The New Terror

It infiltrates and burrows quietly through society to isolate and tempt and encourage and train the young and the disaffected, looking for a deeper meaning in their lives and finding it in the promise of self-sacrifice. They immerse themselves in the ideology of fiercely fanatical Islamism and find their purpose in life within its confines. Part of a tight, like-minded, assertively-violent enclave of believers in active jihad.

The West believes that when it offers education, creature comforts, opportunities for advancement in those free and open societies there should be none to find fault with them. Freedoms guarantee that people can speak as they wish, associate with whom they will, practise their faith without concerns, and be free to have political and social and ideological connections that appeal to them.

Seems fair and just and why would anyone object? But then reality intrudes and it becomes evident that it is not only what obtains living in free and democratic Western countries that matter but how those who live in such countries view what these countries are engaged in elsewhere, where some of their residents and citizens have cultural, ethnic and heritage ties.

Above all, ties of religion. And when these vulnerable people feeling disgruntled about how they perceive the West reacting to values and priorities that have meaning to those torn between an adopted culture and one that is a traditional one, in ways that demean, degrade and threaten the traditional one, they become readily engaged in psychological conflict within themselves.

It becomes a problem of where loyalty lies, and if there is a deep-seated aggrievement against a heritage and religious attachment and the appeal for revenge is strong enough, along with the acclaim that will result from among other like-minded vengeance-seeking cadres, the adventure proves irresistible, and a home-born jihadist is born.

Countries within the European Union, the United States, Australia, Canada, all have been introduced to the advent of the home-grown jihadist. Who are instructed to maintain a low profile while identifying their line of activity, either attacks abroad, joining an established group like the Taliban or al-Qaeda or its affiliates doing battle with foreign troops in Muslim lands, or turning inwardly.

Because of the launch of new and integrated security measures in the West, and growing vigilance against planned terror attacks on a large scale alerted through shared intelligence, the mission of the jihadists has turned to small-scale, unexpected attacks with high shock value, because they are never anticipated and it is never known what the target will be and from which direction it comes.

This is how terror works. There will be successful attacks, like transitway suicide bombings, like shoot-outs at U.S. army installations, like bombs set out at tourist attractions, and there will be a far larger number of apprehended attacks, where intelligence and vigilance pay off and those planning assaults will be arrested before they are able to launch their attacks.

It is by incremental bits and pieces; a shock here, a threat there, whether or not they are carried out to fruition and success; that they exist and that they are meant to threaten, to mount a successful attack, that they see their success in. This is how legends of terror and their associated fears grow.

In the growing suspicion and apprehension from the public and from authorities reacting to them. In the cost to business as usual, in mounting protective and expensive responses. Mounting fear and insecurity. In a growing sense of doom and inevitability.

Because...you never know...where...when...how...why.