Terrorism and National Security: Issues and Trends
Abstract
International terrorism has long been recognized as a serious foreign and domestic security threat. This issue brief examines international terrorist actions and threats and the U.S. policy response. Available policy options range from diplomacy, international cooperation, and constructive engagement to economic sanctions, covert action, physical security enhancement, and military force. A modern trend in terrorism is toward loosely organized, self-financed, international networks of terrorists. Another trend is toward terrorism that is religiously or ideologically motivated. Radical Islamic fundamentalist groups, or groups using religion as a pretext, pose terrorist threats of varying kinds to U.S. interests and to friendly regimes. A third trend is the apparent growth of cross-national links among different terrorist organizations, which may involve combinations of military training, funding, technology transfer, or political advice. Looming over the entire issue of international terrorism is a trend toward proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). For instance, Iran, seen as the most active state sponsor of terrorism, has been aggressively seeking a nuclear arms capability, and North Korea has both admitted to having a clandestine program for uranium enrichment and claimed to have nuclear weapons. Indications also have surfaced that Al Qaeda has attempted to acquire chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear weapons. As a result, stakes in the war against international terrorism are increasing and margins for error in selecting appropriate policy instruments to prevent terrorist attacks are diminishing. U.S. policy toward international terrorism contains a significant military component. Issues for Congress include whether the Administration is providing sufficient information about the long-term goals and costs of its military strategy and whether military force is necessarily an effective anti-terrorism instrument in some circumstances.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Sep 08, 2003
- Accession Number
- ADA473919
Entities
People
- Raphael F. Perl
Organizations
- Library of Congress