American Jihadist Terrorism: Combating a Complex Threat

Abstract

Between May 2009 and November 2010, arrests were made for 22 "homegrown," jihadistinspired terrorist plots by American citizens or legal permanent residents of the United States. Two of these resulted in attacks - U.S. Army Major Nidal Hasan's alleged assault at Fort Hood in Texas and Abdulhakim Muhammed's shooting at the U.S. Army-Navy Career Center in Little Rock, AR - and produced 14 deaths. By comparison, in more than seven years from the September 11, 2001 terrorist strikes (9/11) through May 2009, there were 21 such plots. Two resulted in attacks, and no more than six plots occurred in a single year (2006). The apparent spike in such activity after May 2009 suggests that at least some Americans - even if a tiny minority - continue to be susceptible to ideologies supporting a violent form of jihad.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Dec 07, 2010
Accession Number
ADA536056

Entities

People

  • Jerome P. Bjelopera
  • Mark A. Randol

Organizations

  • Library of Congress

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Air Platforms
  • Biomedical
  • Counter IED
  • Engineered Resilient Systems
  • Human Systems

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Counterterrorism
  • Criminal Investigations
  • Criminals
  • Employment
  • Ethnic Groups
  • Fish
  • Geography
  • Human Population
  • Interagency Coordination
  • National Security
  • Personnel Management
  • Police
  • Residential Section
  • Societies
  • Terrorism
  • Terrorists
  • Weapons Effects

Readers

  • Military History of the United States in the 20th Century.
  • Political Violence and Terrorism Studies.