PWAD 355 Final

According to Nacos, why may the neat distinction b/w nat'l and internat'l terrorism no longer be useful?

"In the past, a neat distinction between international and domestic terrorism was a useful tool for examining the complexities of the terrorist phenomenon. But this differentiation is no longer meaningful, if only because the news about indigenous terrorism transcends national borders

According to Nacos, how are message boards like Stormfront typically tied to acts of violence? Directly, or in some other way?

- transcends borders - A place where people who are alike go that are white supremacists or Neo Nazis and they draw sustenance and support from each other and has been responsible for around 100 deaths in the past 5 years. Professor: So, how is Stormfront used regarding violent acts? are they actually being planned there? are ppl meeting up on the site to get together for particular acts of violence? or is it something more subtle?

How did AQ view the Islamic State in Iraq according to Bunzel?

-***From 'Ali's perspective, the very idea of the Islamic State of Iraq was problematic, as it suggested itself as "the legitimate imamate known in the Shari'a," i.e., the caliphate. In his view, Abu 'Umar al-Baghdadi's "state" did not meet the test of statehood, which is political capability; as such it was not a state in any actual sense. - as it amounted to an "imaginary state" whose controversial acts of extreme violence were tarnishing al-Qaeda's name. Al-Qaeda had not ordered or advised the Islamic State's behavior; in any case, the "ties" between the two groups had been "effectively cut for a number of years," and the state of affairs ought to be made official -Al-Qaeda, in the Islamic State's view, had become irrelevant to the pursuit of global jihad. Its affiliates were being ordered to dissolve themselves and join the Islamic State.

What % are converts to Islam relative to the % of converts in the population of American Muslims as a whole? (you don't need a number - is it more than, less than, same as?)

-Approximately 40% of those arrested are converts to Islam. Given that an estimated 23% of the American Muslim population are converts, it is evident that converts are overrepresented among American ISIS supporters -Professor: so MORE of the IS guys are converts relative the % of converts in the rest of the Muslim population than, no?

How does she say hate groups obtain financing and revenue? According to Nacos, there are groups that engage in both normal political processes and illegal violence

***-Donations through internet

Why do many white supremacists follow so-called "Christian Identity?"

- At the heart of Christian Identity's original gospel is the claim that white Christians are the true Israelites of the Old Testament and therefore God's chosen people - Identity theology provides both a religious base for racism and ant-Semitism, and an ideological rationale for violence against minorities and their white allies

Who are using children as terrorists, according to Nacos?

- ISIS and affiliate Boko Haram are the main offenders - 'The Islamic State is not the first terrorist organization that recruits and trains young boys to commit unspeakable violence but ISIS is the first terrorist enterprise that documents and publicizes how it runs its training camps for young boy, many not older than 9 and 10 years and some significantly younger" - "Earlier, the Afghan Taliban and Lashkar-e-Tayyiba and the Taliban in Pakistan began the practice of recruiting young boys. Al Qaeda in Iraq, too, enlisted boys to attack U.S troops and their allies. More recently ISIS and its associate in Nigeria, Boko Haram, are the main offenders

The Malike, Khalili, Ackerman, Younis piece argues AQ is on the brink of collapse: why?

- Isis has not simply eclipsed al-Qaida on the battlefields of Syria and Iraq, and in the competition for funding and new recruits. According to a series of exclusive interviews with senior jihadi ideologues, Isis has successfully launched "a coup" against al-Qaida to destroy it from within. As a consequence, they now admit, al-Qaida - as an idea and an organisation - is now on the verge of collapse. - while al-Qaida, largely guided by veterans of the Afghan era, has been brought to its knees in this jihadi civil war. - According to Maqdisi, al-Qaida's organisational structure has "collapsed". Zawahiri, Maqdisi said, "operates solely based on allegiance. There is no organisational structure. There is only communication channels, and loyalty." And unfortunately for Zawahiri, Isis has done its utmost to ensure that loyalty is in short supply. - He said that donations, which once came in waves of "hundreds of thousands", have dried up as donors directed their money to Isis, or else refused to fund further bloodletting between the two groups

The anarchists had a key contribution to the theoretical development of terrorism, "PROPAGANDA BY DEED," you'd better be on top of that

- Propaganda by deed - this argument shapes the thinking of terrorists to this day even if they do not know where they are getting it from. Make your statement by your actions, so attention gets more by one than violence. 1866 invention od dynamite and people believe modern terrorism would not have been possible without it. The car bomb is an anarchists weapon. - Buda's Wagon - The first car bomb

There's a theme we've gone back to again and again about tactical failure and strategic success, make sure you're on top of that

- Raps around to the idea of glorious failure like in Munich where you had guys tactically fail their objective of getting their men released by taking hostages but was a strategic success because it got the Palestinian causes out on the global stage and within 18 months, the PLO was given observer status. - Terrorism can be a tactical failure but a strategic success if it has an audience

Keram and Jannsen say ISIS is using a variety of techniques to grow their base: know what those are.

- Yazidi boys like Yahya had a different fate: The group sought to re-educate them. They forced them to convert to Islam from their ancient faith and then tried to turn them into jihadi extremist fighters. - concerted effort by the extremists to build a new generation of militants, according to a series of AP interviews with residents who fled or still live under IS in Syria and Iraq. The group is recruiting teens and children, using cash, gifts, intimidation and brainwashing - take another community's youth, erase its past and replace it with IS radicalism. - recruiting starts on the streets of IS-held areas at outdoor booths called "media points," where militants show young people propaganda videos. Militants hold outdoor events for children, distributing soft drinks, candy and biscuits, along with religious pamphlets and CDs. Bit by bit, the idea of jihad as a duty is drilled into young minds. The Islamic State group's acolytes distribute toys in the street and tell children to call them if they want to join

According to Hagan, what was the result of the Arab Spring? According to Dauber the 2011 protests of the Arab Spring brought down governments when earlier ones had failed because in 2011 protesters had access to something earlier generations hadn't had

- give way to an Islamic caliphate in Iraq, Syria and Libya and a de facto military dictatorship in Egypt - In 2011 as the Arab Spring spread across the Middle East and North Africa, the West was confronted with a choice: to support the pro-West "secular strongmen" or oppose them in favour of these new mass pro-democracy movements. Neither was really achieved, and where it was (for example, Libya) the follow-up was conspicuous by its absence. The result of this policy, certainly in Syria and Iraq, has been to create a power vacuum in which the authoritarian Islamic State has taken control of vast swathes of both countries, and is currently pushing into Libya. The movement for democracy has ended up creating authoritarian extremism. As George Orwell observed, the meaning of the word revolution is that everything turns full cycle. -That something was smart phones

What are the earliest instances of terrorism we looked at?

-Jewish Zealots - group that refused to listen to Roma rule, also called the Sicarii - Assassins of Persia- also called Hashashin, this term comes from them being dope smokers - Thuggee (India) - ritual kills

According to Nacos, how have handheld devices changed how terrorism is conducted? Do these groups use digital and legacy media for the same purposes?

-Nacos talks about how the team that attacked ten sites in Mumbai, India in November 2008 carried Blackberrys and cell phones with exchangeable SIM cards that made it difficult to track them, they navigated from Karachi to Mumbai with the guidance of a Global Positioning System, and they carried CDs with high-resolution satellite images of their target sites" - Police cannot now shut off power to the terrorists like they could in past because they cant shutoff handhelds ***-IDK

According to Nacos, what's the difference in the way terrorist groups use social media versus mainstream news?

-Social Media as an Ideal Alternative to Mainstream Media - Today, all other means of communication, print and radio broadcasting included, plae in comparison to the opportunities that the internet offers terrorists and hatemongers - To begin with, hate groups and terrorists organizations utilize online media for the same objectives that they hope to further through the traditional media's coverage - They disseminate propaganda material to get attention of friend or foe, to intimidate the enemy, and impress potential sympathizers and supporters; They explain their grievances and demands, justify violence, and portray themselves as legitimate political and/or religious actors. - Computer based communications seem ideal to further several other important objectives, namely: 1.Radicalization, recruitment, and incitement 2.Self-reporting of violence 3. Planning and executing terrorist operations 4. Retrieving valuable information 5. raising funds

Soufan argued flawed assumptions led to no change a year after IS took Mosul. What were those?

-The first assumption, that the Iraqi military can become an effective national military with a bit more training -The second assumption was that Iraq's Sunnis would once again drive off the insurgents -Third, that countering the Islamic State's social media narrative would be effective

The Lima article talks about the systematic practice of rape as sexual conquest and slavery. Be familiar with that system. That piece also argues that b/c casual sex and dating aren't allowed, the slave markets may play a role in recruiting: know that argument.

-The systematic rape of women and girls from the Yazidi religious minority has become deeply enmeshed in the organization and the radical theology of the Islamic State in the year since the group announced it was reviving slavery as an institution -The trade in Yazidi women and girls has created a persistent infrastructure, with a network of warehouses where the victims are held, viewing rooms where they are inspected and marketed, and a dedicated fleet of buses used to transport them. -To handle them, the Islamic State has developed a detailed bureaucracy of sex slavery, including sales contracts notarized by the ISIS-run Islamic courts. And the practice has become an established recruiting tool to lure men from deeply conservative Muslim societies, where casual sex is taboo and dating is forbidden -Their captors appeared to have a system in place, replete with its own methodology of inventorying the women, as well as their own lexicon. Women and girls were referred to as "Sabaya," followed by their name. Some were bought by wholesalers, who photographed and gave them numbers, to advertise them to potential buyers. -To handle them, the Islamic State has developed a detailed bureaucracy of sex slavery, including sales contracts notarized by the ISIS-run Islamic courts. And the practice has become an established recruiting tool to lure men from deeply conservative Muslim societies, where casual sex is taboo and dating is forbidden. - Said the sex was ibadah which means prayer and they they are praying to God

inured

-accustom to something, especially unpleasant -come into operation, take effect

What characteristics are typical of young people recruited by terrorist groups online?

-looking online for people who appear lonely or alienated - socially inept

Know Rappoport's four waves (very broadly speaking) and the order in which they occurred.

. Anarchist Wave - 1880s through roughly 1920s A. The return of political terrorism a. Narodnaya Volya 1."Peoples Will" - Russian group from the 1880s, they were czarists. "Serfs" weren't technically slaves but were pretty close to it. "NV" believed in very precise targeting and normally went around throwing bombs. Believed in regicide - kill the king. Would not kill the innocent civilians, and killed Czar Alexander II. Their big thing was they do not run, you throw the bomb and stand their to wait to be arrested. They would use their trials as a propaganda event to try and turn on the system. This is our professor's term of secular martyrdom. B. Anarchists - 1880's to the early 20th centuries, intellectual group, when they make people believe that anarchists are everywhere it makes them appear stronger than they are and that they appear everywhere. If they engaged in enough acts of violence they could manage to provoke governments to overact and crackdown on everyone. There belief that these crackdowns would reflect the true nature of government. Anarchists believe they could see this clearly but most people couldn't. If they create this illusion that they are everywhere, they actually might do the opposite of their intention and turn everyone against them. They never turned over a single government. - Propaganda by deed - this argument shapes the thinking of terrorists to this day even if they do not know where they are getting it from. Make your statement by your actions, so attention gets more by one than violence. 1866 invention od dynamite and people believe modern terrorism would not have been possible without it. The car bomb is an anarchists weapon. - Buda's Wagon - The first car bomb 2. 2nd Wave: Anti-Colonial 1920's-1960s A. Violence is controlled 1. Carefully calibrated violence is a hallmark 2. There's a calculus at work - they want the civilians in the colonizing nation to think "Is this Policy worth what we need to do to sustain it?" The real target is the political will of the colonizers civilians. They want the people to say holy crap, no everyone home, if they don't want to be a colony okay lets leave. The terrorists basically can also say what body count are you willing to accept amongst your troops but also amongst your civilians. You can crush any organization if you're willing to crush them. 3. Does terrorism only work on Democracies? Dictators have a easier time washing coverage. B. Internationalization is key 1. Appeals to audiences outside immediate geographic are - Atlantic Charter 1941 - Allied nations get together to give the war everything they had to set principles and how do they see the world being after the war was over? Fighting so that all nations had the rights to govern. Countries after the war that didn't get the independence they were promised when they gave people to help fight the war, this is what sparked this kind of terrorism. 2. Attract media attention (Especially international media attention) - this became easier as time went on because television began to spread throughout countries - Algerian FLN DIR #9 - " Is it preferable for our cause to kill ten enemies in an oued{dry river bed} of Telergma where no on will talk of it, or a single man in Algiers which will be noted the next day by the American Press?" -> these people fought the French for independence, small in numbers and no way they could beat the French army which is why they resort to terrorism, we are going to win by killing people in the cities around the American Press. Important to note this was a rhetorical question. 3. Appeals to Diaspora Population - these populations are populations that have moved out of their home country and gone elsewhere. Community that moved from their homeland and resettled somewhere else. These are targeted by terrorists groups for funding. o 3rd Wave Early 60's New Left : • People's War- this concept came from Mau in China. You start by spreading the successful conditions for revolution. First you get support from people on the country side. • Che Guevara: he believed there was a need for global revolution, but for this to happen there has to be a vanguard to create the conditions • Carlos Marighella: The Mini-Manual of the Urban Guerilla, this is a practical guide or how to guide on terrorism. How to run a campaign for it and strategize it. He differs from Mau because he thinks the violence needs to be urban. Builds off of Che by saying it needs to be run by a small group. His ideas are used to across the world even though they don't know it. Successful phases: 1. Conduct violent attacks 2. Follow up the violent attacks by giving them meaning and you do that through propaganda and communication. These acts would force governments to reveal their repressive nature. Groups that followed this idea: o Italian Red Brigades o PFLP o 17 November (Greece) o Baader-meinhof (Germany) o Japanese Red Army o Sendero Luminoso (Peru) o All of these fell apart with the collapse of the Soviet Union because their money run out. o 4th Wave: The Religious Wave (Kickoff in 1979

Dauber argues AQ at its peak was so successful in large part b/c of certain structural characteristics: make sure you know what those are

1. Really was a corporate structure A mix between IBM and a Marxist revolutionary cells. Tight security 2. If you only take the best, you only get the best Qutb idea of the vanguard, so how do you implement that? They did this from their admissions, so if you take only the best and are highly selective, then only the best will seek you out because you make it known the people who don't meet the standards wont make it 3. An adaptive learning organization Story: on their target list they wanted to takeout a US navy combat vessel: USS Sullivan Brothers. They were going to send a suicide boat, but did the math wrong and their ship sank. When this happened they sat everyone down and redid the math and figured out what went wrong. In Suddam's Iraq, he would have just killed the people who messed it up and nobody would have known why it failed. The guys trust of being fairly treated allowed them to share the knowledge of what went wrong and how they could fix it 4. Reframed the conflict - reframed every conflict - as al the same conflict Convince these smaller local groups to adopt their agenda and reframe their issues according to Al-Qaeda's framework and this effects their targeting decisions - why hit these small targets when you can hit these big global ones and with these smaller groups doing that they were given resources, training, etc

What's the average age of those arrested for ISIS activities relative those arrested for terrorism more generally?

26

What percent of those arrested for ISIS activity are male? (ball park, you don't need a specific number.)

86%

What was the relationship b/w anti-colonial groups and the level of violence? Anti-colonial terrorism really ramped up after WWII b/c of the Atlantic Charter: KNOW THAT.

A. Violence is controlled 1. Carefully calibrated violence is a hallmark 2. There's a calculus at work - they want the civilians in the colonizing nation to think "Is this Policy worth what we need to do to sustain it?" The real target is the political will of the colonizers civilians. They want the people to say holy crap, no everyone home, if they don't want to be a colony okay lets leave. The terrorists basically can also say what body count are you willing to accept amongst your troops but also amongst your civilians. You can crush any organization if you're willing to crush them. -Atlantic Charter 1941 - Allied nations get together to give the war everything they had to set principles and how do they see the world being after the war was over? Fighting so that all nations had the rights to govern. Countries after the war that didn't get the independence they were promised when they gave people to help fight the war, this is what sparked this kind of terrorism.

Where do federal agencies derive their definitions of terrorism from?

Agencies aren't making up the definition, they are given by the charter or piece of legislation that sets them up.

Vidino and Hughes write about American supporters of IS. Why are they hard to categorize?

American ISIS activists and sympathizers are active on a variety of platforms, from open forums like Facebook, Google+,and Tumblr to more discrete messaging applications such as Kik, Telegram, sure spot, and the dark web. But Twitter is by far the platform of choice of this informal echo chamber. For this reason, our researchers focused on the Twitter activities of approximately 300 individuals identified as American supporters of ISIS. Identifying the 300 individuals was challenging because most online ISIS sympathizers seek anonymity. Individuals were coded as Americans if they self-identified as such; if Twitter's geo-location software placed them within the U.S.; or if they used a variation of the kunya "al Amriki" in their Twitter username or handle. Additionally, researchers analyzed the content of English-speaking ISIS sympathizers for syntax, spelling, word selection, and cultural context and cross-referenced lists of followers to isolate Americans from the much larger English-speaking ISIS community on Twitter. The categorization of an account as belonging to an American was reaffirmed on a few occasions, most frequently when an individual's criminal complaint and/or indictment made reference to social media accounts. In at least one case—that of Terrence McNeil—a technical mistake by an ISIS supporter on social media revealed their identity as an American.102 Professor: They're hard to characterize b/c their demographic details are all over the map.

Terrorist groups will manipulate variables of suicide bombers to make an attack esp. shocking - which ones?

Any individual bomber might have any number of demographic characeristics (maybe characteristics is a clearer word.) So if I'm the guy who picks who goes out and detonates, I can manipulate how shocking the bombings are by who I decide to send. Is it one single young man after another? Or do I start sending out older men who are leaving behind families? Maybe I start sending out moms, as was discussed in the last lecture. Those kinds of variables would make suicide attacks even more shocking, no?

According to Mattheis in the last lecture, what are some of the biases or beliefs about gender (supposedly female characteristics) that lead people to conclude women will not be active participants in terrorism?

Biases: Passivity, Caring-Emotional, Non-violent, and Romance

According to Nacos, since 2008 the number of right wing extremist groups in the US have increased or decreased?

Decreased

After US armed forces withdrew, the Iraqi Prime Minister was a disaster. Why?

Departure of the US from Iraq • The problem was the way we came out, is that everyone came out and we left no residual force so we have no political leverage with the government of Iraq and no leverage with the Prime Minister, Nouri Al-Maliki. Why does this matter? He was Shia, and without us checking his behavior he acted in a very bad way, meaning he oppressed the Sunni. The Iraqi army was gutted as a result, he took out the guys that were trained by the Americans, and replaced them with his guys so then they can have the good paying jobs, and then they will owe him.

Who was Ibn Taymiyya, when was he writing, why was he important? (what were his contributions?)

Ibn Taymiyya (1200s) • This guy was referenced in chat rooms more than bin Laden. • The Arguments o No deviation allowed - Taymiyya is writing when there is a single great question facing the Islamic world, Taymiyya said the reason the giant Islamic empire was defeated and crushed because God no longer favored them and that he wasn't on their side, fallen off the true path. What had they done wrong? They had fallen off the right path, but you can get back on God's side by falling the right path. To Taymiyya, its all about practice. He said our practice was correct but not it's not. o Apostasy - you aren't practicing your faith wrong, you have turned away from you faith. There is only one punishment for apostasy - death. No such thing as I'll do better tomorrow or second chances. o The profession of faith - there is but one God, and Mohammad is His Prophet - How things were before Taymiyya o Takfir - a category that Taymiyya creates and he and his guys decided if you were takfir. These people now are called Takfiris. If you were considered takfir by these people you were no longer considered Muslim o The goal is a unified Caliphate - The large empire that she showed on the map was a unified Caliphate • Caliph - the one overall leader that runs the Caliphate, a good Caliph according to the Sharia law would use the Quran as his guide. No real separation between church and state o The Centrality of Jihad • Contemporary Application - Why is he so important to today's guys? o Fatwa Against the Mongols (Something he wrote) • Fatwa - you go to someone who has as scholarly background (cleric), and you ask for a religious ruling on how to live a devout Islamic life (email example). An example of the Fatwa in ISIS, is it okay to harvest the organs from our prisoners. • Mongols conquered them and would try and make nice with the people they conquered. Married the local women, convert to Islam and make nice. This created a problem with the Muslims because their was a strict prohibition against attacking Muslim leaders. Every king dies eventually, just wait the guy out. On the other hand, if you attempt to overthrow a ruler, you risk a fitna - social disorder or chaos. • People came to Taymiyya and asked for a loophole that would allow them to attack now the Mongrels, who were now their leaders that were now Islamic. The argument he came up with was that Mongrels weren't real Muslims. They ruled with Sharia and their own legal codes, so they were blending them together, which Taymiyya said was a corruption and a real ruler would rule in only Sharia, so that now the Mongrels were considered takfir. This set the precedent for today when a ruler isn't ruling in only Sharia law, the ruler is considered takfir, and this also effects the population because if the ruler is takfir, the population is obligated to fight them and if they do not, they are then considered takfir. This logic can get out of hand real quick, as seen in the Algerian Civil War example.

Who was Wahhab, when was he writing, why was he important?

Ibn Wahhab (1700s) • Founder of Wahhabism (1700s) • Based in part on interpretation of Taymiyya • Central concept is Tawhid - the unity or oneness of God, anything that interferes with this idea or suggests other than this that could lead people to idolatry, it might lead to polytheism, it has to be destroyed. Shirk - refers to polytheism or idolatry o Destroyed shrines and tombs - they even destroyed Mohammad's tomb for the sake that if people found where he was buried it might become idolatrized. Burned shrines and libraries in Timbuktu. Any practice post Mohammad that had any innovation, they wanted it all gone. • No distinction between your status as Muslim, status as good Muslim - in other words, this is threshold and not a linear issue. You cant say I will try to do better tomorrow, once you fall off the wagon you are done. There are people in ISIS who have known to have said the Quran says you must pray 5 times a day, we caught you praying a 6th time. Once things are about practice and not faith, you must be real careful because things become very rigid

Why are Iran and Saudi Arabia competitors? (hint, you need to know which is Sunni and which Shia.) The Iranian revolution also put great pressure on the Saudis: why? Make sure you're up to speed on the story about the Grand Mosque takeover.

Iran: Shia, SA: Sunni o Puts worse pressure o the Saudis - complete crisis • Who leads the Islamic world? - as far as the Saudis were concerned they believed that answer to this was crystal clear, that they had the two holy places, strictest in the Sunni world, most aggressive in trying to get other Muslims to live their version of Islam, Shia are barely registered as Muslims and at best 2nd class Muslims, so they believed it was them. Iran is the largest wealthiest and most powerful Shia state. Main competitor to the Saudi's but hadn't played their role really because had a secular administration but this changed when Iran was overthrown and both then claimed to be leaders of the Islamic world for religious reasons. Iran is arguing Islam can be the basis for a state - they are a theocracy while Saudi is a monarchy. This competition goes up all the way until today, and having proxy wars going on. • Grand Mosque takeover - by 1979, the Saudis are way wealthy. They are unique that they are the only country in the world named for a family. Who is getting the lion share of the money - royal family. You can't do business without their hand in everything. It is an open secret that as all this money goes to the royal family, inside the kingdom they lived as devout Muslims, but outside the kingdom they lived different lives - gambling, buying yachts, drinking, smoking, expensive clothes. This was deeply offensive for conservative Muslims - not how much money they took but what they did with it. * The prophecy story* * The taking of the mosque story* The Saudi's didn't have a plan for this because didn't think would happen. Sent a team to the mosque and then they were sniped. They blacked out the news, was no internet or cable or smart phones anyway and they shut down the city basically. However by doing this and creating a news black out - the news is that there is no news - but they begin to speculate that something awful has happened. Mecca goes dark for 3 weeks and Saudi doesn't answer any questions - Zbigniew Brzezinski - was one of Nixon's people and he causes a press conference and speculates that Iran bombed Mecca. Iran responded and said no we haven't done anything and they would never touch Mecca as devout Muslims, and they say it was the Americans. The Muslims in Pakistan then believe that it was America and they burned down our embassy. Riots and attacks on Americans in these countries. The people who took mosque new that it would be a big enough embarrassment to the royal family to put them in danger of being overthrown. They saw the news blackout coming so they wrote up charges against the royal family. They left them with friends and supporters throughout the country and these people had a designated time to release the charges. The royal family had another problem that the only way to get the mosque back is through violent force. If they use violence without clerical approval they are also done. They need the highest level clerics to give them permission to use force in the most holy site. They borrowed French special forces and had a quick conversion before entering city. Clerics sign off on this but now they have a lot of bargaining power. In the end, all the people in the mosque who held them captive ended up dead. Clerics now then demanded of most things being dialed back and most of the rebels things were what got dialed back

Is Al Queda dead?

Is Al-Qaeda dead? - No • The argument was always disingenuous - at its best, this was true of Al-Qaeda senior leadership o People wanted to believe Osama Bin Laden was it - we got him, its game over - Bush made it seem like it he was the goal with the whole wanted dead or alive poster phrase o Wildly irresponsible press • No one ever asked we got Bin Laden, how will that effect the other 7 or more affiliates of Al-Qaeda. Then they ignored the Islamic State. Nobody in the American press was mentioning it. There are amazing reporters that cover topics like this and risk their lives, so its not necessarily the reporters problem because they will write about it, but then their editor might not publish it. Having ignored ISIS for such a long, then they only reported ISIS as if AQ had gone completely away. A if we are only going to allow a certain amount of time for crazy terrorists o Complacency - we act as if it has been 15 years so what do we have to worry about - when people complain in security lines at airports about taking their shoes off. Each is treated as a complete unique event that has nothing to do with one another where in fact they are all basically connected in the same ideology. o Obama administration (certainly campaign) lied • In order to mislead the public and get us to believe that the threat was gone. • Benghazi was a preplanned setup that was attacked by an AQ affiliate - they framed it as a protest that went wrong and manipulated by the public by doing so because they had the power to • Osama Bin Laden was never the organization o He was invaluable symbolically o There was debate over how much command and control he had o In advert ant ways, taking him out may have strengthened him. Now they don't have to worry about all of these things to protect him. Now they have a boss who can send emails occasionally and use a telephone. We made their command communications wildly more efficient. We made room at the top for more brutal leadership. Bin Laden cared about what the Muslim masses thought because he always wanted to reign in the affiliates that later became ISIS that were too brutal publicly. With him gone, it freed space for people who don't have those kind of issues. o Killing him was worth it because the gains were more than the losses. Even though it kept him contained where he lived and slowed their communication process, killing him was so large symbolically to the American people and to the global jihad movement o A single blow was never going to take them out - originally the way they communicated to the larger world was by send a courier to Al-Jazeera or sent someone to London. Now however they do everything online, and you cant kill something that is now on the internet without killing the internet all together. When Awlaki died, there were about 5,000 videos on YouTube from, but now there are 55,000. Making new videos of old stuff, like memorials. Makings martyrs out of them, but better then having them make new videos or plot attacks o Affiliates now operationally more dangerous - stories now about people just getting up and doing things, story of woman stabbing the man for voting for Iraq War o Persistent efforts to radicalize westerners - once online they use the internet to radicalize and recruit- Comey says this is a huge problem because now you don't have to go out and look for material. They realized now that they couldn't train people and insert them into the countries. This business model wouldn't work after 9/11, so they targeted people that were already here legally.

How was the Afghan war "a safety valve?"

Islamic governments would send off the radicals to go fight in Afghanistan and then they are out of our hair and they will die there -Professor: Got rid of radical members

What was Zarqawi's key tactic in relationship to the Shia community?

Key tactic that he used and key goal was to initiate a sectarian war, a religious war. Like Iran, Iraq is mostly Shia, but unlike Iran, it has been ruled by its minority Sunni population. He wants a civil war and chaos. If I can do that, he believes that in a matter of theology that his greatest enemy is the Shia. Partially this is a tactic, he figures if he can hit the Shia hard enough, they will fight back and attack the Sunni community and then the Sunnis will want someone to defend them, and he will be right there ready to help them. It is also partially a bank shot, he figures fastest way to get Americans out is not to fight them directly, but can convince the American people that Iraq is hopeless and no reason for us to be there, get these guys out between these two groups. The problem is he keeps hitting the Shia population, and the head of Shia keeps saying don't hit back, don't hit back, don't hit back. He says he is going to find a target so big that the head of the Shia wont be able to hold his people back. He targets the Gold Mosque, and after this, it was on.

What was the key difference b/w the passengers on United 93 and those on the other 3 flights on 9/11?

Known as the first battle against terrorism • There were no difference in these passengers and others on different planes. This was the last plane to take off and they understood what was happening because they were talking to people on their phone. They understand now that being passive was not an appropriate response • Todd Beamer "Lets Roll" -What did make them different from the earlier three flights is that thanks to the delay and their ability to communicate with their families, they knew what the passengers on the earlier flights did not: that the nature of hijacking had changed, that being passive was no longer a legitimate survival strategy b/c they were not being flown to a different destination, but were now essentially sitting on home brew missiles.

Be able to look at a particular scenario and know whether it is one of the "terrorism adjacent" phenomena we talked about. Be able to look at a particular scenario and know whether it would count as terrorism, and if it would (or would not) why. Events: Truck Bombs Marine Barracks in Beirut ELF Burns Ski Resort Pentagon 9/11 USS Cole Attack OKC Bombing UNC Pit Attack East Africa Embassy Attacks Beslan School Attack VT Massacre Jared Lee Loughner, batman shooting Abortion Doctor Sniper Syrian Gas Attacks Fort Hood Shooting ISIS Execution of Soldiers Charleston Church Shooting

Nacos Definitions Terrorism - Terrorism Adjacent - Guerilla Warfare - State Terror - Nacos, "Terrorism is political violence or the threat of violence by groups or individuals who deliberately target civilians or noncombatants in order to influence the behavior and actions of targeted policies." Professor: Difference between state terror and war crimes?: ---Both are committed by states (or agents of states) the difference is that state terror is systematized and used as a method of population control (Soviet gulag, North Korean gulag, Syrian or Iranian system of detaining without trial protesters etc.) and the other is used in the context of combat (so, in Syria, its the difference between sweeping of protesters and detaining them and torturing them and bombing them with chemical weapons or barrel bombs.)

Is visual i.d. always necessary for US governmental policy before a drone strike?

No - Metadata - Signature Strike - Double Tap

Is there a consensus on the definition of terrorism, at the domestic or international level? If there isn't, are there reasons why there aren't?

No Reasons: - People want to make exceptions, governments have to agree to write treaties, terrorists would obfuscate the term, media will make it worse

Why do the Pakistanis care about Afghanistan?

Pakistan number 1 national security goal is keeping a strong border a long India, and because of this wants an Afghanistan they don't have to worry about. So the best way to do this is by having them basically being the same. We came to Pakistan saying hey help us with our Soviet problem in Afghanistan, and they see this as huge and play along as as if they care about the Soviets, so they are using the money we give them to give to the most radical militias and create the most radical Afghanistan because this is what is best for them. We got played because we assumed Pakistan had the same agenda as us, and they didn't. We weren't aligned with the militias and customs in Afghanistan to know the difference of what was happening

What parameters of an attack can terrorists manipulate in order to communicate? With which audiences would they possibly communicate?

Parameters of Manipulation: - Target - Date - Weapon Audiences: 1. Group's natural constituents - the people the group thinks that they are doing it for 2."Swing voters" - people who could go either way 3.. International community- very vague group 4. Target audience - the groups enemy, the people they are trying to terrorize.

How does she characterize use of the internet to coordinate terrorist activities: simplistic, developing, sophisticated, what?

Part of the information was encrypted and difficult to decode, but it revealed for the first time how sophisticated terrorists utilized computers for planning their operations

Why is terrorism a unique form of violence?

Professor: Its unique b/c its communicative and because its communicative it requires . . . an . . . AUDIENCE, right?

Who was Qutb, when was he writing, why was he important, what were his contributions?

Qutb • Nacos says that he is Muslim Brotherhood, but we aren't sure whether or not that's true • Does most of his writing in the early 60s. What leads him to his writings? - His whole story about the masters program and going to Colorado • The Argument ? o Milestones - this book is everywhere in the Middle East, trying to answer about the same question as Taymiyya. How is the US the power of the world, when they are such degenerates and awful people - the only possibility is because God has withdrawn his sanction. o He adds the updated concept of jahiliyya - a mainstream Muslim would call this a time of darkness before Mohammad receives revelation. You cant blame them for being pagans because they don't know. Qutb says that their practice is wrong and people have strayed so far away from Islam that they don't even realize they are in a time of darkness. o No compromises, ever - you can't do your practices a little bit, you have to do it completely and exactly how long it says to do everything. It's not about what you believe, its about practice o Good Muslims are not permitted, but required to wage war against apostate leaders - So he comes back from America and is looking around the region where many rulers are allies with the US and not fully participating in Islamic activities, so he says they are not good Muslims. How can we handle our rulers that are apostates? o There has to be a vanguard - Why? The masses will not rise up on their own. You need a small educated elite to rise up everyone else. Telling people that are reading this book that they are special and it's up to them to help save their country. People like to hear that they are special. Good Marketing • The Impact o Sovereignty belongs to God alone - anything that God reserves to himself or says it's his, that's it, it's his forever and ever. Once God put Sharia law into the Quran, this carved out law-making. The concept of writing laws is carved out, and his forever. Any man made laws are you using God's appropriate law. Only legitimate process for writing a law is that if it comes out of the Quran. o Democracy = Blasphemy

Know the difference between Sunni, Shia, and Salafi

Sunnis believe that the most competent companions of Mohammad were right in succeeding him o Salafist - Islam is no more a single unified world than Christianity is. Iraq and Iran are majorly Shia while the rest of the world is Sunni. Salafism is a form of Sunni - and they argue that a pure form of Islam is by practicing that of people with living memory of Muhammad. "Salaf" means founders • Salafist does not always equal terrorist - not only do these people not equal terrorism, they also reject violence. • Pretty much any (Sunni) terrorist will be a Salafist • A correct term that would clear things up and help • Shiites believe that Mohammad's descendants were his spiritual heirs, with his son-in-law Ali first in line Salafist - Islam is no more a single unified world than Christianity is. Iraq and Iran are majorly Shia while the rest of the world is Sunni. Salafism is a form of Sunni - and they argue that a pure form of Islam is by practicing that of people with living memory of Muhammad. "Salaf" means founders • Salafist does not always equal terrorist - not only do these people not equal terrorism, they also reject violence. • Pretty much any (Sunni) terrorist will be a Salafist • A correct term that would clear things up and help would be a "violent salafist". The problem with this term is that not many people know what it means

According to Nacos, could a disruptive attack, against the electrical grid lets say, ever be more destructive than an intentional mass casualty attack?

Terrorists who aim at seriously disrupting a country's or region's infrastructure could aim at hitting electric power grids and gas pipelines. A blackout of the Stock Exchange or Wall Street Firms and their backups would affect and perhaps paralyze the domestic and global financial markets. Such incidents do not simply disrupt the lives of people in the immediately affected areas but cause ripple effects that are felt throughout and country and abroad and that inflict high costs on individuals, the business community, and markets.

What did the title given the leader of the Islamic State mean?

The newly proclaimed leader of the Islamic State was titled amir al-mu'minin ("Commander of the Faithful"), the traditional title of caliphs in Islamic history, and he was described as a descendent of the Prophet's tribe of Quraysh, establishing a traditional qualification for the office of the caliphate.

Osama bin Laden (OBL) got one really big idea from the Sudanese: what was it?

This is important in the first instance because the Sudanese are the first part where bin Laden steals their visionary idea and applies to Al-Qaeda. The Sudanese bring both Shia and Sunni and argue that look we have bigger problems at home than killing each other. Lets take care of the West and our apostate governments and then we can get back to killing each other. Original Al-Qaeda embraced this idea at first and not many people remember that

Is the saying "one man's freedom fighter" (etc. etc.) true, false, or other, according to Dauber?

This is true, as far as it goes. But it does not go very far...

What are the procedures a group has to go through to get itself declared a wilayah of the Islamic State? (see Masi article.) Why does Arrango argue local people may accept IS?

Though ISIS supporters now span the globe, ISIS has official provinces, also known as "wilayat," only in places where it can directly exert a form of control. The expansion of the so-called caliphate happens according to a clear procedure. Each current and future wilāyah (the singular form of the word) has its own a strategic purpose for the group, whose stated goal is widespread domination according to the strictest interpretation of Shariah, or Islamic law. The application process is complicated and long. Several groups that pledged allegiance to Baghdadi in the early months of the caliphate have yet to be acknowledged as provinces -extremist groups that aspire to lead a wilāyah must have a unified leadership, a strong base of fighters and be the dominant jihadi group in the area -Once the groundwork has been done, the next step to getting Baghdadi's acceptance is to publicly declare allegiance in a way that can be documented and shared. The underlying goal is for Baghdadi to be recognized as the leader who can restore the Muslim world to the perceived glories of the past. -The first group to become an official ISIS wilāyah was Ansar Bait al-Maqdis, based in the Sinai Peninsula -Under the Islamic State, he said, life can be brutal, but at least it seems more stable for those who can avoid crossing the group's leaders -"The judiciary system is swift and effective. That is why locals find stability in ISIS, and wrongdoings such as bribes and corruption are barely heard of.

Dauber argues that we can know terrorist attempts to get media coverage are intentional b/c of a specific aspect or characteristic of the evidence for this claim: know what that is.

We get out hands on documents for OBL and the FLN Dir. 9 which indicate that there attempts to get media coverage are intentional - We know their media strategies because of internal documents that weren't meant to be public

The hate groups that have survived over generations: are they ones that have moderated their views?

Yes

Is terrorism a rational choice? If so, why?

Yes -Impossible to defend against - All Targets are soft targets which there are infinite number of - Terrorism can be calibrated to reflect a group's aims and motives

Do terrorist groups or hate groups ever use art, fiction, creative works?

Yes, ISIS has used call of duty in their videos, GI Joe movies and they have taken pictures in the same formation as the avengers

What happens to you if you're a terrorist group and you don't attack international targets?

You want receive the full attention you want Ex. South Moluccan Island Terrorists and attacks on the Dutch

Bunzel also says that Zarqawi eventually swore fealty to OBL, but didn't do so for years: why?

Zarqawi did not submit to Bin Laden's authority in Afghanistan due to his stricter theology

According to Bunzel, in 2005 AQ leaders outlined what steps as a strategy for AQI?

Zawahiri outlined a four-stage strategy for al-Qaeda in Iraq, telling Zarqawi to expel the Americans, establish an Islamic state, expand the jihad to Iraq's neighbors, and ultimately confront Israel. Zawahiri described the first two goals as "near-term." Like 'Adl he appeared optimistic, envisioning the Islamic state to be in the offing. He hoped that eventually it would "reach the status of the caliphate."59

What are examples of roles women have played in terrorism that are currently on the rise?

Zohra Drif: Algerian Independence Leila Khaled: Palestinian Liberation Gudrun Ensslin: Baader-Meinhof Gang Mairead Farrell: IRA Female member of Tamil Tigers The Black Widow: ISIS The White Widow: ISIS ***Maybe Recruitment and leading roles

When was the first military deployment of drones? What are the requirements, in the US, before drones will be launched against American citizens?

o 1982 Lebanon War • The conflict - Israel used drones to take out the Syrian air force • First Military application of drones Anwar al-Awlaki - American citizen killed in Yemen via drone strike, and because of this the CIA released what makes it okay to strike a US citizen 1. Ranking enemy operative 2. Imminent threat 3. We cant capture them - this strike also killed his 16 year old son that might not be radicalized

She also argues the anthrax attacks were brilliantly conceived as a terrorist attack. What did that guy use that frightened people so much, and what about it scared them so bad?

o Begins Sept 18 - only 7 days after the attacks • It comes in nature through spores, but then they grind it up into a fine powder, Unabomber? • We know now that they had nothing to do with 9/11 and know that they had nothing to do with any terrorist organizations - we didn't know any of this until years later. We thought this was the 2nd wave of attacks and it was biological. OKC bombing was seen as an attack on Oklahoma, and 9/11 was seen as an attack on the US, but now they didn't know where the 2nd wave would be. • Less than a dozen people got sick, a small number died, but a crazy percent of the country told pollsters that they had changed the way they were opening the mail. The targets of these attacks were a couple of senators and members of the media. Even though this wasn't a terrorist attack, if it would have been it would have been a brilliant attack. Attacking the media makes it seen that media was personally under attack. Media covered it crazy because of this. If these senators were shot it doesn't create terror but sympathy, where as now something that could target everybody created terror. • There was the circulation of the pictures of handwriting and this made things worse because it made it look so ordinary and how anyone could have this •

What mistake did Pres. Clinton make after the attack on the East African embassies? In what ways were the East African embassies attacks "classic" AQ method?

o Clinton makes OBL a star - law of unintended consequences - he didn't talk about some vague terrorist network, he specifically named OBL. Since our cruise missiles didn't kill him, it made OBL the man who stood up to America and lived and this made him an idol to many people. • Introduction of "Classic" Al-Qaeda method o Patience, patience, patience - sleeper cells were there so long that they married local women to make sure they seemed like legit immigrants o Use of suicide attackers - Islam is definitive that suicide is a sin so AQ's people had to come up with some manipulation to make the argument that what they were doing was legitimate o Not just large, not just spectacular - simultaneous - they liked having more than one attack going on at once o Most of the victims were Muslims - most of the victims were local people, from the start more Muslims have been injured and killed by AQ than the US and their allies. AQ's response to killing Muslims is well they aren't real Muslims - in this case especially because they should have been in the Mosque. If they kill a righteous Muslim, they say we sent them to paradise o Selection of target for symbolic reasons - they want to kill and hurt a lot of people but they also want a symbolic target so they look for both • The Target o The date: Anniversary of the arrival of the 1st US troops to Saudi in 1990 o Embassies were a genius target - much more vulnerable in 1998 and all these attacks lead to strict standards for them for US ones (Inman Standards). A story for another day - all of these standards were waived in Benghazi. Attacking an embassy is a way to attack American soil sense they couldn't get here at the time Professor: think you mean the 1998 East African embassy bombings: those were simultaneous. That was the first real ex. of what came to be considered "classic" AQ method -- they were almost exactly simultaneous.

Know the basics about the Iranian hostage crisis

o Group of Iranian students hold most of embassy hostage - when they took our people hostage, this was a made for television event. Reporters said people were protesting all day every day but most of the time it was for 15 min when the press were there. If a country that doesn't speak English has a protest where the sign are in English, it is meant for us. Hostages were held for 441 days?

Why was internationalizing so key to modernizing?

o International hijacking makes it impossible to ignore a group or a cause. People that had nothing to do with the dispute were now becoming targets. Attacking just the group that you have the dispute with isn't enough to get attention of outside groups. South Moluccan island example is proof. Another option they had was they will use enough dynamite to kill 10,000 people but then this doesn't work because it discredits them because they are too violent that no one will negotiate with them. Once international air travel is in play, you have essentially attacked everyone, even if not literally, you have potentially done so.

Why was the Munich attack so successful? It was, according to Dauber, the first what? What does she argue got hijacked (metaphorically speaking.) Why do we remember Munich but not that Dawson's Field deal?

o Munich was the first event that we are going to categorize as "terrorist spectacular". This events are designed and planned for global television, therefore it is seen live by as many as hundreds of millions • The international television audience because the Olympics are the one time that gets the whole globe watching - Dauber says that technology was built that allowed for live coverage of out of studio events -- game changer

According to Dauber, the Bush administration knew almost immediately that it was AQ that had attacked us (we heard Betty Ong in class call in the seats the hijackers were in, other flight attendants made similar calls) yet they stalled telling the public for days. Why does she say they held that information back?

o Sept 20 - president gives address to Congress and says we figured it out and it is a group called Al-Qaeda, gives an elaborate explanation. Why did they wait 9 days for explanation? They needed to give the pentagon and CIA time to come up with stuff. Those 9 days also gave the everyone in the country a time to catch their breath a little bit. 9/11 compared to Pearl Harbor - difference is FDR was trying to get everyone riled up and lets get those bastards. Bush wanted the people to calm down and make the correct military response

What's the critical bright line b/w terrorism and legit military action?

o Terrorists don't target other combatants o 1.Targeting is the key bright line between terrorism and legitimate warfare • terrorists go out of their way to target noncombatants

Why was the FBI the lead agency on the Cole? B/c the FBI was a law enforcement agency (remember, this is pre-9/11) that had certain ramifications: have a general sense of those.

o The FBI was the lead agency - Why? PDD (Presidential Decision Directive) 39 - Was response to the aftermath of OKC. If it is terrorism, I'm putting the FBI in charge. They didn't think to make the distinction of whether or not it was domestic or international. One problem with this was that they were a law enforcement agency and their goal is criminal prosecution (catch the bad guy). Have to find evidence that is subject to the evidentiary standards of the US courts.

When the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan, what was their narrative about why they'd won?

o They believed that God had intervened on their side - They had been outmanned and outgunned so how was it possible that they had won? The answer of that question was in a story in the Quran called the "Battle of Badr". Same situation had happened in this story, but God sent down his angels to help the Muslims, and well you cant beat God's angels so they won. They look at these events and aren't understanding this as trying to understand the world as a parable, they see this a historical event. All of these guys believed in what Taymiyya said, so now this was proof that they were back on God's side and favored by him because they believe they won because of him o They believed the defeat in Afghanistan led directly to the collapse of the Soviet Union - it did not help the Soviet Union but there were other factors. There was a Polish Pope, where he grew up in a Catholic Church that was heavily prosecuted by a communist regime. They continued to push and push back against communism. Mikhail Gorbachev became chairmen of the Soviet Union. He was younger than most chairmen and viewed himself as a reformer to change the Soviet Union so he could save it. 2 key policies. Perestroika - referred to an economic change that would open up just a little bit of free market. Glasnost - "the opening" - they would open up with a little more information by allowing the Soviet press to say things like the soldier deaths in Afghanistan and other information. o They believed they'd defeated the most powerful military on Earth - Soviet military was a representation of the society that it represented. This was partially our fault in making them think this due to our propaganda to try and get people to support our military.

AQ lost the physical sanctuary of Afghanistan and migrated where, according to Dauber? At that point its relationship to the affiliates changed. They had resembled one type of American business (a metaphor) and now resemble a different one.

o We have bombed them, and then dropped aide, and then have our marines on the ground. AQ is now being pushed out of Afghanistan and they are losing their sanctuary o Early Dec, 2001 in Tora Bora - big mistake • We have them pinned and now lets finish them. Our special force guys says send us some more people so we can finish them off, but we don't because we don't them to see our external forces as occupying forces. They are told to work with Afghan troops, but they decide they don't want to finish them off, lets give them a break and try to negotiate, and this break allows AQ to escape through the mountains to Pakistan. Professor: Sorry, this is our mistake, it didn't occur to us in writing the guide that there really are two possible answers as the guide words it (the test question is precise, promise). We are thinking of the web, the internet, because that became their alternate sanctuary. • The Change o Prior to 9/11 the way it worked was an affiliate went to the center and then the center reached out to who they needed and worked that way. It never went to affiliate to affiliate. o Post 9/11 - the affiliates worked more like franchises, corporate tells you what is on the menu and what the general rules are and then you take it from there. You are independent but you are independent to a certain limit. • The Periphery, not the core o The AQ core, senior leader or original groups of guys, Bin Laden's inner circle, there is dispute of the command control relationship that this core has over the rest of the affiliates. We can say that they have spent most money on ideological work, propaganda work, and staying alive work. They themselves have not really been performing operations, so for the most part, the affiliates are the ones that pose a threat Professor: If both are mentioned that's a note taking issue: hub and spoke is what was going on pre-9/11, before they lost Afghanistan (resembling the US commercial airline sector) franchises (think fast food) after.

Who was Zacharias Moussoui?

o Zacharias Moussoui (The 20th hijacker- mentioned as sometimes but he has nothing to do with it - there were only 19 actual hijackers) -FBI looked into him because he was at flight school and they were like hes making them uncomfortable because he couldn't speak English well and didn't really care about take off or landing, but just part in the middle

Why does she say groups "go public" on the internet while committing violent strikes?

they can communicate with people via twitter, but it is also used to draw the greatest possible attention

We've detailed who fits in the "AQAM" set of buckets, be sure you know that list.

• "Core" AQ (AQSL) These are the originals, bin Laden and the boys, wondering around Afghanistan and Pakistan • Formally affiliated groups Other groups that have sworn their allegiance to the Core, and take orders from them, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula • Fellow Travelers More or less in agreement, but have not sworn allegiance or there has been some kind of split. ISIS would fall in this category because they were a splinter that came off of al-Qaeda • "Jihobbyists" Guys that don't belong to a particular group, participation is mostly virtual, they participate not to go pick up guys but to produce media and propaganda

What are the ideological differences b/w AQ and ISIS/IS?

• Both at the end of the day are violent salafists groups but there are some key differences but The Islamic State and Al-Qaeda • The Caliphate - the restoration of the caliphate is a goal of all these people even in different groups, but it's a goal we will get to in someday, eventually, it will be great....someday. It is never part of an action plan. Then ISIS goes ahead and actually does it, and when they did it, the simple fact that they were willing to make this declaration, shifted every ounce of cool in the jihadist movement directly to them. All of the sudden, AQ was no longer the cool thing, but rather the old men still fighting. • Apocalyptic - This is true going back to when they were AQI, this is not saying that this is the end of days or that that would even be a good thing, but that the end of days would be a good thing and they can help bring about that. o How is that possibly true and not blasphemy? • They have a list of prophecies that are more like a playbook that they can go and make happen, different than other end of days prophecies. One is that you will defeat the armies of Rome on the fields of Dabiq. They lost and took so many people here because they were expecting the Roman army to come and fight them. There is another prophecy that says the end of days will come when a slave gives birth to her minister. No, pregnant slaves means no end of days. This has to do with their sex slaves. Al-Qaeda believes there will be one, but its someday, sometime, in the future. They have never picked up a calendar and picked a day or try to bring about Judgment Day. • Relationship to Non-Believers - non-believers to the people of The Islamic State is most people in the world. You are one if you are not a Muslim. Their first targets are the Shia Muslims. It is a huge deal to them if you are committing idolatry and to them, the Shia put so much value on Muhammad that they have idolatrized him. Sunni Muslims that don't believe are also non-believers. Non-believers are handled by either you convert and believe or you are killed, and even if you commit we probably wont trust you so we will kill you too. Also in the process, we will take your kids to our re-education camp. • State Building - o to them this is a state building project - this is not a metaphor but an actually state that is better than any and their goal is legitimacy and expansion. They try and do this from recruitment and propaganda - class videos o Relationship to other states - once the caliphate is declared, if you believe its legitimate than every Muslim everywhere owes it's allegiance to The Islamic State, not where you are living. At the point, you are to make hijra, which is moving to The Islamic State. There were many videos trying to convince people to go to The Islamic State. - video at the park o Sykes-Picot - was that France and Great Britain drew the maps and boundaries of the state that were illegitimate to them

How can we best describe the relationship b/w Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and OBL?

• He is Jordanian and starts out as a street thug. He's living at home with his mom and he is in and out of jail. She enrolls him in religion class in hoping that is straightens him out. This fires him up and he wants to go to fight the Soviets, but he gets there as they are pulling out. Comes back to Jordan and ends up in prison and now starts to become radicalized. Maqdisi further radicalizes him, and they form a terrorist group in Jordan and get arrested immediately and are back in jail. The King of Jordan dies, the new leader now creates a general amnesty and lets these two out. By now, Afghanistan is ruled by the Taliban. He goes back there and is introduced to Bin Laden. They meet and almost immediately realized they cant stand one another. He is not invited to join, and this is a pretty serious diss, but they also don't throw him all the way out. They offer to sponsor him his own training camp, but is not considered Al-Qaeda. He had no knowledge of 9/11 and then didn't know the Americans were coming. Like many of the jihadists and Bin Laden's inner circle, he escapes out of Afghanistan and ends up in Iran. Iran is Shia so why would they like these Sunnis, but they thought they would come in handy eventually so they had them in a really nice house arrest. He ends up in Northern Iraq, and sets up a small terrorist group and he waits. There is no evidence but there is a pretty good guess that the US will invade Iraq, and he will be there waiting for them. In 2003 the US goes into Iraq, and he renames the group, "Al-Qaeda in Iraq", but he has no relationship with Al-Qaeda so it is pure branding, just takes the name. This gave him instant attention. Meanwhile, core AQ is hiding and running, they are radio silent regarding attacks, and now you have AQ in Iraq bombing the UN and Jordanian embassy. He is now the guy with the hot hand in jihad. Key tactic that he used and key goal was to initiate a sectarian war, a religious war. Like Iran, Iraq is mostly Shia, but unlike Iran, it has been ruled by its minority Sunni population. He wants a civil war and chaos. If I can do that, he believes that in a matter of theology that his greatest enemy is the Shia. Partially this is a tactic, he figures if he can hit the Shia hard enough, they will fight back and attack the Sunni community and then the Sunnis will want someone to defend them, and he will be right there ready to help them. It is also partially a bank shot, he figures fastest way to get Americans out is not to fight them directly, but can convince the American people that Iraq is hopeless and no reason for us to be there, get these guys out between these two groups. The problem is he keeps hitting the Shia population, and the head of Shia keeps saying don't hit back, don't hit back, don't hit back. He says he is going to find a target so big that the head of the Shia wont be able to hold his people back. He targets the Gold Mosque, and after this, it was on. This was in direct contradiction of what Bin Laden was working for, this was that the Sunni and Shia should be working together. Even though they didn't like what he was doing, he was doing all the stuff, getting money, and recruits so they have no choice but to accept him. Zarqawi was setting new standards in that they would kill hostages in brutal ways, film it, and post it on the internet. Nick Berg was an American trying to make a fortune in Iraq, but was captured by AQ in Iraq and beheaded online. AQ core is like what the f**k, and sends letters to Zarqawi, but he ignores them which is unheard of.

How did the Arab Spring start?

• Most of the Arab countries were run by dictatorships of one form or another even if they were called presidents. They sucked the resources out of these countries, and there families were worth billions. So you had a few rich families, but then the rest were poor. The big change in one city was that a man had to pay a bribe at city hall and he had enough and so he set himself of fire. Tens of thousands of people protested on memory of him and were moved by what he did and demanded change. The things people had now was that people now had smart phones and could upload videos before police could get them. The Tunisian family left on plane with their money rather than being hung. This spread across boarders and protesters were in all these kind of countries. In Syria, four boys were spray painting these things like screw Hassad and stuff like this, but then the security people took them. Parents freak out and no one knows where they are, but then they meet with the chief of police and they don't know he had them. He basically says, your sons are gone, go make more sons, if you want, we will with your wife. The boys bodies are sent back home that were tortured to death, and boom this sent people off and the city was all out on the streets and the rest of Syria know it. The cops try to violently shut it down, and then it pisses off the next city and this cycle continues and then the people start to fire back and suddenly it is a civil war.

The so-called "surge" is actually a nickname - for what? Why was the Sunni Awakening critical to its success?

• The "Surge" - nickname for counterinsurgency o Coin o Counter-Insurgency - strategy that requires many more forces, goes along with the "Surge" - was more successful but happened at the exact same time as the Sunni Awakening, they didn't cause each other, but fed off each other o FM-3-24 - only military field manual that made NY Times best seller list. o Sunni Awakening - Anbar Awakening - Sahwa • Once AQ comes into your village, you live by AQ rules, or you are dead. What turned the tide was that Iraq was a tribal society and the way this worked was also through inter-marriage and this is how they kept they peace between certain people. AQ moves into the village and they were saying that they were marrying local girls, and high local leaders stood up to them and they were shot. This made people mad and was the point of no return, and now said they would have the Americans help to deal with them.

The Islamic revolution put pressure on the US: why?

• This Happens during the Carter Administration. He is following the Nixon Doctrine which said we can't be everywhere all the time. Problem number 1 is we will worry about the Soviet Union and in other regions of the world we will deputize other countries and makes sure they are well armed and well equipped. In the Persian Gulf our deputy was the Shah in Iran who is now gone. Now the people in power have all the weapons from America that were given to the Shah. • "Islamic Fundamentalism" Professor doesn't like the term, but in 79 we had no context for this and nobody knew what this meant • Lack of Warning - right up until the Shah is actually overthrown, all intelligence agencies said Iran is really stable. Now we are saying holy crap we missed something this big, how could we trust anything else we knew if we missed something this big. • We were shown as powerless - it is really hard to over estimate the psychological impact that Vietnam had on this country. The blow to our self confidence is staggering from this. Seemed as if getting pushed around again. Holding our hostages and nothing we could do about it. "Nightline" originally started during the Iran hostage situation and was meant for a news update

What are the Wiliyats to the Islamic State? Are they the same as AQ affiliates?

• Wiliyats o Not affiliates - they are more comparable to provinces, however there are not always contiguous. o Non-contiguous - this is important is talking about breaking up their structure, Libya, Philippines are example