Counter ‘new age terrorism’

(MainsGS2:Security challenges and their management in border areas - linkages of organized crime with terrorism.)

Context:

• Recently meetings of the United Nations Security Council Counter-Terrorism Committee, the No Money for Terror Conference, and an Interpol Conference on the issue of countering terrorism worldwide.

Strategic implications:

• History is most relevant when it comes to ensuring a proper understanding of threats such as terrorism, which have a long-term impact. 
• While there appears to be a lull as far as major terror incidents are concerned, it must not be lost sight of that it was as recently as at the beginning of this century that the world witnessed several landmark terror attacks. 
• Two that stood out were the September 11, 2001 terror attack in New York, and the November 26, 2008 attacks on multiple targets in Mumbai. 
• Both had profound strategic implications as the 9/11 attack heralded what came to be regarded as ‘new age terrorism’, while Mumbai underscored the dangers of state-sponsored terrorism.

Defining threat:

• During 2016, the IS launched several more spectacular attacks (some with its allies) across Asia, Europe and North Africa. 
• The intensity has since declined to an extent, but this is offset by indications of new complicated patterns of relationships among various terrorist conglomerates. 
• It has provided a fillip to many fringe extremist organisations that nurse a terror mindset. 
• Hence, it would be wise for those in authority to heed the warning that terrorism could well prove to be the defining threat of not merely the present, but to future generations as well.

Growing ambit of terrorist:

• The belief that the growing ambit of terrorist activities was the primary reason for the recent spate of meetings on terrorism would, however, be misleading. 
• Very little seems to have been discussed at these meetings on how to deal with the spate of newer terror groups, i.e., groups apart from al-Qaeda and the IS, whose ambit of activities had widened and become more widespread. 
• There is again no indication that the meetings took stock of the fact that ideology intertwined with religious extremism had become an even more potent threat than previously. 
• Instead, it would seem that the terrorist ‘handle’ had become a useful ploy for many governments to drum up support for their various initiatives, without much substance to their declarations.
• No doubt, today’s scaled-down attacks of little known targets do not attract public attention but as in most other fields of human endeavour, it is the small incidents that portray what could happen in the near and the not too distant future.

Way ahead:

• What is most needed by world leaders, at one level, is not to accept all declarations of a decline in levels of terrorism at face value and, at another level, not to treat some terrorists as good and others as bad, based on each nation’s predilections. 
• The next step is to reactivate the proposal for the Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism (CCIT) that has been languishing in the offices of the UN (since India first proposed this in the 1990s), and finalise the list of items needed to check terrorism globally. 
• Acceptance of the CCIT would send signals far more potent than empty platitudes by world leaders at global conferences on the need to defeat terrorism. 
• Once the CCIT is accepted by the UN, the war on terror would gain a new salience.
• Counter-terrorism agencies the world over need to hone their skills and capabilities on how best to counter ‘new age terrorism’. 
• There is also a clear need for counter-terrorism agencies across the world to function in a more coordinated manner, exchanging both intelligence and tactics.

Conclusion:

• Counter-terrorism experts will again need to enlarge their expertise to accommodate multi-domain operations, and undertake terror ‘gaming’, all of which have become essential in today’s day and age.