text: Counterterrorism (also spelled counter-terrorism), also known as anti-terrorism, incorporates the practice, military tactics, techniques, and strategy that governments, military, law enforcement, business, and intelligence agencies use to combat or eliminate terrorism. Counter-terrorism strategy is a government's motivation to use the instruments of national power to neutralize and conquer terrorists, these organizations they have, and these networks they contain in order to render them incapable of using evil to instill fear and to coerce the government or citizens to react in accordance with these terrorists' goals.[1]
  If definitions of terrorism are part of a broader insurgency, counter-terrorism may employ counter-insurgency measures. The US Armed Forces use the term foreign internal defense for programs that support other countries in attempts to suppress insurgency, lawlessness, or subversion or to reduce the conditions under which these threats to national security may develop.[2][3][4]
  The first counter-terrorism body ever to be formed was the Special Irish Branch of the Metropolitan Police, later renamed the Special Branch after it expanded its scope beyond its original focus on Fenian terrorism. Law enforcement agencies established similar units in Britain and elsewhere.[5]
  Counter-terrorism forces expanded with the perceived growing threat of terrorism in the late 20th century. Specifically, after the September 11 attacks, Western governments made counter-terrorism efforts a priority, including more foreign cooperation, shifting tactics involving red teams,[6] and preventive measures.[7] Although sensational attacks in the developed world receive a great deal of media attention,[8] most terrorism occurs in less developed countries.[9] Government responses to terrorism, in some cases, can lead to substantial unintended consequences.[10]
  Domestic intelligence is often directed at specific groups, defined based on origin or religion, which is a source of political controversy. Mass surveillance of an entire population raises objections on civil liberties grounds. Homegrown terrorists, especially lone wolves, are often harder to detect because of their citizenship or legal status and ability to stay under the radar.[11]
  To select the effective action when terrorism appears to be more of an isolated event, the appropriate government organizations need to understand the source, motivation, methods of preparation, and tactics of terrorist groups. Good intelligence is at the heart of such preparation, as well as a political and social understanding of any grievances that might be solved. Ideally, one gets information from inside the group, a very difficult challenge for HUMINT because operational terrorist cells are often small, with all members known to one another, perhaps even related.[12]
  Counterintelligence is a great challenge with the security of cell-based systems, since the ideal, but the nearly impossible, goal is to obtain a clandestine source within the cell. Financial tracking can play a role, as an communications intercept. However, both of these approaches need to be balanced against legitimate expectations of privacy.[13]
  In February 2017, sources claimed that the Trump administration intends to rename and revamp the U.S. government program Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) to focus solely on Islamist extremism.[14]
  Australia has passed several anti-terrorism acts. In 2004, a bill comprising three acts Anti-terrorism Act, 2004, (No 2) and (No 3) was passed. Then Attorney-General, Philip Ruddock, introduced the Anti-terrorism bill, 2004 on March 31. He described it as "a bill to strengthen Australia's counter-terrorism laws in a number of respects – a task made more urgent following the recent tragic terrorist bombings in Spain." He said that Australia's counter-terrorism laws "require review and, where necessary, updating if we are to have a legal framework capable of safeguarding all Australians from the scourge of terrorism." The Australian Anti-Terrorism Act 2005 supplemented the powers of the earlier acts. The Australian legislation allows police to detain suspects for up to two weeks without charge and to electronically track suspects for up to a year. The Australian Anti-Terrorism Act of 2005 included a "shoot-to-kill" clause. In a country with entrenched liberal democratic traditions, the measures are controversial and have been criticized by civil libertarians and Islamic groups.[15]
  On December 14, 2006, the Israeli Supreme Court ruled targeted killings were a permitted form of self-defense.[16]
  In 2016 the Israeli Knesset passed a comprehensive law against terrorism, forbidding any kind of terrorism and support of terrorism, and setting severe punishments for terrorists. The law also regulates legal efforts against terrorism.[17]
  One of the primary difficulties of implementing effective counter-terrorist measures is the waning of civil liberties and individual privacy that such measures often entail, both for citizens of, and for those detained by states attempting to combat terror.[18] At times, measures designed to tighten security have been seen as abuses of power or even violations of human rights.[19]
  Examples of these problems can include prolonged, incommunicado detention without judicial review or long periods of 'preventive detention';[20] risk of subjecting to torture during the transfer, return and extradition of people between or within countries; and the adoption of security measures that restrain the rights or freedoms of citizens and breach principles of non-discrimination.[21] Examples include:
  In November 2003, Malaysia passed new counter-terrorism laws, widely criticized by local human rights groups for being vague and overbroad. Critics claim that the laws put the fundamental rights of free expression, association, and assembly at risk. Malaysia persisted in holding around 100 alleged militants without trial, including five Malaysian students detained for alleged terrorist activity while studying in Karachi, Pakistan.[21]
  In November 2003, a Canadian-Syrian national, Maher Arar, publicly alleged that he had been tortured in a Syrian prison after being handed over to the Syrian authorities by the U.S.[21]
  In December 2003, Colombia's congress approved legislation that would give the military the power to arrest, tap telephones, and carry out searches without warrants or any previous judicial order.[21]
  Images of unpopular treatment of detainees in U.S. custody in Iraq and other locations have encouraged international scrutiny of U.S. operations in the war on terror.[22]
  Hundreds of foreign nationals remain in prolonged indefinite detention without charge or trial in Guantánamo Bay, despite international and U.S. constitutional standards some groups believe outlaw such practices.[22]
  Hundreds of people suspected of connections with the Taliban or Al-Qaeda remain in long-term detention in Pakistan or in U.S.-controlled centers in Afghanistan.[22]
  China has used the "war on terror" to justify its policies in the predominantly Muslim Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region to stifle Uyghur identity.[22]
  In Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Yemen, and other countries, scores of people have been arrested and arbitrarily detained in connection with suspected terrorist acts or links to opposition armed groups.[22]
  Until 2005, eleven men remained in high security detention in the UK under the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001.[22]
  United Nations experts condemned the misuse of counter-terrorism powers by the Egyptian authorities following the arrest, detention, and designation of human rights activists Ramy Shaath and Zyad El-Elaimy as terrorists. The two activists were arrested in June 2019, and the first-ever renewal of remand detention for Shaath came for the 21st time in 19 months on 24 January 2021. Experts called it alarming, and demanded the urgent implementation of the Working Group's opinion and removal of the two's names from the "terrorism entities' list.[23]
  Many argue that such violations of rights could exacerbate rather than counter the terrorist threat.[21] Human rights activists argue for the crucial role of human rights protection as an intrinsic part to fight against terrorism.[22][24] This suggests, as proponents of human security have long argued, that respecting human rights may indeed help us to incur security. Amnesty International included a section on confronting terrorism in the recommendations in the Madrid Agenda arising from the Madrid Summit on Democracy and Terrorism (Madrid March 8–11, 2005):
  Democratic principles and values are essential tools in the fight against terrorism. Any successful strategy for dealing with terrorism requires terrorists to be isolated. Consequently, the preference must be to treat terrorism as criminal acts to be handled through existing systems of law enforcement and with full respect for human rights and the rule of law. We recommend: (1) taking effective measures to make impunity impossible either for acts of terrorism or for the abuse of human rights in counter-terrorism measures. (2) the incorporation of human rights laws in all anti-terrorism programs and policies of national governments as well as international bodies."[22]
  While international efforts to combat terrorism have focused on the need to enhance cooperation between states, proponents of human rights (as well as human security) have suggested that more effort needs to be given to the effective inclusion of human rights protection as a crucial element in that cooperation. They argue that international human rights obligations do not stop at borders, and a failure to respect human rights in one state may undermine its effectiveness in the global effort to cooperate to combat terrorism.[21]
  The human security paradigm outlines a non-military approach that aims to address the enduring underlying inequalities which fuel terrorist activity. Causal factors need to be delineated and measures implemented which allow equal access to resources and sustainability for all people. Such activities empower citizens, providing "freedom from fear" and "freedom from want".[citation needed]
  This can take many forms, including the provision of clean drinking water, education, vaccination programs, provision of food and shelter and protection from violence, military or otherwise. Successful human security campaigns have been characterized by the participation of a diverse group of actors, including governments, NGOs, and citizens.[citation needed]
  Foreign internal defense programs provide outside expert assistance to a threatened government. FID can involve both non-military and military aspects of counter-terrorism.[citation needed]
  A 2017 study found that "governance and civil society aid is effective in dampening domestic terrorism, but this effect is only present if the recipient country is not experiencing a civil conflict."[25]
  Further information: Violent extremism § Prevention of radicalization and deradicalization
  Military intervention has not always been successful in stopping or preventing future terrorism, such as during the Malayan Emergency, the Mau Mau uprising, and most of the campaigns against the IRA during the Irish Civil War, the S-Plan, the Border Campaign (IRA) and the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Although military action can temporarily disrupt a terrorist group's operations temporarily, it sometimes does not end the threat completely.[26]
  Thus repression by the military in itself (particularly if it is not accompanied by other measures) usually leads to short term victories, but tend to be unsuccessful in the long run (e.g., the French's doctrine described in Roger Trinquier's book Modern War[27] used in Indochina and Algeria). However, new methods (see the new Counterinsurgency Field Manual[28]) such as those taken in Iraq have yet to be seen as beneficial or ineffectual.
  Whatever the target of terrorists, there are multiple ways of hardening the targets to prevent the terrorists from hitting their mark, or reducing the damage of attacks. One method is to place hostile vehicle mitigation to enforce protective standoff distance outside tall or politically sensitive buildings to prevent car and truck bombing. Another way to reduce the impact of attacks is to design buildings for rapid evacuation.[29]
  A more sophisticated target-hardening approach must consider industrial and other critical industrial infrastructure that could be attacked. Terrorists need not import chemical weapons if they can cause a major industrial accident such as the Bhopal disaster or the Halifax Explosion. Industrial chemicals in manufacturing, shipping, and storage need greater protection, and some efforts are in progress.[30] To put this risk into perspective, the first major lethal chemical attack in WWI used 160 tons of chlorine. Industrial shipments of chlorine, widely used in water purification and the chemical industry, travel in 90- or 55-ton tank cars.
  Equipping likely targets with containers (i.e., bags) of pig lard has been utilized to discourage attacks by suicide bombers. The technique was apparently used on a limited scale by British authorities in the 1940s.[31] The approach stems from the idea that Muslims perpetrating the attack would not want to be "soiled" by the lard in the moment before dying. The idea has been suggested more recently as a deterrent to suicide bombings in Israel.[32] However, the actual effectiveness of this tactic is probably limited. A sympathetic Islamic scholar could issue a fatwa proclaiming that a suicide bomber would not be polluted by the swine products.
  Most of these measures deal with terrorist attacks that affect an area or threaten to do so. It is far harder to deal with assassination, or even reprisals on individuals, due to the short (if any) warning time and the quick exfiltration of the assassins.[33]
  1972 Munich massacre Munich, West Germany Israeli Black September German Federal Border Guard All hostages murdered, 5 kidnappers killed, 1 West German police officer killed. 3 kidnappers captured and released.
  2008 Operations Dawn Gulf of Aden, Somalia Mixed Somalian piracy and militants PASKAL and mixed international forces Negotiation finished. 80 hostages released. RMN, including PASKAL navy commandos with mixed international forces patrolling the Gulf of Aden during this festive period.[34][35][36]
  A particular design problem for this system is that it will face many uncertainties in the future. The threat of terrorism may increase, decrease or remain the same, the type of terrorism and location are difficult to predict, and there are technological uncertainties. Yet we want to design a terrorism system conceived and designed today in order to prevent acts of terrorism for a decade or more. A potential solution is to incorporate engineering flexibility into system design for the reason that the flexibility embedded can be exercised in future as uncertainty unfolds and updated information arrives. And the design and valuation of a protection system should not be based on a single scenario, but an array of scenarios. Flexibility can be incorporated in the design of the terrorism system in the form of options that can be exercised in the future when new information is available. Using these 'real options' will create a flexible anti-terrorism system that is able to cope with new requirements that may arise.[37]
  While some countries with longstanding terrorism problems, such as Israel, have law enforcement agencies primarily designed to prevent and respond to terror attacks,[38] in other nations, counter-terrorism is a relatively more recent objective of civilian police and law enforcement agencies.[39][40]
  While some civil-libertarians and criminal justice scholars have called-out efforts of law enforcement agencies to combat terrorism as futile and expensive[41] or as threats to civil liberties,[41] other scholars have begun describing and analyzing the most important dimensions of the policing of terrorism as an important dimension of counter-terrorism, especially in the post-9/11 era, and have argued how police institutions view terrorism as a matter of crime control.[39] Such analyses bring out the civilian police role in counter-terrorism next to the military model of a 'war on terror'.[42]
  American law enforcement[edit]
  FBI Hostage Rescue Team agents
  Pursuant to passage of the Homeland Security Act of 2002, federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies began to systemically reorganize.[43][44] Two primary federal agencies (the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS)) house most of the federal agencies that are prepared to combat domestic and international terrorist attacks. These include the Border Patrol, the Secret Service, the Coast Guard and the FBI.
  Following suit from federal changes pursuant to 9/11, however, most state and local law enforcement agencies began to include a commitment to "fighting terrorism" in their mission statements.[45][46] Local agencies began to establish more patterned lines of communication with federal agencies. Some scholars have doubted the ability of local police to help in the war on terror and suggest their limited manpower is still best utilized by engaging community and targeting street crimes.[41]
  While counter-terror measures (most notably heightened airport security, immigrant profiling[47] and border patrol) have been adapted during the last decade, to enhance counter-terror in law enforcement, there have been remarkable limitations to assessing the actual utility/effectiveness of law enforcement practices that are ostensibly preventative.[48] Thus, while sweeping changes in counter-terrorism rhetoric redefined most American post 9/11 law enforcement agencies in theory, it is hard to assess how well such hyperbole has translated into practice.
  In intelligence-led policing (ILP) efforts, the most quantitatively amenable starting point for measuring the effectiveness of any policing strategy (i.e.: Neighborhood Watch, Gun Abatement, Foot Patrols, etc.) is usually to assess total financial costs against clearance rates or arrest rates. Since terrorism is such a rare event phenomena,[49] measuring arrests or clearance rates would be a non-generalizable and ineffective way to test enforcement policy effectiveness. Another methodological problem in assessing counter-terrorism efforts in law enforcement hinges on finding operational measures for key concepts in the study of homeland security. Both terrorism and homeland security are relatively new concepts for criminologists, and academicians have yet to agree on the matter of how to properly define these ideas in a way that is accessible.
  Counter-terrorism agencies[edit]
  Within military operational approaches, Counter-terrorism falls into the category of Irregular Warfare.[50] Given the nature of operational counter-terrorism tasks national military organizations do not generally have dedicated units whose sole responsibility is the prosecution of these tasks. Instead the counter-terrorism function is an element of the role, allowing flexibility in their employment, with operations being undertaken in the domestic or international context.
  ^ Stigall, Miller, and Donnatucci (October 7, 2019). "The 2018 National Strategy for Counterterrorism: A Synoptic Overview". American University National Security Law Brief. SSRN 3466967. {{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  ^ https://www.doctrine.af.mil/Portals/61/documents/AFDP_3-22/3-22-D01-FID-Introduction.pdf[bare URL PDF]
  ^ "Differences Between Foreign Internal Defense (FID) and Counter Insurgency (COIN)".
  ^ Sexton, Renard; Wellhausen, Rachel L.; Findley, Michael G. (2019). "How Government Reactions to Violence Worsen Social Welfare: Evidence from Peru". American Journal of Political Science. 63 (2): 353–367. doi:10.1111/ajps.12415. ISSN 1540-5907. S2CID 159341592.
  ^ "The Challenges of Effective Counterterrorism Intelligence in the 2020s". June 21, 2020.
  ^ Feiler, Gil (September 2007). "The Globalization of Terror Funding" (PDF). Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, Bar-Ilan University: 29. Mideast Security and Policy Studies No. 74. Retrieved November 14, 2007. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  ^ "Counter-Terrorism Module 12 Key Issues: Surveillance & Interception".
  ^ "Proposals to further strengthen Australia s counter-terrorism laws 2005".
  ^ Nagl, John A.; Petraeus, David H.; Amos, James F.; Sewall, Sarah (December 2006). "Field Manual 3–24 Counterinsurgency" (PDF). US Department of the Army. Retrieved February 3, 2008. While military manuals rarely show individual authors, David Petraeus is widely described as establishing many of this volume's concepts. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)