War against terrorism - SpeedyLook encyclopedia

The “ war against terrorism ” or “ war against terror ” (“ War one Terror ” or “ Total War one Terror ”, GWOT) is a concept Géopolitique developed by the American Administration of George W. Bush after the attacks of the September 11th, 2001.

To note that the Cooperation organization of Shanghai, gathering the Russia, the Popular republic of China and other nations of Central Asia, before that had already declared the war against the three forces of the evil : the Terrorism, the Separatism and the Extremism.

They are various police, political actions and soldiers whom carries out the Gouvernement the United States (supported by various allies) against various organizations related to the islamist Terrorisme. She dissociates traditional fight against terrorism by military actions of great width abroad and an active interventionism. She leads to the concept of preventive Guerre , against the States sheltering of the groups terrorist and/or likely to provide them weapons of massive destruction.

This war combines the direct fight, i.e. the dismantling of the terrorist cells, the destruction of the camps of drive, and the indirect fight. The latter includes/understands the investigations and the pressures on the governments, organizations and people supporting the terrorist organizations, and the freezing of the assets suspected of belonging or of being used for terrorist groups. They is also financial aids with the countries taking part in the fight against terrorism, the increase in the international cooperation on the level of the information, organizes and justice, the political reorganization of the the Middle East.

Question of the denomination

In the first next month 9-11, president W Bush had started to name the program the " Crusade against the terrorisme" (employing by name the word crusade in English), but its advisers took again the formula rather quickly, fearing that she recalls too much for the populations of the Middle East the historical time of the Holy Land Crusades carried out by the Christian Occident.

In July 2005, of the members of the American administration tried to impose the total term struggle against violent one extremism (“ world combat against the extremism violates ”) for better taking into account dimensions political and ideological of this conflict. Others still speak about third or fourth world war (World War III, World War IV).

To also read the paragraph “a disputed expression” at the end of the article.

Chronology

See Chronology of the war against terrorism .

The American target

In the declarations of the islamist terrorists, the United States is often regarded as “the Great Satan” or the “Empire of the Evil”. Indeed, all opposes the american company such as it is perceived in its cultural productions (films, popular music, where stripped women are seen, for example) at the company desired by the islamist radicals. Recurring geopolitical problems as the Israeli-Arab Conflit makes that the United States is perceived like the indéfectible ally of Israel, whose existence is refused by these same movements. Thus, allied super power with the “intimate” enemies, the United States is the main target (although often indirectly) of the islamist terrorists.

The war against terrorism takes its source in the attacks of the September 11th, 2001, where were killed close to 3 000 people, as a majority of the civilians. These attacks are not the first with touching American interests, but they are outstanding by their width. They were not the first fatal islamist attacks to strike the ground of the United States directly (cf the preceding attack of the World Trade Center, nearly 10 years earlier).

The mobilization

These aggressions are lived like a true traumatism by the whole of the population, which associates them with the Attaque on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese in 1941, without declaration of preliminary war. Quickly the feeling appears which the nation entered in war.

This certainty is quickly taken again by the administration, which issues the national mobilization. It sets up a whole series of measure aiming to destroy the terrorist groups and to protect the population, the territory, the lifestyle, the values and the interests of the United States.

The first measurement, on September 11th, was to make land all the civil aircrafts flying over the airspace of the United States, a few hours after the attacks, and to prevent the other planes from penetrating there; with several exceptions for some private aircrafts, of which a Saoudi plane which made it possible Ben Laden family members to leave the country - detail that certain opponents with George Walker Bush raise (of which Michael Moore).

The countryside of Afghanistan

As of on September 12th, NATO declared officially that the attacks were an attack against the nineteen countries of alliance. It was the first time that this organization thus called upon the clause of solidarity of article 5 of the Traité of the North Atlantic.

Quickly the organization Al-Qaida is recognized like person in charge of the attacks. Its representative Usama Bin Laden was then protected, with the many fundamentalist ones, by the mode of the Taliban S in Afghanistan. Following the refusal of the Talibans to deliver their host without formal evidence of his culpability, an international coalition decides to support the opposition which fights against the Afghan mode. This one falls quickly in front of the attack from NATO at the end of 2001, but Bin Laden and much of its comparses manage to escape.

This action made it possible to destroy camps of drive and to destabilize the structure of command and planning of the attacks. But Al-Qaida is more one nebula that a really structured organization. Very autonomous, the local groups spontaneously could implement new actions. Although it seems that the attacks of Madrid were planned before the fall of the mode Taliban, they are an example among others that the capacity to harm of the islamist terrorists was not really affected.

See the detailed article War of Afghanistan

The countryside of Iraq

Members of the Bush administration, as private individuals those which one calls the Néo-conservatives, had called with the inversion by the force of Saddam Hussein since 1997. Sometimes this is why one reproaches the United States for having sought before very freeing from the dependence of the Saoudi Pétrole by having access to other sources of supply.

However, the néo-conservatives succeeded in presenting their strategy of Grand the Middle East (Doctrine Bush) like an essential component of the war against terrorism. Applicant whom Islamic terrorism is caused by the absence of democratic prospects for the countries of the Gulf, they recommend an active policy to make evolve/move the modes of the area. The inversion of the mode of Saddam Hussein would make it possible to establish the democracy in Iraq and by a kind of effect of “contagion”, in the adjoining countries (Théorie of the dominos). Many people and governments criticize this strategy which they consider utopian. For them, in particular in France, the democracy cannot be exported by the weapons: it would be necessary that the population is in favor of this change and is durably committed maintaining such a system so that this one is durable.

That is a voluntary strategy, or following an error of appreciation of their secret services, the leaders of the United States justified their action by a bond much more direct between the Iraqi mode and international terrorism. They thus stated to have the proof of an association between Al-Qaïda and Iraq, but especially that this State still had Armes of massive destruction which could be used by a terrorist group; they have also advanced that Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi dictator, intended to attack her neighbors using WMD. After the invasion, and in front of the absence of convincing elements, the government gradually recognized that these allegations were inaccurate. Thus the October 5th 2004, the secretary with Defense Donald Rumsfeld officially admitted not having any proof of the bond between Al-Qaïda and the Iraq, thus contradicting its assertions of March 2003. It rejects the responsibility for this change of position on the unreliability of the information provided by the CIA.

According to criticisms, the chaos which followed the fall of the mode is primarily due:

with the lack of preparation of the soldiers to the intervention within an Arab population (lack of translators, not-comprehension of the habits, etc);
with the lack of preparation of the soldiers to carry out a work of police force during the occupation;
with the lack of protection, even with the voluntary destruction (during the years 1990) of the strategic infrastructures (hospital, powerplant, treatment plants of water, etc).

In spite of the capture of Saddam Hussein and the success of the elections in January 2005, the situation is far from being stabilized in Iraq and the terrorist attacks are daily.

See the detailed article War in Iraq, 2003

Outlines

In her Speech on the state of the Union of 2002, George W. Bush used the expression “centers Evil” to indicate marked countries to support terrorism like Iraq, Iran or the North Korea. Since the fall of the mode of Saddam Hussein, the United States focuses itself primarily on the Syria and the Iran that George W. Bush regards as country supporting terrorism in Iraq and Palestine.

In particular, the United States considers that the Syria supports terrorism in Iraq while letting pass the terrorists by the border between Syria and Iraq. The question of the Lebanon is also crucial between the Syrian mode and the American mode. The withdrawal started by the Syrians in Lebanon the 14 March 2005, in particular after the Lebanese demonstrations after the assassination of the former Prime Minister Rafic Hariri the 14 February 2005, is regarded by the Americans as a victory.

With regard to Iran, it is the question of the nuclear proliferation which is in question. At the summer 2005, in particular after the accession with the presidency of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a ultra-conservative, with the Iranian presidency on August 3rd, 2005, the situation worsens after the resumption of conversion to the power station of Ispahan on August 8th, 2005 and the refusal of the Iran to negotiate on the question of the nuclear power. George W. Bush evoked, the 12 August 2005, the possibility of an military intervention in Iran. The Iran answered by evoking a counterpart in the event of attack of the Americans.

Consequences in the United States

The United States set up series of measure to face the terrorist threat. Some of them are derogatory practices with the common right, legitimated near the population by the state of emergency induced by the war against terrorism.

The Department of the Internal security

Whereas traditionally local safety is responsibility for the federated States, the administration creates a new agency charged to protect the borders, the ports and the air traffic. At January 1st 2003, the department of the internal security (“ Department off Homeland Security ”) joined together 22 federal services, employing 180.000 civils servant, and had a budget of 32 billion dollars.

See also: Department of the Internal security

Patriot Act

the USA Patriot Act is a law of exception, limited in time (the majority of the provisions had at the beginning being null and void after the December 31st 2005) and voted by the Congress with the quasi-unanimity the October 26th 2001. It is intended to reinforce the power of the government agencies of the United States. The adversaries of Patriot Act (in particular associations of protection of individual freedoms) regard this Loi as Liberticide.

Patriot Act was prolonged on July 21st, 2005 (with the room of the representatives) and on July 29th, 2005 (with the American Senate) in a permanent way for 14 of the 16 provisions of Patriot Act and 10 years for the two others (on the phone-tappings and the access to the personal file).

The prison of Guantanamo

The military camp of Guantanamo, located on the island of Cuba, was transformed into prison for foreigners supposed terrorist following the countryside of Afghanistan. Its first occupants were thus the combatants talibans or supposed such as well as the people suspected of membership of Al-Qaïda.

The Prison of Guantanamo became one of the most criticized points war against terrorism, in particular abroad. Thus the concepts of “Enemy combatants” and their imprisonment with Guantanamo is contrary with the public International law. ONG Amnesty International criticized has many recoveries the detention out of any legal framework, national or international, individuals captured by the armed forces states-uniennes, in Guantanamo like in others “black Sites” ( black sites ), located out of the territory states-unien. In addition to these prisoners imprisoned out of international law (in what the Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben called a “permanent state of exception”), association criticizes the imprisonment of “phantom Détenus” as well as the practices of “extraordinary Restitution” ( extraordinary returnings ), qualified by diplomatic Le Monde of “Délocalisation of the Torture”.

Unbounded detention, the procedures of the lawsuits where certain prisoners will be judged, the detention conditions and supposed the acts of torture within the prison are as many points which are denounced by many governments and ONG.

Extraordinary restitutions

Consequences in the world

The American security services multiply the contacts and the centers of coordination of fight against terrorism with their counterparts throughout the world the such Alliance Bases in Paris.

According to its opponents, these multilateral interventions (gathering the allied United States of America and some other countries) weaken the United Nations and put at evil the principles international law governing the relationship between the States. It is especially in Europe that the concept of war against terrorism is badly accepted by the public opinions.

The American preserving press shows the Western diplomacies which criticize the American action in the name of the principles of the international law to want to preserve their own networks of influence, the first consequence of the unilateralism of the United States being to make null and void the sets of capacities to which they are delivered within large the organization international.

Other States applying these doctrines

Other States declared that their own actions concerned the war against terrorism.

The Popular republic of China

The Communist government of Beijing engaged a policy of repression and of discrimination against the populations Ouïgour be Moslem west of the China. Beijing repressed several riots in the Moslem province with a majority of the Xinjiang. Several separatist leaders ouïgours were carried out in the years 1990 and with the beginning of the year 2000. After the attacks of September 11th, 2001, 22 Ouïgours were stopped by the Americans in the camps of Bin Laden in Afghanistan. They were sent on the basis of American Guantanamo. Washington refused to return them to popular China, because Xinjiang is the only province where the execution of the political prisoners remains commonly practiced.

Russia (Chetchnia)

The war against the terrorism of George W. Bush reinforces the Russian government in the Second war of Chetchnia. Trained in the existing camps as Chetchnia and Afghanistan in the years 1990, and financed by the international terrorist capital, of many nationalist groups djihaddists tchetchenes had regularly recourse to the terrorist acts within the framework of their armed struggle against the Russian domination.

The Russian authorities affirm to have evidence of bonds of the groups djihaddists tchetchenes (especially of those of the emir Al-Khattab or Chamil Bassaïev) with foreign terrorist networks, in particular Al-Qaïda. The Information paper of the Commission of the foreign affairs of the French National Assembly on the international cooperation to fight against terrorism also affirms qu' in terms of training of the terrorists, with the shelter of the Afghan sanctuary, a nebula (Al-Qaïda) with relays in the whole world developed (Algeria, Chetchnia, Balkans…). Towards this sanctuary converged of the hundreds of djihadists. Thus, during five to seven years, of the hundreds of combatants were formed in the Afghan camps, before turning over to Europe, in the United States or in their countries of origin where they had at the same time legitimacy and competence to direct terrorist cells, not having besides more necessarily of direct links with Al-Qaida. .

The parliamentary Parliament of the the Council of Europe affirms that within the framework of the fight against terrorism, become an important international priority, one notes an agreement of sights between the United States on the one hand, and Russia and Georgia on the other hand, on the fight against the combatants tchetchenes and their allies mercenaries, called “Arabic of Pankissi”, hidden on the other side of the Russian border and suspected of being related to the network Al-Qaïda. In October 2002, the parquet floor of Paris opened an instruction on the preparation of an attack against the Russian embassy in the French capital. This investigation was presented by the media under the generic name of the " business of the dies tchétchènes". Indeed, the common denominator of supposed terrorist consisted in the fact that they had passed all through Chetchnia, in 1999-2000 and were related to the Benchelali Imam, itself near to the combatants of Al-Qaida.

According to the Canadian research Center on universalization, The rebellious main leaders as Chetchnia, Chamil Bassaïev et al. Khattab, received their military and ideological formation in camps of drive financed by the CIA in Afghanistan and with the Pakistan . According to Yossef Bodansky, director of the US Congress' S Task force one Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare , the war tchetchene was planned during a secret meeting of Hizb Allah, held in 1996 in Mogadishu, in Somalia. Many senior officers of the Intelligence services Iranian woman and Pakistani, would have taken part in this meeting, to which Usama Bin Laden was also present . To see the complete study: .

According to the declaration the chief of the Russian FSB, Mr. Nikolaï Patrouchev, in November 2005 “was liquidated” as Chetchnia the representative of Al-Qaïda for the the Caucasus of North, the Sheik Abou Omar have-Seif, the large treasurer of the independence combatants. According to the documents seized by the Russian special forces, it would have been indicated to develop the strategies of establishment of “International Green” fundamentalist in the Caucasus by Bin Laden in person, 10 years before.

Israel

Israel for a long time follows a policy armed against the Islamic terrorism represented by the movements Hamas and Hezbollah of which the methods of fight against the Israeli occupation of the Palestine are most of the time terrorist attacks.

Other countries

Others Political against terrorism.
the British intervention in Ireland does not seem to answer these criteria, because the army simply intervened as a police force.

In the Arab peninsula

The United States now makes pressure on their allies in particular in the Middle East in order to engage of the democratic reforms. It was a long time ago the case of the Kuwait after her release in 1991. It is the pressure of the US government which led the Egypt to reform its mode of election of the president and who led the Saudi Arabia to organize at the beginning of year 2005 his first municipal elections while waiting to extend the right to vote with the women to the next elections.

Lastly, the American administration calls directly with the withdrawal of the Syria out of the borders of the Lebanon and gives in this direction its Lebanese support for the movements by the means of its ONG.

Terrorist acts appeared in Iraq following the American intervention. Citizens of all the continents and all the religions were thus taken as an hostage by gangster terrorist movements or groups.

Other terrorist acts directly dependant on Al-Qaeda appeared in Saudi Arabia.

In Africa

Military units of the United States bring a logistical support, help with the formation of the local forces and offer information to several countries of North Africa and the West (Algérie, Chad, Tunisia Mauritania, Morocco, Mali amongst other things) to fight against various groups armed (terrorism and organized crime) which is in the the Sahel within the framework of the Trans the Sahara counter Terrorism Initiative (TSCT) (in the past Initiative the Side-Sahel launched in 2002).

1.400 American soldiers are installed in the Corne of Africa within the framework of the mixed Force in East Africa of the Central Commandement . Their mission consists in carrying out operations and organizing drives aiming “fighting terrorism, making safe the zone and at establishing regional stability”. In order to discharge this mission, it organizes operations civilo-soldiers, operations concerned with the civil cases, and the training cycles in collaboration with the African Union. The zone of operation of this combined force includes/understands the the Comoros, Djibouti, the Érythrée, the Ethiopia, the Kenya, the Somalia, the Sudan, the Tanzania, the Uganda and the Yemen.

This force will be repositioned in 2008 pennies the command of the United States Africa Command.

In Somalia, since 2006, the Westerners support the provisional government and the factions opposed to the militia of the Islamic courts while since 2001, the marines of several nations try to fight against the Piraterie like the Combat off Somalia the March 18th 2001.

In Asia

police Co-operation and soldier increased, technical assistance and exchanges of information to the India, the Pakistan and of another country.
Economic aid and soldier increased with the Filipino fighting against an terrorist activity in the south of the archipelago.
Co-operation with Singapore and other states of the South-East Asia to fight against the Piracy and threatens it of maritime terrorism.

In Europe

police and legal Co-operation reinforced. The special services of the continent exchange almost all their information on the terrorist threats in real-time.
maritime Opération of prohibition Activates Endeavor following the attacks of September 11th, 2001. The permanent naval force at sea the Mediterranean (Stanaformed) of NATO is deployed to take part in the fight anti-terrorism while escorting in other of the ships in the Straits of Gibraltar. 1.200 soldiers concerned.

Forsaken zones and perverse effects

The terrorism aimed by this war is very specific, it is that which threatens the United States (attacks of September 11th, 2001) and its allies, or which can possibly be used as pretext for an intervention which has other goals that the war with terrorism. This war properly étatsunienne is thus avoided international pretexts: defense of the right, the Civilization.

DEBATEs

A true war

For the former philosopher, writer and academician French Jean-François Revel, the Hyperterrorisme is well a war of a new kind: But they are however wars there, since we deal with actions coordinated by an organization with the service of precise political objectives and which appear such with those which continue them.

A disputed expression

The expression war against terrorism can be regarded as a word game on the direction of the word war , which is taken here halfway between its direction illustrated (as in war against illiteracy ) and its own direction. The French minister Dominique de Villepin challenged this name in September 2004: according to him, the word of war applies to a precise context, which is that where two recognized entities of international existence fight in the respect of laid down rules , respect of which they will have to answer at the end of the war (see Tribunal of Nuremberg, International penal court). This extension of direction galvauderait the mot. It does not see there either simple a maintenance of law and order vis-a-vis delinquency or Organized crime, but well a specific phenomenon (enemy nondefinite geographically), and which needs for this reason to keep a specific designation. This definition seems however a little reducing, since for example the civil wars do not relate to “two recognized entities of international existence”.

The expression also seems to give echo to Bin Laden and her “fight of Croisés against the Moslems”.

In 2006, Terry Jones publishes My war against the war with terrorism , compilation of texts where he criticizes the syntactic and semantic diversion of the expression and where he develops a whole of argument to show the nonsense of this not-war .

Traditionally, one distinguishes the conventional war, of the guerilla then terrorism according to the imbalance of the involved forces. But the recourse to weapons of massive destruction can break this distinction. Today already of the attacks like that of New York, Madrid, Bali or Beslan have an assessment equivalent in term of victims so that it is agreed to call “the war”.

Always it is that the criteria which will indicate the end of this war, whose belligerents are badly identified, are not known.

See too

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