Published: 1 June 2008
Air & Space Power Journal - Summer 2008

What Terrorists Want: Understanding the Enemy, Containing the Threat by Louise Richardson. Random House Publishing Group (http://www.atrandom.com), 1745 Broadway, 18th Floor, New York, New York 10019, 2006, 336 pages, $25.95 (hardcover).

Amongst the hundreds of books about the nature of terrorism, its causes, and the motivations of terrorists, What Terrorists Want provides a unique and absorbing perspective on how these aspects interact and influence the United States’ challenges in the international-security environment. The book is a historically based survey of various terrorists, groups, and their motivations, including examples from nineteenth- and twentieth-century anarchists, Cold War–era nationalist and postcolonial movements, and the post-9/11 environment, laced with religious fervor and increasingly lethal means. The author, Dr. Louise Richardson of Harvard University, begins part 1 of What Terrorists Want with a well-organized and insightful analysis of individual terrorists and groups. Part 2, also effective and interesting, includes rather controversial recommendations on existing strategies and tactics that are working—and failing. All in all, this book is an engaging study that enables the reader to better consider policy options and assess shortcomings in the continuing and evolving global war on terror (GWOT).
Raised in the 1960s and 1970s in rural Ireland, the author describes the emotional appeal of Irish patriots along with the emotional dissonance created by British tactical and strategic missteps and blunders in attempting to defuse the often-violent Irish independence movement. Her technique lays the foundation for a sense of empathy (if not sympathy) for understanding why moderates and mainstream Catholics came to tacitly support or join the “activists’ ” cause, despite their methods. Dr. Richardson does an excellent job of conveying the logic of those who feel they have no choice other than standing up to perceived injustices perpetrated upon the persecuted, and she shows linkages between how they create, build, and maintain support from a wider community.

In part 1, Dr. Richardson extends her reflections and analysis to causes and trends in current transnational terrorism. She extracts her conclusions not only from her early experiences but also from her work in terrorist studies. In describing the dynamics of what motivates Islamic radicals (focusing on Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda), “revenge, renown, and reaction” emerge as driving forces that energize and perpetuate the use of terrorist techniques more generally. One of the unique insights of Dr. Richardson’s argument suggests that these groups, unable to defeat their enemies outright, derive maximum benefit by humiliating them. Humiliation has become a source of power and perpetuation for their cause by enabling them to attract new recruits, cause political concessions, and withstand violent and catastrophic losses to their infrastructure. In fact, she convincingly shows how using terrorist actions to provoke state actors into violent reactions helps accelerate and sustain these groups and their agendas.

Thus, Dr. Richardson seems to reassert a rather well-known or at least intuitive theory: state actions can often provide fuel to the terrorist fire. But she both enhances and extends the credibility of this common assertion—not by blaming the United States for 9/11 but by showing how suicide terror is part of a fabric of social conflict and resistance to perceived injustices of a merciless and overwhelming enemy. One question, where do the terrorists “get the social support they needed to sustain them?” (p. 134), marks the transition from part 1 to part 2 of What Terrorists Want, wherein she addresses counterterrorism, losing some momentum as she analyzes what has and has not changed in the nature of terrorism after 9/11. Some of her thoughts are controversial, including assertions that al-Qaeda does not have foreseeable, credible access or sufficient will to employ weapons of mass destruction. Also, she places less focus upon the inherent corruption and bankruptcy in some of the societies that provide the breeding ground for radicalized groups. Meanwhile, she spends a great deal of time discussing the hubris and self-serving agenda of American and other Western foreign policies.

However, Dr. Richardson finishes strongly by associating how and why these behaviors can create self-defeating results, undermining long-term success. As she states, “The urge to declare war in response to atrocity . . . is very understandable. I have argued, however, that it is also very unwise” (p. 199). Her recommended approach is to disrupt the cycle of “revenge, renown, and reaction” by starving-off and making irrelevant the leadership and vision provided by today’s Islamic radicals. This implies deemphasizing direct force, public displays of American pride, and overt support to certain friends and allies. Her concluding chapter makes a number of recommendations familiar to anyone who has read the National Strategy for Combating Terrorism (2003) or various Department of Defense counterinsurgency documents and counterterrorist doctrine. They include separating terrorists from their communities, knowing one’s enemy, setting achievable goals and establishing alliances, and cooperating in the international community.

Despite concluding with these generic and pedestrian policy recommendations, which one can question as idealistic or impracticable, What Terrorists Want is a timely, interesting, and useful read. Dr. Richardson’s style is direct and easy to synthesize. Her ability to bring personal experience into the story and to convey a sense of perspective from the radicals’ point of view makes this book work. It gives the reader a sense of how US strategy and behavior operate in the cycle of terrorist behavior. Although the author seems strident in her critique of US foreign policy at times, her provision of a framework for understanding how terrorists think and what they want will enhance any military officer’s comprehension of US effectiveness in the continuing GWOT.

Lt Col Chris Eisenbies, USAF
Air Force Fellow
University of Illinois–Champaign-Urbana

Disclaimer

The conclusions and opinions expressed in this document are those of the author cultivated in the freedom of expression, academic environment of Air University. They do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, the United States Air Force or the Air University.