SOS-440
Final Paper

According to Author Rex A. Hudson, “Terrorists are motivated not only by psychological factors but also very real political, social, religious, and economic factors, among others. These factors vary widely”. Accordingly, the motivations, goals, and ideologies of ethnic separatist, anarchist, social revolutionary, religious fundamentalist, and new religious terrorist groups differ significantly. (Hudson, 1999) Therefore, each terrorist group must be examined within its own cultural, economic, political, and social context in order to better understand the motivations of its individual members and leaders and their particular ideologies. (Federal Research Division, Library of Congress, 1999, para. 54) I will use Hudson’s assertion as my theoretical framework to analyze if my findings are compatible with a plausible assertion that terrorism is based off social and political views of the people who see their current state as unjust.

The National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional or ELN) is a revolutionary guerrilla army; who have fought in the Colombian Civil War since it began in 1964. The ELN advocate a composite Communist ideology of Marxism and Liberation Theology. The ELN was founded by Fabio Vásquez Castaño and other Colombian rebels trained in Communist Cuba; upon the Vásquez Castaño death, the ELN was headed by a series of Roman Catholic priests, exponents of Liberation Theology. (Brittain, 2010) Most notable was the Priest Camilo Torres Restrepo, a university professor, egalitarian and Marxist, who was openly critical of the grossly unequal distribution of income among the social classes of Colombia. More concretely, the ELN's self-appointed role was to represent the rural poor and decrease the foreign presence in Colombia. The ELN's goal was to take power from the Colombian government and replace it with a more egalitarian "popular democracy" that would represent all Colombians equally under the law. Colombian President Álvaro Uribe invited ELN Spokesman Francisco Galán for new talks about peace on April 3, 2008. The two spoke in the presidential palace, after the meeting Galán says the ELN will return to the negotiation table. The ELN released a press note shortly after that saying the rebel group "does not share the views" of Galán and dismissed him as their spokesman. The Marxist rebels did say they would continue to let Galán negotiate between the Colombian government and the rebels. (Shifter, 2000)

The Irish Republican Army (IRA) was an Irish republican revolutionary military organization. It was descended from the Irish Volunteers, an organization established on November 25, 1913 that staged the Easter Rising in April 1916. The IRA waged a guerrilla campaign against British rule in Ireland in the 1919–21Irish War of Independence. From 1969 through 1997, the IRA splintered into a number of organizations, however they continued to use the title of IRA. (Coogan, 1970) The IRA began its terrorist attacks on the British army and police following a summer of violent rioting between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland. For the next generation, the IRA carried out bombings, assassinations and other terrorist attacks against British and Irish Unionist targets. The Provisional IRA embarked on a thirty year armed campaign against the British presence in Northern Ireland that claimed 1707 lives. In 1997 it announced a ceasefire, which effectively marked the end of its campaign. In 2005 it formally announced the end of its campaign and destroyed much of its weaponry under international supervision. The movement's political wing, Provisional Sinn Féin, is a growing electoral force in both Northern Ireland and the Republic. (Bew, Gibbon, & Patterson, 2002)

The Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) is the most violent of the Islamic separatist groups operating in the southern Philippines and claims to promote an independent Islamic state in western Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago. Split from the Moro National Liberation Front in the early 1990s, the group currently engages in kidnappings for ransom, bombings, assassinations, and extortion. (Banlaoi, 2004) The ASG operates mainly in Basilan, Sulu, and Tawi-Tawi Provinces in the Sulu Archipelago and has a presence on Mindanao. Members also occasionally travel to Manila. It seeks a separate Islamic state for the country's Muslim minority. Its first leader was Abdurajak Janjalani, a Philippine Muslim who fought in the international Islamist brigade in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation. Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, a Saudi businessman living in the Philippines, provided crucial financing and organizational support for Abu Sayyaf in its early years. From 1998 to 2006, Khadaffy Janjalani, who took over the leadership position when his older brother Abdurajak was killed, led the group. Abu Sayyaf suffered major losses of leadership in 2006 and 2007. In September 2006 Khadaffy Janjalani was killed in a clash with troops on Jolo Island. (Niksch, 2002) In January 2007, U.S.-backed Philippine troops killed Abu Sulaiman, a senior Abu Sayyaf commander and Janjalani’s likely successor. Romeo Ricardo, chief of the Philippine National Police Intelligence Group, said that the two leaders were the main contacts to Middle Eastern donors who provided funding to the group and to Islamic militants in Indonesia. Radullan Sahiron, a one-armed septuagenarian and senior leader in the group, was promoted to the top leadership position in January 2007. However, it was unclear how active a role he would play in Abu Sayyaf’s operations. In a June 2008 article, Zachary Abuza, a leading scholar on terrorism in Southeast Asia, writes that Abu Sayyaf now lacks "any semblance of central leadership".

What each of these groups has in common are the circumstances they were under around the time they were created. The National Liberation Army drew inspiration from the Cuban Revolution, having an initial Marxist movement, fought back against wealthy Colombians for a better-distributed wealth. (Brittain, 2010) There were also other historical factors that gave them cause to fight back such as the Banana Workers Massacre (or Santa Marta Massacre), where United Fruit Company employees were shot down while striking for better work contracts. The National Liberation Army wanted to keep the wealth in Colombia, for it’s people, rather than export it out to the United States and Europe. Much like the Colombians, the Irish fought against Britain imposing on their way of life and the economy of Northern Ireland. Land was slowly being stripped away and colonized by the British, in the late 1960’s a Civil Rights Association was formed to campaign for the reform of their political system. The protests led to rioting and violence, British troops were sent in an attempt to keep the peace, however during a demonstration protestors were shot and killed; this event was caused the IRA to begin it’s campaign of bombing and terror as a means to ending partition. (Coogan, 1970) Lastly, the Abu Sayyaf group, which originated from the Moro National Liberation Front, began struggling against the Philippine Government in order to achieve the independence of the Bangsamoro Land. The MNLF has an egalitarianism ideology, like the National Liberation Army, they believed in the promotion of equality of all the people in the political, economic, social, and civil rights aspects regardless of differences in religion, race, ethnic origin, age, and gender. However, the Abu Sayyaf Group was started when the MNLF begun peace talks with the Philippine Government. Abu Sayyaf is now a separatist group, who are intolerant to other religions and calls for continuous Jihad to pursue a pure Islamic state. (Niksch, 2002)

All three groups strived to separate themselves from newer, unjust changes within their own countries, because they all, in their eyes, were doing what was necessary in order to seek justice for what was done to them and claim what was rightfully theirs. (Combs, 2011) They chose terrorism when they were trying to right what they perceive to be a social or political or historical wrong, when they have been stripped of their land or rights, or denied these.

My position agrees with Hudon’s assumption that a terrorist is born with certain personality traits that destine him or her to become a terrorist is that the root causes of terrorism can be found in influences emanating from environmental factors. (Borum, 2004) Environments conducive to the rise of terrorism include international and national environments, as well as subnational ones such as universities, where many terrorists first become familiar with Marxist-Leninist ideology or other revolutionary ideas and get involved with radical groups. (Hudson, 1999) The usefulness of the assumption can be beneficial in each of these cases; it can be used to make new policies that push equality, without the public having to sacrifice their rights or land. In the case of the National Liberation Army, had Colombia thought about the rights of all this citizens, rather than consuming itself with the ruling bourgeoisie, United States political influences, and monopolization of it’s resources; there would be no use for groups like FARC and the ELN. (Kegley, 2003) Looking at Northern Ireland’s situation, an entire civil war could have never taken place, had they not taking land away from its Irish owners and handing it over for the British to colonize. Rather than just colonizing, and having Northern Ireland under British rule, Britain might have been able to still colonize but give the Irish the “home rule” which would allow them to govern within its own administrative area that have been deputed to it by the central government. Lastly, Filipino Muslims, or Moros, also had to revolt against colonization, but from Spain, however this was not the direct cause of the creation of Abu Sayyaf; rather this time the revolts were against United States rules. The Muslim population of the Philippines was also worried that the expanding of Catholic settlements would soon take over their area. After a revolt, the Philippine Government reached an agreement with the Moros, claiming that the Basilan Province would be a Muslim region. (Banlaoi, 2004) Unfortunately, this was not good enough for some of the Moros, which then created the Abu Sayyaf group, who are a separatist group fighting for the creation of a Muslim state within the Philippines. This may be the one case where the situation may not be able to contribute to the assumption, considering that the Philippine government made an attempt, through negotiations, to appease the Moros; sadly this did not put an end to the violence.

References:

Banlaoi, Rommel (2004). War on Terrorism in Southeast Asia. Quezon City: Rex Book Store. pp. 1–235. ISBN 971-23-4031-7.

Borum, R. (2004). Psychology of Terrorism. Retrieved November 15, 2012 from: http://worlddefensereview.com/docs/PsychologyofTerrorism0707.pdf

Brittain, James (2010). Revolutionary Social Change in Colombia: The Origin and Direction of the FARC-EP. Pluto Press. pp. 74–76. ISBN 978-0-7453-2876-8.

Combs, C. C. (2011). Terrorism in the Twenty-First Century (6th ed.). United States: Pearson.

Coogan, Tim. (1970) The I.R.A., ISBN 0-00-653155-5

Federal Research Division, Library of Congress. (1999). The Sociology and Psychology of Terrorism: Who Becomes a Terrorist and Why? Retrieved November 15, 2012 from Jill St. Claire’s HomelandSecurityUS.NET: http://www.homelandsecurityus.net/sociology_and_psychology_of_terr.htm

Hudson, R. A. (1999). Retrieved from Federal Research Division, Library of Congress website: http://www.fas.org/irp/threat/frd.html

Kegley, C. W., Jr (2003). The New Global Terrorism – Characteristics, Causes, Controls. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

Niksch, Larry (2002). "Abu Sayyaf: Target of Philippine-U.S. Anti-Terrorism Cooperation" (PDF). CRS Report for Congress. Federation of American Scientists.

Paul Bew, Peter Gibbon, & Henry Patterson (2002) Northern Ireland 1921 - 2001; Political Forces and Social Classes, ISBN 978-1-897959-38-1 http://www.serifbooks.co.uk/books/history/

Shifter, Michael. The United States and Colombia: Partners in Ambiguity. Current History 99:51-55 February 2000