that would anger Americans at home.
Q Mr. Jenkins, how deeply is the Soviet Union involved in
promoting international terrorism?
A The Soviet Union openly supports what it calls "na-
tional liberation movements--groups it views as fighting
against colonialism and foreign interference. Historically,
this means any group that happens to fit Soviet interests in
a given area at a given time. Generally, these have been
Marxist guerrilla groups fighting Western-oriented govern-
ments in the Third World.
Some of these groups routinely employ terrorist tactics.
Soviet allies-Cuba and Libya, for example-provide sup-
port to an even wider range of guerrilla and terrorist
groups. And some of the recipients of this support-like the
Palestinians-provide support to many of the terrorist
groups active in Western Europe.
But there's no convincing evidence that the Soviet Union
created any of these terrorist groups. They are indigenous
growths, and Soviet support or exploitation doesn't imply
Soviet orchestration, central direction, master plans or blue-
prints. People get themselves all wound up developing elab-
orate conspiracy theories. To me, that's a futile exercise.
Q What about the effectiveness of terrorists in achieving
their aims? Are they more-or less --successful today than they
were in the early '70s?
A Their ability to coerce governments certainly has de-
clined. Governments have adopted much firmer attitudes.
They've come to realize that if they continued to yield to
terrorism, they would indirectly be governed by terrorists.
The impact of terrorists also has declined in terms of the
publicity they can achieve. Continuing media coverage acts
like inflation; it reduces the value of the currency. Repeti-
tion decreases the novelty and news value of terrorist inci-
dents. The first hijacking is page-one news. After 87
hijackings, people tend to ignore them.
There are exceptions. A major hostage event-such as
the kidnapping of Aldo Moro in Italy or the seizure of the
American Embassy in Iran-still has a major impact on
governments and the public. It forces governments to con-
centrate their attention on the crisis and induces a degree
of paralysis as far as the rest of. government business is
concerned. But, generally speaking, terrorism is bringing
diminishing returns, and this may generate pressure within
terrorist groups to escalate their violence.
Q Are we approaching the time when terrorists may escalate
to using nuclear weapons or threats of germ warfare?
A That gets us into the toughest questions of all, because
the answer requires a better understanding of the terrorist
mind-set and decision-making process than we have now.
What goes on inside the heads of the terrorists individually?
And, collectively, how do they decide to do what they do?
Q You mean the possible use of nuclear weapons is a behav-
ioral question, not a technical or strategic question?
A In part it is. Without exaggerating the ease with which
terrorists may fabricate a chemical or a biological weapon,
or even a crude nuclear device, the constraints are not
entirely technical; there are also self-imposed constraints
even for terrorists.
Q What are those constraints?
A I can tell you what I think they are. First, terrorists
aren't bent on killing a lot of people. Terrorists want a lot of
people watching, not a lot of people dead. Second, killing a
lot of people could alienate people they perceive as constit-
uents. The terrorists may, in fact, have no constituents, but
they perceive themselves as having many.
Third, such an act could provoke public revulsion. You
don't poison the city water supply in the name of the
popular front and expect to remain the popular front for
very long. Fourth, terrorists may fear unleashing an un-
precedented government crackdown.
For these reasons, any suggestion of an operation involv-
ing mass killing is likely to provoke dissension within the
ranks of the terrorists and thus expose the operation and
the organization to betrayal. Terrorist operations must have
a certain consensus behind them. To stay together as a
cohesive unit and live a close life underground, terrorist
groups must generally agree on what to do. That imposes a
degree of conservatism.
Q On the basis of all the experience we've had with terrorism
over the past decade, have any clear-cut answers emerged?
A In my view, there isn't a solution as such to terrorism
in our Western democracies. The kinds of measures that
would be required to end or eradicate terrorism are all too
visible in the totalitarian states. There, the government
exercises absolute control over the news media and every-
thing else-weapons, movement, people, what people
watch, listen, hear, do. It's so thorough that they don't have
the kind of problem with little groups that we do.
Even if an incident were to occur in the Soviet Union,
the terrorists would have less leverage. Without saying
Soviets value human life less than we do, their primary
interest is in the collective rather than in individuals. The
lives of individual hostages would count for little.
We would have to look at the problem country by coun-
try. Strategies devised by Israel to counter terrorism do not
apply here. Similarly, our situation differs from that of the
European countries.
Q What should we be doing in the U.S. to counter the terror-
ist threat?
A That's primarily a police problem, and it's within the
capacity of our law-enforcement agencies to handle. But
there are questions about our domestic-intelligence capa-
bilities and about the continued capability of the political
system to absorb the forces that could generate terrorism.
One special danger that we should be thinking about is
what I call "extraordinary extortion events." These appear
to be increasing in the form of nuclear hoaxes, threats that
force the evacuation of hotels, and other threats of large-
scale destruction or disruption. This might escalate to the
point where a city would be held hostage.
In dealing with these, the President would be facing
issues similar to those he would face in a war or a natural
disaster-damage limitation, evacuation, social disruption
and rapid recovery.
Q So there's no simple remedy for terrorism?
A No. It's a lot more complex than simply saying, "Take
two aspirins and call me in the morning." ^
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