Who Is a Terrorist, Essay Example

Thesis

The essay is based on establish the answer to the question, ‘who really is the terrorist?’ From the results of the War on Terror in Afghanistan, to the invasion of on a falsified assumption, it paves the essential need to address the question. The question is meant to establish who really can be termed a ‘terrorist’. The fact of the matter is that the term terrorism cannot be fully defined, and the term was meant to create a group of individual who would serve as a guilty party to any American endeavors.

Who is a terrorist?

The key thing is to define the term ‘Terrorism’ before proceeding with the arguments. Based on the definition provided on Wikipedia, ‘it is a systematic use of terror’. That brings up the issue of the actual definition of terror. If a boy tortures another boy in school, does that classify as terror? If a thief robs your house, is that terror? Scaring an individual based on their phobias, is that terror? The definition of terror will always be a controversial issue as it based on the individual perceptions of terror (Hoffman 30). On that basis it can be said that terror can be considered to be a general interpretation of an individual. On that reasoning, terror will always be a controversial issue as the actual definition cannot be established.

So if the aspect of terror is down to personal interpretation, a terrorist is down to the same perception. Thus the actual definition of a terrorist cannot be ideally defined in a universal factor. It is the basis for the question who really is a terrorist? The general term is used to create a level of animosity towards an individual that he or she may dislike (Hoffman 45). There is no actual aspect that can be used to illustrate what is and is not terror or who is or is not a terrorist.

The best example to illustrate this fact is the ideology behind the ‘war against terror’. The phrase is fairly general and can be termed as a factor that is intended to differentiate between the United States and their enemies. However that is beside the point; when the United States invaded Iraq, the intention was to seek and destroy weapons of mass destruction (Pape 36). The end result was that Saddam Hussein was hanged, and no weapons of mass destruction were ever found. Who really is the Terrorist in this case? The ruler who was accused of being in possession of weapons that were nonexistent, or the individuals who sought out to kill him in the first place under misleading information?

The general problem with the invasion of Iraq was the simple fact that it caused the country to come to a complete stand still. I am under the conviction that the country is worse now than it ever was in the era of Saddam Hussein. Baghdad is more of a ghost town rather than a town that would be a place of business. So in actual fact, the Americans managed to make the country worse than it already is (Pape 56). Terror has an implication of making a situation worse, so in this case can United States be considered to be a terrorist? My argument is not meant at incriminating the United States, but more to illustrate the aspect double standard and how the terminology of terrorism is a based on no actual definition.

Individuals may resent this factor by stating that the war on terror was on the basis that the there were terror acts that caused the bombing of the World Trade Center as well as the Pentagon. In response to these claims, it is obvious that the evidence does not seem to support these claims. In the case of the pentagon, the hole the facility had incurred was too small to be considered to be caused by a large plane, as earlier reports had suggested (Pape 66). So the question is whether it was a conspiracy, or a plot to create the element of terrorism for concealed motives. I cannot prove that my assumption has any basis, but that is not my intention, I am simply seeking to establish that the case of 9/11 was a fabricated factor that was a cover up for invading Iraq.

People who are pro war on terror would claim that the United States was triumphant in that they killed Saddam Hussein, but in actual fact they is a case of the amount of damage that the United States did in the country that may contradict the achievement. In the case of the undercover military group Blackwater, they proved to do more damage than help the cause of the United States (Hudson 69). the military group managed to kill innocent civilians as well as rape women in Baghdad. I am sure that these factors were not part of the objectives of the company, so in actual fact they can be considered to have disregarded their assigned orders and carried out their own objectives. Based on their activities as well as their association to the United States, can it be said that the United States has its own brand of terrorists? I put this question to you, as you ponder the ideologies that are presented in the paper.

Work Cited:

Bruce Hoffman, inside terrorism, 2 ed., Columbia University Press, 2006,

Pape, Robert A. “The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism,” American Political Science Review, 2003.

Hudson, Rex A. Who Becomes a Terrorist and Why: The 1999 Government Report on Profiling Terrorists, Federal Research Division, the Lyons Press, 2002