How Has the American Invasion of Afghanistan Contributed to The Rise of Transnational Terrorism?
Abstract
Terrorism is violence used in an attempt to accomplish, pursue, or justify political, economic, and religious ambitions. Terrorism disrupts the peace and results in casualties. Terrorism is different from other wars since targets are rarely the right adversaries but rather subjects of adversary’s authority. In essence, victims are citizens who live under a government that is opposed by the terrorists. The impacts and consequences of terrorism make it a unique subject of study since it disrupts the peaceful coexistence of humanity. This paper explores how the American invasion of Afghanistan has contributed to the rise of transnational terrorism in America and in countries that support American activities in Afghanistan. Furthermore, it shall specifically focus on understanding how transnational terrorists have responded to the American invasion of Afghanistan. Factors that cultivate terrorism shall also be explored to support the causes of terrorism against America and what contributed to the rise of a new wave of transnational terrorism.
INTRODUCTION
Terrorist groups are often organizations smaller in population, or inferior economically, or politically. Terrorist groups can take the form of states, but they can be scattered worldwide while abiding by ideologies of the terror group. Terrorists target enemy states, nations or subjects of opponent authority. Terrorists are aggressive against sympathizers of their foes and believe that mediators are more lenient to enemies’ opinions. Terrorists seek radical actions that are violent in an attempt to provoke an immediate response that would be otherwise ignored. Terrorism is often cultivated by political injustices, boundary disputes, ideology clashes and economic imbalance.
Terrorists often advocate for political independence, amendment of economic policies and justice but, their inability to achieve these claims leads to violent approaches, especially by weak leaders. Ezcurra, Roberto, and David (63-70) explain that long-term terrorist goals could range from the union of all believers into one state, expansion of territory, acceptance of their ideologies by enemies, independence from the enemy or control over the opponent. Asal, Victor, and Karl (438-442) explain that terrorism is a strategy of weak leaders to impose radical ideologies through fear due to a lack of better approaches to pursue influence or power. Afghanistan’s occupation by America has led to the rise of transnational terrorists that have developed strategies that are often used against the United States.
Terrorist groups use strategizes like;
pursuing adversaries that one has the power to impact costly consequences for pursuing an opposing policy,
intimidating enemy governments that they are too weak to stop terrorist punishment,
provoking adversaries to retaliate with violence,
attacking to undermine peace attempts, and
rallying support of the public through severe attacks that prove their superiority.
This paper aims to explore the impact of the American invasion of Afghanistan and how it has influenced a rise of transnational terrorism in America and in countries that support American activities in Afghanistan. This paper further aims to explore the various strategies that transnational terrorist use against America−both domestically and in affiliate nations.
LITERATURE REVIEW AND RESEARCH QUESTION
Literature Review
George, Justin (473-475) explain observe that terrorism can be both domestic or transnational. Findley, Michael, and Joseph (287-288) assert that domestic terrorists target the home country, while transnational terrorists target more than one country. Findley, Michael, and Joseph (287-288) argue that deaths caused by domestic terrorists are more in number than those of transnational terrorists and that transnational terrorists exist as a result of state sponsorship. Terrorist attacks may be executed through car bombings, explosive bombings, assassinations, suicide bombings, skyjacking and paraded killings of enemy citizens (Findley, Michael, and Joseph, 287-288). Terrorism is a phenomenon that arises from political ideologies and religious fundamentalism. Crenshaw and Martha (481) affirm that religious oppressions, economic discriminations and territory expansion or separation motives lead to terrorism. Findley, Michael, and Joseph (287-288) established that civil wars promote the growth of terrorism. Corruption and unfairness in justice institutions cause the rebirth of a more radical terrorist with a deeper cause to retaliate. Magouirk, Justin, Scott and Marc (1-10) explain that specific foreign policies may result in terrorism consequences. The insights provide a better understanding of terrorist groups and frameworks of their organization.
Magouirk, Justin, Scott, and Marc (1-10) explain that terrorism is intentional and is chosen as a strategy to achieve an outcome. Magouirk, Justin, Scott, and Marc (1-10) affirm that transnational terrorists thrive through the recruitment of loyal believers in their course. They often utilize socialization and gradual exposure to initiate recruits to extreme behaviours. Transnational terrorists often act through opportunities for immediate action that they believe are effective. Tilly and Charles (5-13) assert that transnational terrorists target recruits that need to belong, hence the aspect use of scriptures to provide more profound comfort and invoke feelings of care. Tilly and Charles (5-13) argue that extremist terror leaders have a great desire for social status. Tilly and Charles (5-13) are of the view that transnational terrorists achieve recruiting by targeting individuals with a desire to attain the material reward for their loyalty. Tilly and Charles (5-13) explain that terrorists may plan an attack under the motivation of revenge for American bombings that killed their families and loved ones. The Al-Qaida terrorist group, for example, may desire to revenge a wrong of injustice to someone they deeply relate to or have affection to. Crimes may be viewed as grievances. Tilly and Charles (5-13) point out that transnational terrorists acquire their personality through a lack of critical and personal assessment of values and ideas they adopt. Tilly and Charles (5-13) argue that an individuals’ search for identity may lead them to extremist organizations that utilize terror to resolve their aggression to a complicated world. The insights are essential in research on the psychological understanding of how transnational terrorist organizations like Al-Qaida are established.
Piazza and James (339-343) reveal that transnational terrorists focus on easy targets hence prefer to attack people more than attacking property. The Al-Qaida terrorist attacks occasionally result in loss of lives and sustenance of physical and emotional injuries, disruption of commerce, destruction of infrastructure, and loss of wages. According to Laitin, David, and Jacob (210-215), American economies are significantly impacted by terrorism through increased expenditure in counterterrorism actions, grown insurance premiums, loss in commerce partners, and boosted spending in security. Latin, David, and Jacob (210-215) further observe that economic situations worsen when investors withdraw their investments due to perceptions of higher risk in the victim countries, and an increase in taxes to finance counterterrorism strategies may lead to the withdrawal of private and public investments. Drawing insights from the September 2001 bombing of the World Trade Centre, Laitin, David, and Jacob (210-215) affirm the economic blow to America due to terrorist attack. The insights provide a research approach to the economic target of transnational terrorists against America.
Transnational terrorism leads to microeconomic consequences to targeted countries that include a reduction of GDP. For instance, despite being a country with a high economic capability, America experienced a decline in its economic growth following the September 2001 World Trade Centre terrorist attack. Additionally, it took the country a significant length of time to recover from the aforesaid terrorist attack. Piazza and James (339-343) explain that transnational terrorist groups that are against American operation in Afghanistan scare away foreign direct investments, thus negatively impacting the economic growth of Afghanistan.
Research Question
This paper shall be guided by the following research question: “How has the American invasion of Afghanistan contributed to the rise of transnational terrorism?”.
THEORETICAL ARGUMENT AND RESEARCH HYPOTHESIS
Theoretical Argument
Terrorists’ strategies are both diverse and specific. The paper aims to explore how transnational terrorists develop in protest to America’s operation in Afghanistan. Transnational terrorists attack America and her affiliate nations to prove to countries that support American activities in Afghanistan that they have the power to impact costly consequences for pursuing an opposing policy by conducting attritional activities. Shapiro and Jacob (6-12) observe that some of the attritional activities employed by the terrorist groups include launching severe attacks to nations that donate troops in peacekeeping missions in Afghanistan.
Shapiro and Jacob (6-12) provide some strategies that transnational terrorists utilize to protest policies by enemy governments. Horowitz and Michael (33-40) give an insight into how Al-Qaida’s weak leaders prefer to use attrition because they feel there is an imbalance of power, and the direct war would ultimately lead to defeat. Furthermore, Horowitz and Michael (33-40) provide the need to investigate how weak leaders use suicide bombing in the attrition strategy. Collard et al. (625-630) help in responding to inquiries of the effectiveness of the attrition strategy to ensure that terrorist attacks result in as many casualties as possible to destroy enemies. According to Shapiro and Jacob (6-12), terrorist attacks are often preceded by harsh political or economic policies that place terrorist groups at a disadvantage. Thus, the research question seeks to clarify why the attrition strategy is quickly adopted by transnational terrorists globally.
This research topic uses Walter and Barbara’s (469-480) argument to explain that Al-Qaida recruits domestic terrorists with the intent to overthrow the American government or to accumulate social control. Transnational terrorist groups characteristically launch severe attacks that invoke fear among subjects of the American government. Furthermore, the research seeks to explain that intense transnational terrorist attacks are planned better in America than in the Afghanistan war fronts. Walter and Barbara’s (469-480) explanation supports this premise by observing that transnational terrorist attacks are intended to change people’s perception that the target government is weak to stop terrorist punishment or attacks. On the contrary, Laitin, David, and Jacob (210-215) assure that transnational terrorists conduct their heinous activities as an attempt to compete with the government for political support. According to Laitin, David, and Jacob (210-215), transnational terrorists use terrorist attacks to prove they can severely punish disobedience. Laitin, David, and Jacob’s (210-215) observation that terrorists target government officials to intimidate them into believing that their government is too week to protect them offers a logical explanation as to why transnational terrorists in Afghanistan are rife. Similarly, Kydd, Andrew, and Barbara’s (49-60) account that the Al-Shabaab terrorist group, which continually embraces Al-Qaida ideologies, targets East African governments that support American activities by occasionally targeting government officials. It is premised that the main aim of transnational terrorist groups is to punish America and countries that support the American imperialism in Afghanistan.
Research Hypothesis
After a conclusive exploration of the research question it is hypothesized that: “After the American invasion of Afghanistan, terrorist groups will launch anti-imperialism tourist attacks to punish America and countries that support the American imperialism in Afghanistan”.
This hypothesis is based on observations from various scholars. For instance, based on Laitin, David, and Jacob’s (213-215) argument, transnational terrorist leaders (in Afghanistan) become political after an attack from the American government; by inciting people and conducting political rallies persuading citizens that the forceful military retaliation from the government is unjust. Consequently, according to Coggins and Bridget’s (457-459) observation, the American government responds by deploying massive security forces that often use excessive force against some of Afghanistan citizens in retaliation. Taking advantage of these unwarranted retaliatory attacks from the American government, Coggins and Bridget (457-459) observe that transnational terrorists utilize this opportunity to persuade Afghan citizens that the American government does not have a concern in the citizens’ interests, but rather a show-off of power. Thus, the American government’s retaliation and efforts to sieve out transnational terrorists may end up hurting innocent citizens, therefore, losing the favour of the population. The research explains how this military response provokes more terrorist attacks against America.
According to observations from various researchers, the American government intention in Afghanistan is to amend peace through a stable political power and leave. However, they (the American government) are undermined continuously in achieving this objective by attacks from the Al-Qaida terrorist group. According to Sedgwick and Mark (97-98), transnational terrorists’ leaders view the act of giving in to American demands as an expression of their weakness. Thus, they are inspired to keep undermining American peacekeeping activities in Afghanistan. Additionally, Sedgwick and Mark (97-98) argue that although the American government is willing to agree with the leaders of moderate transnational terrorist groups in Afghanistan, they (The American government) still have mistrust perpetuated from occasional incidents of terrorist attacks from transnational terrorists. The situation is exacerbated even further by the moderate leaders’ perception of a peaceful America-terrorist group agreement as an act of insubordination. As Walter and Barbara (469-480) explain, the pursuit of territorial expansion makes a peace treaty an unlikely option for transnational terrorists hence ignoring any peace agreement with the American government. Sedgwick and Mark (97-98) assert that terrorists conduct attacks when the peace agreements are in progress to invoke mistrust and lack of confidence in the agreement. Based on the observation from Sedgwick and Mark (97-98), it is evident that the American government is ready for peace and withdrawal of soldiers if Afghanistan has a stable government. However, transnational terrorist groups in Afghanistan consistently violate any peaceful agreements with anti-imperialist attacks against the American government.
Similar to Sedgwick and Mark (97-98) observations, Danzell and Orlandrew (85-101) link the perennial terror attacks in Afghanistan to the opposition and power-hungry leaders who quickly turn to terrorists. Similarly, Conrad, Justin, and Kevin (547-550) observe that competition for power is the primary factor that drives violence in Afghanistan. However, according to research, terrorists gradually spread the need for instant political justice against America by comparing American operation in other countries to that in Afghanistan. Thus, Danzell and Orlandrew (85-101): Conrad, Justin, and Kevin (547-550) explanations support the research hypothesis that “After the American invasion of Afghanistan, terrorist groups will launch anti-imperialism tourist attacks to punish America and countries that support the American imperialism in Afghanistan”.
RESEARCH DESIGN
This research model shall rely on the available literature materials to explore how the American invasion of Afghanistan has contributed to the rise of transnational terrorism in America and in countries that support American activities in Afghanistan. Thus, this research intends to use a desktop research model that shall involve matching of different literature materials to compare the execution of various terrorist attacks in countries that support American activities in Afghanistan. A literature search will be conducted through scholarly websites like Google Scholar, JSTOR, and EBSCO to explore the research question conclusively. Additionally, the paper will review literature material from the UCL Department of Political Science to extract research insights and supporting information to develop and explore the research question. The search for the relevant literature material to help explore the research question will be guided by various research interest titles and keywords (Fink, Arlene). Upon conducting a literature search for relevant materials through the aforementioned scholarly websites, irrelevant materials will be discarded. After that, content analysis, based on the selected literature materials, will be conducted to derive essential information to use in exploring how transnational terrorist groups develop in protest to America’s operation in Afghanistan.
In summary, the research design will begin with a literature search to obtain the relevant materials for use in exploring the research question: “How has the American invasion of Afghanistan contributed to the rise of transnational terrorism?”. The suitable literature materials will be obtained from online academic websites like Google Scholar, JSTOR, and EBSCO and the UCL Department of Political science. A review of the literature will help develop a framework for the research question.
Work Cited
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