Motivating the War on Terror

Defining Terrorism

Terrorism is a difficult term to define
- In one study 119 different definitions for the term were found in respectable literature.
- This difficulty is enhanced by its emergence as a one of the most pejorative terms in our time. It is used to charge that actions are an uncivilized form of warfare.

Terrorism is not a new form of warfare

During the American revolution it characterized the war in the South. Homesteads of "loyalists" and "patriots" were attacked, whole families including women and children were killed, buildings burned to the ground. The objective, like in modern terrorism, was to spread fear that would weaken the commitment to the enemy army.
The United States' war on Native Americans was marked by the same practices. Natives burned homesteads, killed men, women and children or carried women and children into slavery. The United States burned Native villages and committed atrocities we still call "massacres" up into the 1890s. Smallpox was spread through blankets in a form of biological warfare.
In Cuba and the Philippines during the Spanish-American War, terror was carried out by the armies.
In World War II the bombing of London by the Nazis, the destruction of Shanghai by the Japanese, the fire bombing of Dresden and Tokyo by the allies, and the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki are all characteristic of warfare by terror designed to break a will to fight.
The warfare between Israel and the Arabs after 1948 has been marked by terrorist acts.

In the late 20th century, terrorism is marked by:
- Asymmetrical warfare. If there is a great disparity of power between two forces, traditional warfare by the weaker power is folly; terrorism may offer an alternative. If those committed to the weaker power are to give their life for their commitment, an effective suicide terrorist mission may be a more logical (in one sense of that term) choice.
- Warfare between cultures. Terrorism works by finding the vulnerabilities of a culture and attacking those vulnerabilities. It not only attacks military forces but attacks the cultures that support them.

9/11: What was unusual about it?

Having lived through it, ask yourself this question and provide yourself a fulsome answer.
It was an attack on US Soil.
It was an attack by other than a nation-state. The rules of war made us anticipate war as something that was made by nation-states. Identifying al Qaeda as the perpetrators did not fit this rule.
The target was civilian in addition to military.
It was the first attack of the age of modern communication
- The first attack on American soil of the television age. We experienced it visually.
- The first attack of the internet age. We could search for answers on the uncontrolled internet.
- The first attack of the cell phone age. Presented a new complex of personal and national communication.

George W. Bush's choices in responding rhetorically to 9/11

Was 9/11 a crime or an act of war?

A different rhetoric surrounds each of these and guides the society to react differently to the events.

	Crime	War
Power	Asymmetrical. Crime is the action of an individual or a small group of individuals against the public order.	Symmetrical. War is fought against another nation-state whose army is to be respected as nearly as strong as ours.
An act of	Deviant from normal society. A criminal law defines deviation from the dominant viewpoint of society.	Enemy. Typically a nation-state. War is much more a one on one encounter among somewhat equals.
Prudent response	Investigation. The crime will be investigated carefully, evidence will be gathered, indictments prepared.	Justification of war. The just-war doctrine will be invoked to cast the events into a framework that makes war the legitimate response.
Community of actors	Criminal justice system.	Military structure.
Rights defined by	Domestic complex of civil rights defined by Bill of Rights and United Nations Declaration of Human Rights.	International law. Specifically the Geneva conventions relating the the rules of war
Scene in which response plays out	Courts of Law	Battlefield
Outcome	Justice	Victory or defeat.

This choice demands a different rhetorical framing:

Rhetoric of Crime. The president would declare the act to be a criminal act committed in opposition to society. He would promise an investigation and assure respect for the rights of the criminal. He would also isolate response to professionals of the criminal justice system. He would promise that everything would be done to identify the perpetrators, and bring them to <justice> as an end.
Rhetoric of War. The president would declare the act an attack against the nation, its commitments and values, invoking the typical ideographs of national identity. He would identify and "enemy". Typically this would be a nation-state. He would identify a response underway by the military, and commit the military and/or the nation to oppose the enemy. He would establish victory as the end. He would finally transform the defeat, which something like 9/11 certainly represents, into a commitment to persevere.

Thus, as an initial choice, George W. Bush had to decide how he was to frame the 9/11 events and thus which approach to response he would motivate.

Bush's response was

In Florida, immediately after the attacks he uses a rhetoric of crime.
An hour later, now in Louisiana, he employs a mix of both rhetorics.
By September 20, he is using the rhetoric of war.

Bringing the Motivating Power of American Rhetoric of War to Terrorism

The uniqueness of terrorism as a mode of war required an adaptation of the rhetoric of war.
This adaptation defined rhetorical requirements on President Bush:
- Who is the enemy? Al Quada was virtually unknown to the public before the attack. This had not been true in previous wars. An enemy had to be created.
- An organization rather than a nation-state as enemy. We are used to warring with states. What does it mean to war with an organization? Or is that what this is?
- The war had to be defined as a just war. How did he attempt to do this? Did he succeed?
- What kind of a war was to be motivated? Given the types of wars that we have fought, which kind is this to be? Then the characteristics of the rhetoric of that kind of war became necessary.
- The obvious defeat had to be molded into a commitment to the war. How did he attempt to do this? Did he succeed
- Victory needed to be defined to give a sense of progress to the war effort. How was this to be done? Did he succeed?