Page 362 - Encyclopedia Of Terrorism

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342———State-Sponsored Terrorism

the war on terror was against Osama bin Laden and Al these groups, however, would fit into contemporary
Qaeda, not the Afghan people. definitions of terrorists.
Although the 193rd has played a vital role in The coinage of the phrase “freedom fighters”
several recent military actions, the 16th SOW is the points to one reason why countries support terrorist
largest, oldest, and most seasoned special operations groups: supporting terrorist movements, especially
unit in the Air Force, with nearly 100 aircraft and those with some popular backing, can actually
7,000 personnel. The 16th reports to the Atlantic, enhance another nation’s standing. The communist
Southern, and Central Special Operations Command, government of Cuba, for example, obtained inter-
and often supports special operations in Europe and national notice by openly promising to “export the
the Pacific. It falls under the U.S. Special Operations revolution”—that is, to foster and support communist
Command (USSOC), which includes the Army’s groups in other nations. Muslim governments in Iran
Green Berets and Rangers, and the Navy SEALs. and Afghanistan have made much the same promise to
militant Muslim groups. While such proclamations
See also COUNTERTERRORISM
can lead to international condemnation and trade
sanctions, they can also establish a nation as an ideo-
Further Reading
logical leader, a country willing to make sacrifices to
Air Force Special Operations Command Web site: http:// help support and export a certain political philosophy.
www.afsoc.af.mil/index2.shtml. Exporting the revolution can also be a profitable
business. Cuba routinely required leftist groups to pay
for Cuban soldiers and civilians sent to help, and Bul-
STATE-SPONSORED TERRORISM garia’s government was once notorious for its willing-
ness to sell weapons to terrorist groups at a hefty
profit.
Although terrorism is widely condemned, never- However, the primary reason countries support ter-
theless many countries have given assistance to ter- rorist groups is neither prestige nor profits—ideologi-
rorist groups in the form of money, weapons, cal conflict that cannot be directly militarily
training, or bases for operations. Every year, the U.S. expressed. A nation almost always supports terrorist
State Department releases a list of countries that sup- groups that share a common enemy with the state,
port terrorism, and those countries face stiff sanc- especially when peaceful reconciliation is impossible
tions. If a country’s support for terrorist groups is not but war is also not an option. For example, during the
extensive enough for it to be placed on the list, the Cold War the United States and the Soviet Union were
United States may impose sanctions nonetheless. The implacable foes, divided by deep ideological differ-
United States declared a war on terrorism following ences. Both countries had extensive arsenals of
the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade nuclear weapons, meaning that an outright war could
Center in New York City and the Pentagon near have very well led to global annihilation. Instead of
Washington, D.C. making peace or waging war, both countries sup-
During the Cold War, a decades-long period ported terrorist groups that operated in other countries
(1945–1991) of conflict with the former Soviet and that were in ideological alignment with one or the
Union, the United States provided extensive aid to other of the superpowers.
anti-Soviet and anticommunist groups in many coun- Obviously, adopting this kind of policy involves
tries. Likewise, the former Soviet Union was risks: if a country supports a group that conducts direct
extremely open about its support for leftist groups— attacks against a second country, the second country
so much so that the U.S.S.R. was criticized for claim- may take military action against the first. Thus, during
ing to extensively support groups to which it gave the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union
little practical assistance. Some linguistic finesse was did not support terrorist groups that conducted opera-
necessary: neither country claimed to support “terror- tions in each other’s country. Instead, they would gen-
ism,” arguing instead that it was assisting, in the ter- erally support insurgent groups operating in a third
minology preferred by the United States, “freedom country. Usually one of the two—say, the Soviet
fighters,” or armed liberation movements that repre- Union—would support an insurgency in countries
sented the true will of a given population. Many of where the government was seen as friendly to the