Manekshaw PaPer no. 69, 2017KNOWLEDGE WORLDKW Publishe.docx

Manekshaw PaPer no. 69, 2017
KNOWLEDGE WORLD
KW Publishers Pvt Ltd
New Delhi
Centre for Land Warfare Studies
New Delhi
Ce
nt
re
fo
r la
nd warfare studies
victory through v
isio
n
cLAWs
Major Akshat Upadhyay
Anatomy of Lone Wolf Terrorism:
Special Emphasis on Countering Violent
Extremism

Issn 23939729
Ce
nt
re
fo
r la
nd warfare studies
victory through v
isio
n
cLAWs
Centre for Land Warfare Studies
rPsO Complex, Parade road, Delhi Cantt, new Delhi 110010
Phone: +91.11.25691308 Fax: +91.11.25692347
email: [email protected] website: www.claws.in
CLaws army no. 33098
The Centre for Land warfare studies (CLaws), new Delhi, is an
autonomous think-tank dealing
with national security and conceptual aspects of land warfare,
including conventional and
sub-conventional conflicts and terrorism. CLAWS conducts
research that is futuristic in outlook
and policy-oriented in approach.
© 2017, Centre for Land warfare studies (CLaws), new Delhi

Disclaimer: The contents of this paper are based on the analysis
of materials accessed from open
sources and are the personal views of the author. The contents,
therefore, may not be quoted or
cited as representing the views or policy of the Government of
India, or Integrated headquarters
of the Ministry of Defence (MoD) (army), or the Centre for
Land warfare studies.
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Contents
1. Introduction 1
2. structural analysis 12
3. solutions 17

4. Conclusion 21
5. references 22
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AnAtomy of Lone WoLf terrorism
Anatomy of Lone Wolf Terrorism:
Special Emphasis on Countering Violent
Extremism
Introduction

The running over of two on-duty soldiers in Canada, the
massacre of 77
people in norway, the mass shooting of 13 soldiers in Texas, a
failed attempt
to blow up Times square in new York City, the decapitation of a
British
soldier in London and many such incidents are portents of an
emerging,
though not novel, form of terrorism. This phenomenon, also
known as ‘lone
wolf’ terrorism or ‘home grown’ terrorism, fuelled by the
unhindered capacity
of the social media in terms of networking, anonymity and
propaganda
dissemination, has left law enforcement agencies foxed and
policy-makers
struggling to identify common linkages, pinpoint causal factors
and, thereby,
come forth with a strategy to counter the threat.
what exactly is ‘lone wolf’ terrorism? what are the reasons for
its
evolution? How are these supposed ‘lone wolves’ identified? Is
lone wolf
terrorism really generated by itself, in isolation, as most
analysts tend to
believe, or is there a need to relook at some of the core societal
issues
to understand this phenomenon? what is the role of the social
media in
the proliferation of ‘lone wolf’ attacks across the world? how is
it that an
organisation like the Islamic State (IS) is able to indirectly
influence foreigners
in their own homeland to conduct attacks on their brethren?
with the help

of various case studies, the author will attempt an explanation
to all the
abovementioned questions.
Terror, legally and technically, has numerous meanings and a
context has
to be provided to bring out its situational relevance. however,
for this article,
we may define terror as “the unlawful use of force or violence
against
persons or property in order to coerce or intimidate a
government or
the civilian population in furtherance of political or social
objectives.”1
This definition, to an extent, limits the cases that may be treated
as terror
incidents. Since what we have laid out is a contextual
definition, we may ask:
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why are fratricides, daylight robberies, random stabbings or an
extraordinary
amount of violence being faced by the common man, not
perceived as
terrorism and classified as merely criminal/ homicidal acts?
These incidents,
too, create fear though may be for the person affected and his
near family,
and through the media, the local community. To classify any
incident as
terrorism, the intent and perception are important, and the
nature of the
act should be political. however, most critical is the narrative
being spun,
that of a third person, an alien, an unknown out to destroy ‘us’,
someone
who doesn’t like ‘us’, our ‘freedom’ or ‘way of life’. seen in
this frame
of reference, the events mentioned in this paragraph are
considered to
be mere crimes, localised in nature, often with mal-intent but
not an all-
encompassing objective of creating a fear psychosis in a broad
chunk of the
population. The narrative remains local. Terrorism is
externalisation in the
form of events creating big-bangs, causing huge damage to a
multitude of
lives and, most importantly, undertaken by ‘them’, the

terrorists. It becomes
relatively simple to blame ‘the others’ for striking fear, for
foreign ideologies.
Personalities such as Osama bin Laden, Leila khaled and
organisations like
Hamas, Al Qaeda and today’s Islamic State (IS) become the
figureheads of
terror. But what happens when the home nation itself is
converted into
the new battlefield? The renewed threat of lone wolf terrorism
has to be
understood in terms of the post 1979 scenario.
The term ‘lone wolf’ terrorism was popularised by white
supremacists
Tom Metzger and alex Curtis in the 1990s who believed it
comprised
underground or small cell activities continuously targeting the
government
in anonymous attacks.2 A formal definition of lone wolf
terrorism is, “The
threat or use of violence by a single perpetrator (or small cell),
not acting
out of personal material reasons, with the aim of influencing a
wider
audience, and who acts without any direct support in the
planning,
preparation and execution of the attack, and whose decision to
act
is not directed by any group or other individuals (although
possibly
inspired by others).”3 according to Professor Mark hamm of
Indiana state
University, an expert on lone wolf attacks, a lone wolf is
“someone who
acts alone without the help or encouragement of a government

or a
terrorist organisation, who acts without the direction or
leadership of
a hierarchy, someone who designs the plan and the methods by
himself
without any sort of outside support, and who acts totally alone
without
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the support of any second individual or third individual.”4
rafaello
Pantucci, in fact, goes further and categorises these attackers
into four groups:

loner (acts alone, no connection with any extremist group), lone
wolf (appears
to act alone, some level of contact with extremists), lone wolf
pack (group of
individuals who are self-radicalised, but have not yet
established contact with
extremist groups) and, finally, the lone attacker (individual who
acts alone but
has clear command and control links with an extremist group).5
One of the most important strategic thinkers of the extremist
movement
abu Musab al-suri (real name: Mustafa setmariam nasar)
evolved the concept
of ‘leaderless jihad’ whose starting point was his belief that al
Qaeda was more
than a group or a terrorist organisation.6 It was a methodology,
a reference
point and a call to arms to all Muslims to attack western targets
in small
self-organising, loosely connected cells, without any defined
hierarchy. The
9/11 attacks were supposed to be a clarion call for such a mass
mobilisation
that would force the end of western support for Middle eastern
dictators,
collapsing their regimes, expediting the establishment of
Shariah-run states,
and culminating in the establishment of a Caliphate, bin
Laden’s ultimate aim.
This was termed by al-suri as Nizam la Tanzim or System not
Organisation.7
Lone wolf terrorism has become enmeshed with this ideology.
One of the major differences between lone wolf terrorism (also
known by

its synonyms: leaderless resistance or jihad, individual
terrorism or freelance
terrorism) and organised group terrorism is that attacks by
groups such
as al Qaeda are primary-level attacks, in that they are a direct
result of
the political intention of these groups. This intent may range
from targeting
the ‘far enemy’ to the establishment of a Caliphate. Lone wolf
attacks are
secondary-level and tertiary-level attacks, conducted by
individuals
influenced by direct interaction with members of these groups,
inside the
country or while travelling abroad, and indirectly, through
sermons, news,
the internet, audio, video or literature respectively. Lone wolves
are also
different from sleeper cells as they are not embedded into the
society by an
organisation for a particular purpose, to be activated later. They
are already
a part of the society and have multiple paths to radicalisation,
some being
self-radicalised through the internet or available literature,
some through
guidance from abroad or direct contact with a member of the
numerous
radical organisations. again, a clear distinction has to be made
between
individuals who are part of an extremist group but carry out
their acts alone
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such as the shoe bomber richard reid, and individuals who carry
out their
act alone, influenced by groups or their action or propaganda
but are not
part of any hierarchical structure of a terrorist organisation.
This article
specifically focusses on the latter cases.
Lone wolf terrorism has taken on such dark hues that it was
classified
by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI’s) strategic Plan
of 2005-09 as
the most significant domestic threat to the US.8 The United
states senate
Committee on homeland security and Governmental affairs, in a

report,
titled “Violent Islamic Extremism, the Internet and the
Homegrown
Terrorist Threat”, has labelled the homegrown extremist attack
as one that
will remain a threat to the United states and Us interests
overseas.9 a total
of 198 cases of such attacks were reported in the Us, europe,
Canada and
australia combined between 1940 and 2010, with 98 occurring
in the United
states from 1940 and 2013. Out of these, 38 occurred pre 9/11,
while 60
post 9/11.10 a broad sampling of these cases would be examined
and their
peculiarities pointed out which could assist law agencies in
understanding
Islamic terrorism’s latest and most potent arsenal.
In order to discern points of commonality amongst the various
lone wolf
attack cases across the years, it is required to cast as wide a net
as possible.
The author has studied and analysed 22 cases of lone wolf
attacks spanning
two decades, ranging from Baruch Goldstein in 1995 to Dylan
roof in 2015.
The ideologies that are supposedly the motivations for these
attacks are also
varied, from white supremacism to jihad to Zionism. The
maximum number
of countries and continents have been represented. after a
thorough analysis,
a number of apparent causative elements have been culled
which have to be
subsumed under a number of structural heads, in order to be

understood
properly, and the relevant courses of action decided. These are
listed below:
y Multi-culturalism vs Assimilation: The United states is, in a
cliched
terminology, known as a ‘land of migrants’ and a ‘melting pot’
of cultures.
There is an effort inside the country to integrate all immigrants
within
an overarching ‘American’ culture, with an almost mandatory
learning of
english and adoption of ambiguous ‘American’ values. also,
persecution,
based on ethnicity, race and religion has occurred on a not-so-
rare basis
in the Us, starting from the afro-american agitations and the
subsequent
violence by the Black Panthers in the 1960s and 1970s, the
knee-jerk
incarceration of a majority of Muslims in the wake of the
september 11
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attacks11 to the recent spate of targeting of black teenagers/
young adults
by the police.12 This perception of undermining of own culture
and forceful
assimilation has created disillusionment and anger in a few
members of
the minority communities. This anger is being conditioned and
directed
against the homeland by various agencies and individuals. On
the other
hand, europe is suffering from the liberal notions of multi-
culturalism.
Burdened by an acute manpower crisis in the wake of the
destructive
world war II, europe invited and coerced hordes of workers,
especially
from north africa and the Middle east, to rejuvinate its
economy. There
was an effort to integrate these workers within the working
culture of
the country, which may or may not have fructified to the extent
needed.
a case in point is that of Mohd Merah, a second generation
French
algerian whose mother was married to sabri essid who tried to

send
fighters to Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI).13 his brother, abdulkader
Merah,
was connected with a Belgian-based jihadist recruitment
network that
sent Belgian and French militants to Iraq via Cairo.14 his sister
souad
Merah fled to Syria where her partner joined Islamist forces.15
since his
childhood, Mohd Merah was fed a steady diet of his distinct
identity as
a Muslim, rather than a Frenchman by his family.16 This was
reinforced
by the time he spent in jail. an idea, a notion that limits the
integration
of various communities with the native population within a
nation-state
and promotes cultural isolation, multi-culturalism has resulted
in the
formation of pseudo ‘ghettos’ near major urban centres in most
european
Union (eU) countries such as Molenbeek near Brussels, the
capital of
Belgium. Molenbeek acted as a transit point for the perpetrators
of the
Paris attacks as well as the Brussels suicide bombings in
2016.17 Merah’s
neighbourhood, Les Izards has been ignored by the French
authorities
for long, and is known for its discrimination against arabs.18
This has also
created opportunities for radicalism to inch its way into the
psyche of
countless unemployed young men like Merah, thriving on state
welfare
benefits, as they feel alienated from a government and a people

they
don’t identify with.
y Perception of Government Policies: Mohd Merah’s attacks in
Toulouse and the nearby town of Montauban in March 2012
were to
protest against France’s recently passed law banning full-face
covering in
public places and the presence of a French contingent in
afghanistan as
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part of the International security assistance Force (IsaF).19 his

sister, in
fact, stated on record that she was proud of her brother’s
martyrdom.20
Faisal Shehzad’s reason for parking an SUV filled with
explosives in New
York’s Times square was in revenge for the drone killings of his
people
in Pakistan.21 arid Uka killed two Us servicemen at Frankfurt
airport
in Germany on March 2, 2011, to prevent more Us soldiers
going to
afghanistan and raping Muslim women.22 Most of the attackers
have
cited western military presence in afghanistan and Iraq as
reasons for
their acts. In fact, when a Jordanian pilot, Moaz al-kasabeh, was
shot
down and captured by the Is, the militants connected the
Jordanian
jet and, hence, the Jordanian regime, with mass casualties of the
syrian
Muslim population and proceeded to burn him alive. The IS has
justified
its attacks on the citizens of western nations, on the fact that
these
civilians have voted their respective governments to power.
Variants of
this belief can be found in the rhetoric of almost all the militant
Islamist
groups. IS agitprop in the form of an apocalyptic final battle
between
the armies of Islam and the armies of ‘Rome’ in the nondescript
town of
Dabiq, syria, has accentuated the perception of all these acts
being done
in the fulfilment of this prophecy.23

y Financial Distress and Criminal Background: anders Breivik
lost
two million kroner in the stock market when he was 18 years
old.24
Michael Zihaf-Bibeau who attacked the Canadian Parliament
building in
Ottawa on October 22, 2014, was a habitual offender with an
extensive
criminal record, who lived in a homeless shelter.25 Dzhokhar
Tsarnaev,
younger of the Boston Marathon bombing brother duo, was a
cannabis
dealer.26 The Tsarnaev family survived on food stamps and
government
welfare27. Amine el Khalifi, accused of attempted suicide
bombing of
Capitol hill in the Us was indicted on charges of possession of
marijuana,
and traffic violations.28 Faisal Shehzad, a financial analyst in
the US, was
from a wealthy Pakistani family, his father being a retired air
Vice Marshal
in the Pakistan air Force.29 however, a collapsing housing
market and his
inability to pay his mortgage, led to growing desperation and a
feeling of
loathing towards his adopted country. he began to look for
reasons to
blame the Us and homed on the drone strikes in his native
country, to
vent his anger.30 antonio Martinez aka Mohd hussein was a
construction
worker who was preemptively arrested by the Joint Terrorism
Task

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Force (JTTF) for trying to blow up an armed Forces recruiting
station in
Catonsville, Maryland.31 Most of these young men had had
brushes with
the law or were in financial distress or stuck in low paying jobs
that led
them to blame the government and its policies.
y Psychological Profile: a majority, though not all of the cases
studied,
had suffered abuse at the hands of their parents during their
childhood,

had breakdowns, were mentally unbalanced, had gone through a
tough
phase in life or were conditioned through contact with their
supposedly
devout families. Yonathan Melaku, an ethiopian-american, who
was
arrested for firing shots at the National Museum of the Marine
Corps
and two military recruiting centres in Fall 2010, was diagnosed
with
schizophrenia.32 One of the Beltway snipers, John allen
Mohammad was
engaged in a bitter custody battle with his wife for the custody
of his
three children. he had earlier served in the First Gulf war which
may
have left him traumatised.33 Philip Michael Ibrahim aka Isa
Ibrahim, who
was arrested by the British police for trying to assemble a
home-made
bomb in Bristol, was always in the shadow of his successful
elder brother
who had gone to Oxford, bar school and finally a US firm in
London. Isa,
on the other hand, was overweight, hopped schools frequently,
smoked
cannabis from the age of 12, had no sporting ability, and was
branded a
loser by his classmates. he experimented with expensive drugs
such as
cocaine and mushrooms, took up body building and injected
himself with
steroids.34 Jason naser abdo, convicted of plotting to bomb a
restaurant
popular with soldiers from Fort hood, Texas, had a traumatic
childhood.

his parents divorced when he was three. his father, a Jordanian
immigrant, was convicted of soliciting a minor on the internet,
served
three years in jail and was deported back to Jordan.35 Jose
Pimentel,
arrested for attempting to build pipe bombs to target the police
and
troops returning from afghanistan was considered mentally
unstable by
the police department.36 Mohd Merah tried to commit suicide
by hanging
and was diagnosed with polar narcissistic disorder.37 Maj nidal
hasan’s
father died in 1998. This loss was hard on him and he dedicated
himself
to Islam and frequented the Dar al hijrah Islamic Centre in Falls
Church,
Virginia, where he came into contact with anwar al-awlaki.38
Personal
crisis and faith are seen to be two very important factors in
egging on
potential lone wolf attackers. They are at a crisis moment in
their lives
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and embrace a radical ideology that resonates with them. Due to
a
probable absence of an emotional support structure, these
people latch
on to a community of perceived supporters. study of these
individuals
also suggests that there is a inclination among psychologically
imbalanced
or substance abuse cases to believe the propaganda being
spewed by
different groups, in the form of the internet or audio or video
clippings,
due to their disassociation from logical reasoning and in sync
with their
distorted view of world events.
y Travel Abroad: The claim that the internet is the major
reason for the
self-radicalisation of lone wolf attackers is giving the internet
too much
credit. The role of the internet, especially the social media, has
been
prominent in the recent years, but it cannot equal the
exhilaration felt

on physical contact with the supposed mentors. radicalisation
cannot
take place inside a vacuum. Travelling abroad and making
contact with
the representatives of groups fighting for the umma, against the
kuffars
creates a perspective that no online lesson can match. Mohd
Merah was
placed under surveillance after a visit to egypt in 2009, made
two trips to
Pakistan and afghanistan, and was arrested in kandahar in
2010.39 andrew
Ibrahim tried to be a scholar in Yemen but failed. abdelhakim
Mujahid
Mohd, convicted of killing one soldier and injuring another at
the armed
Forces recruiting Centre in Little rock, arkansas, in 2009,
visited Yemen
in 2007 and stayed in the country for 16 months, even marrying
a local
schoolteacher, reena abdullah ahmed Faraz.40 During his
incarceration,
he claimed to have known people who showed him around in
Yemen and
helped him to get started. he even tried to go to somalia for
explosives
training.41 khalid ali al-Dowsri, convicted for attempting to
construct an
Improvised explosive Device (IeD), was a saudi national who
had come
to the Us for his studies.42 he had planned to carry out attacks
against
the Us long before he came to the country, indicating the
inception
of a psychosis in his home country, possibly within his family
or peers.

Faisal shehzad made multiple trips to Pakistan and claimed to
have been
trained on explosives and weapons in waziristan between July 7
and
22, 2009.43 One of the duo of the san Bernardino shootout, a
Pakistani
permanent resident of the Us, Tashfeen Malik, attended the al-
huda
International seminary in Pakistan, known for its teaching of
wahhabi
sunni Islam and propagation of hardline anti-western views.44
The elder
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of the Tsarnaev brothers, Tamerlan travelled to russia, spent
time in
Chechnya (Dagestan) and may have been radicalised there,
though this
fact remains uncorroborated.45 Taimur abdelwahab al abdaly,
who blew
himself up during bombing attempts in stockholm in 2010, went
to syria
in 2008 to train in explosives.46 he also spent time as a student
in Luton,
england, which is home to a large number of Islamic extremists.
This
is the same place where the perpetrators of the 7/7 attacks
assembled
before going to London.47 With a huge influx of refugees into
Turkey and
the countries of the eU, and individuals returning from Iraq and
syria to
their home nations, the increasing probability of lone wolf
attacks cannot
be ruled out.
y Immigrants and Age Profile: even a perfunctory look at the
case
studies will reveal that almost all the lone wolf attackers were
either
young men (between the ages of 20 and 30), first or second
generation
immigrants or a mix of both. Baruch Goldstein, the Israeli
reserve Major
who massacred 29 Palestinian arabs in February 1994, had
migrated to
the country from the Us.48 Maj nidal hasan was the son of
Palestinian
immigrants who had migrated to the Us from the west Bank.49

Dzhokhar
and Tamerlan Tsarnaev were of krygyzstani descent. They were
20 and
27 years old respectively.50 Michael Zihaf-Bibeau’s father was
Bulgasem
Zihaf, a Libyan national who fought in 2011 in Libya against
the Qaddafi
regime.51 syed rizwan Farook, of the notorious san Bernardino
terror
couple, was an american citizen of Pakistani origin while his
wife was
a permanent resident of Pakistani origin, who spent most of her
life in
Saudi Arabia, and their age profiles hovered in the late 20s and
early
30s.52 Amine el Khalifi was a 23-year-old Moroccan citizen
who had
come to the Us on a visitor’s visa at the age of 16 and had
settled in
Virginia as an illegal immigrant after the expiry of his visa in
1999.53 Faisal
shehzad was a 31-year-old naturalised citizen of Pakistani
origin. Taimur
abdelwahab al abdaly was an Iraqi born swedish citizen.54 Jose
Pimentel
aka Mohd Yusuf was a naturalised american citizen from the
Dominican
republic.55 arid Uka was a 21-year-old albanian born German
citizen.56
Though there have been native lone wolf attackers also, such as
Timothy
McVeigh and Dylann roof, among many others, an
overwhelming
majority are either religious converts or first or second
generation
immigrants. Virtually all are in the age group of 20 to 30.

according to
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the late Prof ernest Gellner,57 an expert on nationalism,
modernisation
is a phenomenon that is characterised by a break in family ties
and a
distancing from roots, the major support structures of humans,
followed
by an insertion into an industrial culture that favours such a
zeitgeist to
enable it to condition the workers according to its needs. when
these

support structures break, whether in the face of a real or
perceived
cultural assault by a ‘foreign’ power, human beings tend to turn
towards
whatever comforts them. with the west’s emphasis on
individualism,
and a very different familial structure (based on either tribes or
extended
or joint families) for the immigrants, most of these individuals
turn to the
nearest thing to a community. This can be either the family in
the case of
n-order immigrants or a motley of local clerics, mosque
sermons, online
friends, audio clippings, videos and online literature. This is a
handy tool
for instigation.
y Role of the Media: Media, in its various manifestations of the
written
word, spoken word, images or a treasure trove of online
material has
made ‘radicalisation’ accessible to an audience, which, a few
years earlier
had to either attend gatherings of local clerics, mosque sermons
or forage
for literature from the local markets. satellite channels beaming
24 hours
of non-stop ‘infotainment’ have, in collusion with the high
speed internet,
changed forever the way people interact with each other. Groups
like
al Qaeda (aQ) realised the potential of the internet long ago.
after the
diversification and expansion of AQ through its various
affiliates, the

aQ high Command (aQhC) used as-sahab, al Qaeda in the
Islamic
Maghreb (aQIM) used the Media Commission, while al Qaeda in
the
arabian Peninsula (aQaP) used the sawt-al-Jihad regional
production
centres.58 These were responsible for producing relevant
propaganda
material which was then sent to a clearing house, the al Fajr
Media
Centre, in this case, responsible for sorting out the data and
maintaining
its veracity and stamping the data with its icon/logo to
distinguish it from
others and possible fakers.59 This material was then posted to
specific
forums such as al ekhlaas, al Buraq and al Firdauss.60 Despite
all these
efforts, the major drawback of aQ was its elitist approach
towards the
distribution of propaganda using specialised forums and
chatrooms. By
the time it had grasped the power of the social media (Inspire
online
magazine by aQaP and extensive use of Twitter by al shabaab),
the
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Islamic state of Iraq and syria (IsIs) had exploded on the scene.
Online
behavioural change mechanics can be explained by the
following
The inherent dichotomy between individuals’ interactions with
the physical
world and the digital domain leads to a rupture in their psyche,
the intensity
differing from person to person. For some, suffering from an
identity void,
personal loss, professional dissatisfaction or any of a plethora
of factors that
induce disorientation, a hook-on mechanism is activated that
forces them to
look for social synonyms either in the physical vicinity or their
digital personal
space. since social media platforms are digital manifestations of
peer groups,
the individuals start associating with like-minded people who
share in their

grief, add to their paranoia of the ‘Big Brother’ and condition
them towards
a comity of supporters, a team, a digitally well defined support
structure. This
commonality, when stoked in favour of a particular ideology,
transforms a
man into a believer, who considers himself part of an
organisation that backs
him up in all circumstances.
Initially based on discussion forums, the IsIs progressed to
posting links
of chatrooms on Facebook and Twitter at a dizzying speed. The
IsIs also
harnessed the power of the ‘Dark Net’ using passwords,
authentication and
membership numbers to verify its members.61 Its longest
shadow, however,
fell on Twitter where its members started using ‘Twitter bombs’
such as
#AllEyesOnISIS and #CalamityWillBefallUS and hijacking
trending
topics like #Brazil_2014 to grab eyeballs.62 By the fall of 2014,
there were
45,000 verifiable ISIS Twitter accounts, of which 73 per cent
had more than
500 followers, while others had upto 50,000.63 IsIs technicians
also developed
fairly complex coding techniques, coming out with an app on
Google Play
store called ‘Dawn of Glad Tidings’.64 The most interesting and
appealing
part of its internet blitzkrieg was the use of live ‘tweeting’
during the fighting
when the location, photos, names of martyrs and active fighters,
and the

status of the clashes enabled its technicians to announce the
steady progress
of the IsIs war machine.65 The IsIs used aerial drone
photography and 360
degree Go Pro cameras in collaboration with High Definition
(HD) video
recording and a raconteur-like narrative to increase its appeal to
all kinds
of people.66 Though the major attraction of videos such as
‘Clanging of
Swords IV’ was brutality, the other themes also visible in the
various videos
were mercy, victimhood, war, belonging and utopianism.67 a
detailed study
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of the videos shows that there is no ‘one size fits all’
propaganda by the IsIs
which carefully constructs multiple narratives for potential
opponents, the
international public, active members, potential recruits,
disseminators and
proselytisers. In order to attract women to its fold, the IsIs has
also founded
the Zora Foundation which is a media wing for luring women,
and currently
has around 32,000 followers.68 apart from the social media
onslaught, the
ISIS has five centralised propaganda units, which are:
y Al Furqan Foundation: Delivers official statements and
concentrates
on military warfare.
y Al Itisan Foundation: social and religious activities.
y Al Hayat Media Centre.
y Al Bayan Radio.
y Amaq News Agency.69
Through its effective mix of political propaganda, nasheeds,
video game
type shooting videos, streamlined narrative, storyteller format,
hD graphics
and revocations to the koran, the IsIs has constructed an image
of the
counter-cultural ‘jihadi-cool’, which is difficult to combat by
conventional
government narratives.
Structural Analysis

all the above mentioned factors have been culled retrospectively
from
studying the aftermath of the events. no amount of computer-
based
modelling or academic intuiting has been able to pin-point the
exact reasons
for these acts of lone-wolf terrorism or helped to prevent it. The
onus for
securing soft targets in a country cannot be on the security
forces/ agencies
only, as the sheer number of people and places to be protected
is massive and
beyond the purview of the armed forces, which are generally
responsible for
external security and are, therefore, extra-enemy focussed and
area specific,
or of the local security agencies which are more information
dependent
and rarely act preemptively. It is, therefore, necessary to go
beyond what is
visible and look at structural factors to focus on, and target, the
root causes
and not the persons responsible, as focussing on the latter is not
possible,
and neglecting the former will ensure that the plague of lone
wolf terrorism
will remain the bane of civilised societies. The following are
the structural
factors responsible:
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y Structural Violence: This term was used by Johann Galtung
when he
referred to it as “some social or structura/ institution that may
harm people by
preventing them from meeting their basic needs”. structural
violence differs
from direct violence in that the presence of physical causality is
not a
prerequisite in structural violence. In the context of lone wolf
terrorism,
direct violence is manifested in the terrorist act itself. In
defining structural
violence, the basic needs are those urges whose satisfaction is
necessary
for human survival. while food, money and physical security
may seem to
be the obvious needs, social identity or affiliation or a ‘place in
the society’

is an oft-ignored basic need that ranks on the lower rung but is
among
the paramount causes which give rise to structural violence.
ambiguity in
identity of the self is a specific product of the modern industrial
society.
At the inception of the capitalist industrial society, this
floating-identity
syndrome was put to good use for the generation of labour
power. But
with the saturation of the world markets in the post-classical
imperialism
era, this led to trained manpower employed wastefully or
redundantly
in various ‘sectors’. an identity crisis coupled with an economic
crisis
was the logical conclusion. The turnover year was 1979. In
terms of
precedence, we will start with two sub-structural factors
responsible for
a dissonance in identity in the Middle east, particularly, and the
Muslim
world, in general.
y The Ascendance of Saudi Arabia and the Epoch of 1979:
1979 was a
watershed year in world history. Two events changed forever
the
way the Middle east would be viewed. The Iranian revolution of
1979
brought to power a shia dominated theocracy in a sunni
dominated
region, while the invasion of afghanistan by the erstwhile soviet
Union in December 1979, ostensibly to support an ailing
Communist
regime, was used by the Us to enlist the help of Islamist

regimes to
counter Communism.70 The saudis, the main sponsors of the
Islamist
extremist ideology, Wahhabism, across the world, and anxious
about
a similar uprising in their repressed shia minority regions,
pumped
in millions of dollars into the region, while foreign fighters
from all
over the world joined what was being advertised as a global
jihad.71
an Islamist counterweight to Communism enabled the Us to
push
the soviets out of afghanistan in 1989, however, the country was
soon forgotten, the countless men trained in irregular warfare,
with
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no place to go and no more infidel enemy to fight, and now
divided
into rigid and impermeable ideological factions.72 One of these
factions became the core of al Qaeda under Osama bin Laden
who,
encouraged by the success of the Mujahideen, instituted the
concept
of a global Caliphate, to be later harped on by al-Baghdadi of
IsIs
notoriety. Infused and enthused with Wahhabi ideology which
was
given a fillip and a wider audience by the Saudis post the
Afghan War
through media outreach and publishing, construction of mosques
that preached Wahhabism, distribution of Wahhabi textbooks
and
endowments to universities and cultural centres, countless youth
from the developing and developed countries took part in varied
conflicts such as in Yugoslavia, Chechnya, Somalia, Sudan and
kashmir, all of which were now perceived to be connected to the
global ummah.73 1979 became the excuse that saudi arabia
needed
to promote its theo-fascist version of Islam.
y Poverty and Underdevelopment: There are two parallel
strands that
explain why most of the recent terror attacks have been carried
out by immigrants and the sense of discrimination felt by most
first
or second generation immigrants across most of the developed
world. It has to be understood that there is a large scale

programme
of radicalisation being funded by the kingdom of saudi arabia,
in
terms of millions of dollars invested in the construction of
mosques.
The most recent example is the saudi offer to build more than
200
mosques for immigrants in Germany, instead of offering
refuge.74
however, most of the radicalisation has been funded covertly
through
‘missionary’ and ‘Islamic charity organisations’, with the
ostensible
support of the sunni Gulf monarchies.75 a substantial part of it
has
been targeted towards poor countries in the form of extremist
madrassas, approved by local politicians who receive kickbacks
for
a positive nod.76 Most of the Third world countries are
suffering
from underdevelopment, a condition of siphoning of resources
and
finances through ‘free-market’ procedures such as lowering of
tariff
barriers for imports, reducing subsidies for exports, intellectual
property rights and patents being a few of them.77 This has
resulted
in a large imbalance, between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’,
resulting in
poverty, illiteracy and malnutrition. In many places in poor
Muslim
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countries, there is no alternative to a madrassa option. Poverty
is
exploited to the hilt to promote extremism. The second is the
process
of underdevelopment perpetrated by the core i.e. the developed
countries against the periphery or the Third world countries,
and
between the developed and prosperous and the undeveloped and
impoverished areas within the same country. Most of the Third
world countries are trying to ape the industrial development of
the
First world, without realising the unique inhibitions that they
have
to counter in terms of trade, technology and trained manpower
bias.
The processes that they are undergoing were never encountered

by the developed countries on account of their being the
colonisers
and, therefore, the residual colonialism in the form of a huge
income
gap between the rich and the poor and a non-inclusive and
lopsided
development has stirred up a latent anger within a huge section
of
the population. Coupled with a parasitic and ever encroaching
social
media network, fiery preachers, and a distorted view of
government
policies, the stage is set for more violent manifestations of this
latent
anger, now under the facade of religion. an apt example for the
second point is the case of southern France which is an
immigrant
heavy area of the country, and where immigrants, especially
from
Morocco and algeria, have been discriminated against for long.
Cities such as Marseilles have been marked as being the most
violent
in europe due to the preponderance of unemployed,
discriminated
against, and proselytised, immigrants.78
y Media Morality and Perception: The media has become the
moralist
of today’s age. In its various avatars such as print, television,
cable,
magazines, social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter et
al and
massive online video directories, it has bombarded the senses of
human
beings with an incessant flow of information and data that could
never

be accessed by a single person even in his/ her entire lifetime.
along with
information comes opinion, biased and not necessarily backed
by relevant
facts, and heavily dependent on rhetoric. Unfortunately,
preconceived
notions of the objectivity of the media have enabled media
powerhouses
to transmit an array of opinions purporting to be facts and
reportage,
thereby diluting and disrupting the decision-making processes
of the
audience. Through a host of talk shows, documentaries,
photographs,
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monographs, articles, essays, hate propaganda, audio clippings
and songs,
the media has twisted reality, shaped views of the past and
sometimes
the past itself, and has declared itself to be the moral minder of
the whole
world. Region-specific media agencies have built up their local
narratives,
focussing on their particular geographical area, however, when
coalesced,
two contradictory pictures have come to the fore. For the west,
whole
religions have been equated to being terrorist breeders, while
the
hypocrisy of their own invasions is sidelined. Though lone wolf
attacks
have occurred on western soil besides the ones mentioned above
that
involved various ideologies such as white supremacism, semite
militarism
and the likes, most of those perpetrators have been painted as
mentally
unstable so as to delink the man and his ideology from his
act.79 The same
courtesy has not been extended to other communities. On the
other
hand, generally for the rest of the world, and for some
communities
in particular, a narrative is being spun, that of the victimisation
of a
religious group. all Islamist extremist groups, with the
assistance of the
media, are weaving narratives of western imperialism in the

case of
‘white skinned foreigners’ or western-backed dictators in case
the regime/
government heads are from their own skin colour, trying to
drown out
an Islamic culture, by painting a war of civilisations: the west
v/s Islam.
Media propaganda, by flashing pictures of killed children,
severed limbs,
decapitated heads and superimposing the greed and callousness
of the
west over the tragedy, has created a powerful culture of
centrality and
unity for the victimised ‘ummah’ and elevated the importance of
religion
in their eyes. a vicious cycle has emerged. anti-terror agencies
are using
all their power to eliminate terror by targeting extremists,
resulting in
violence; this violence is then being used as a counter
propaganda by
the same extremists to showcase the devious nature of the
‘white man’,
resulting in more followers.
y Globalisation: The new world Order, marked by the end of
the Cold
war era, has witnessed major upheavals in large parts of the
world.
Dichotomies have ruled the roost. while on the one hand,
nationalist-
identity linked movements have ripped apart fabrics of pre-
existing
states such as the demand for kurdistan from parts of Iran,
Turkey,
syria and Iraq, Uighur separation from China, and south sudan

from
sudan, on the other, religious-identity linked movements such as
the al
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Qaeda and the IsIs have tried to merge together existing states
in their
dream of a global Caliphate. Divergence and convergence are
occurring
simultaneously. In conjunction with the rhetoric about a global
culture
that is increasingly seen as western and threatening to inundate
the

traditional mores of different societies, ease of movement of
people
between countries, perceived usurpation of jobs and livelihood
by other
nationalities, people have sought the protective comfort of their
own
affiliated groups, all imagined but some manifested physically
in forms
of ethnic, religious, social or gender-based groups and others in
the
forms of digital relations. These digital relations have been
amplified by
globalisation. Globalisation has led to an increasingly
connected world,
which has brought common opinions across the world onto a
single
platform, linking people to a common cause for the good of
society such
as Avaaz80 and #Bringbackourgirls,81 or on the downside
enabling al-awlaki
to widen his madrassa-limited audience to anyone who would
listen in
the entire world. It has also enabled extremist groups to
propagate Do it
Tourself (DIY) bomb-making procedures such as aQaP’s online
magazine
Inspire, one issue of which had the headline ‘hOw TO Make a
BOMB
In YOUr MOTher’s kITChen?82’ Online recruiters have played
on
these culture-threatening vulnerabilities by highlighting the
injustice
done to these communities by the supposedly democratic
governments,
thereby deepening the chasm of doubt and suspicion. Virtual
trust has

weaponised the angst and frustration of a number of educated
youth
who view globalisation as having been unequal and
impoverishing rather
than the miracle it claims to be.
Solution
s
short-term solutions to counter lone wolf terrorism is what anti-
terror
agencies are currently following, which is a two-pronged
approach. The
first prong involves targeting prospective and suspected lone
wolf terrorists
by way of ‘profiling’ and masquerading as terrorists themselves
to win the
trust of the would-be lone wolf, and enticing him to divulge
information
regarding his plans. These actions have had limited yet effective
success in
avoiding major attacks on important landmarks and cities,
examples of which
have been discussed earlier. The second prong has been an
effort by various

governments and heads of states to dissuade the youth from
joining the ranks
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of extremist organisations, and not to indulge in acts of terror,
through use
of the social media such as Twitter handles and Facebook pages
such as @
Thinkagain_DOs run by the Us government’s Global
engagement Centre
(GeC).83 These efforts, however, have proved quite ineffective
in dealing with
the torrent of propaganda dumped by the IsIs everyday on the
internet and
lapped up by thousands, if not millions. with the IsIs’ real
estate shrinking
every day, an increased focus on social media platforms is
likely--one which
would focus on creating more lone wolf terrorists. In view of
the various
causative and structural factors discussed, the following long-
term solutions
can be particularised and adapted to local conditions in order to
reduce the
probability of lone wolf terrorism.
y Countering of Narrative: Surprisingly, against the tirades of
figures

such as anwar al awlaki and Jihadi John, the voices of reason
have been
generally silent, in the physical as well as the digital world. The
‘jihadi cool’
attitude fostered and tempered by the IsIs through its videos and
stills,
as well as the victimisation narrative has to be countered
effectively. This
can be done only by the local preachers and community leaders
who,
by way of their standing in the community and consequent
moral high
ground, can wean the youth away from proselytisers and
extremist ideas.
similarly, the online battle of the social media has to be fought
using the
Twitter profiles and gravatars of local leaders and influential
personalities
of a particular community whose links with the west or the
supposedly
imperialist countries of the extremist propaganda, have to be
shown as
being non-existent. The language and semantics of the narrative
have

to be local. The resistance against the extremist, especially the
IsIs,
propaganda, and the spinning of a counter-narrative has to
delink itself
from any governmental or external, especially western backed,
effort,
in any form.
y Inclusive and Integrative Policies: There is a need for
governments
to have a relook at their economic and social policies. a
conscious effort
has to be put in to ensure a more equitable, integrative and
inclusive
development process. The idea of ‘separateness’ grows stronger
when
distinguishing factors such as race, ethnicity, religion are
supplemented
by unequal development, which can be exploited by a number of
agencies
to promote numerous agendas. Directives, aimed at a perceived
cultural
more of a particular community, need to be endorsed by the
relevant

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community leaders publicly and not applied or declared

unilaterally
in the name of secularism. The ban on the wearing of hijab in
France,
though ostensibly to promote gender equality and inhibit an evil
practice
of discrimination against women, was viewed as an assault on
the
religious sentiments of the huge Muslim population in the
country. Mohd
Merah’s lone wolf attack was ostensibly against this policy.
Globalisation,
in terms of a prevailing pop and american dominated culture has
been
seen as promoting a culture that promotes inequality and
accumulation
of wealth, all the while assaulting and invading other
communities whose
point of view and way of living may be at odds with it.
y Cultural Sensitisation of the Media: western media tends to
portray stereotypical versions of members of particular
communities
and all incidents and news tend to be filtered through a ‘racial
profiling’
lens. This is true not just for the television news media but the

more
freelance social media. Pre-conceived notions of the Middle
east being
a violent region, or killings being frequent, is one of the main
reasons
why the latest suicide car-bomb attack in Baghdad which killed
more
than 200 people went relatively unnoticed as against the
Istanbul airport
bombing or the Paris terror attacks last year.84 Cultural
insensitivity or
rather over-sensitivity against a particular religion or race may
result in
a feeling of being singled out each and every time a terror
attack occurs
anywhere. This leads to segregation and further anger which
may be
directed by online videos and religious figures into action.
There have
to be discussions with the media, both on and off the air, to help
learn
about the sensitivities of other cultures. Portrayal by the media,
whether
good or bad, aids in forming opinions about groups based on the
actions

of a few individuals. hate crimes against a particular community
need
to be labelled as terror attacks, notwithstanding the racial,
ethnic or
religious make-up of the perpetrator. Dylan roof’s attacks were
passed
off as the acts of a psychotic individual,85 while similar leeway
was not
given to Jose Pimentel who was classified as a lone wolf,
despite suffering
from a mental disorder. not correctly labelling an attack is as
grievous a
crime as the act itself and the media needs to be held
responsible.
y Foreign Policies of Western Countries: Introspection has to
be
carried out by the leadership of countries such as the Us,
France, Uk
about their hypocritical actions. while the leaders at various
echelons
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of the countries are adept at the rhetoric of democracy, free
will, laissez
faire and upholding of human rights, this is not matched by
their actions

on the ground such as unilaterally and wilfully ignoring the
sovereign
borders of countries such as Pakistan, somalia, Iraq and syria,
to name
a few, conducting drone strikes resulting in massive collateral
damage
(euphemism for civilian deaths), conducting covert operations
on
foreign soil, including assassinations and sabotage.86 Targeting
and killing
terrorists on foreign soil has, on the one hand decimated the
leadership
of extremist organisations such as al Qaeda, but, on the other,
given an
excuse to these very organisations to recruit an ever growing
number
of potential cadres, thereby sustaining a vicious cycle of
annihilation
and regeneration. Videos and news articles about these almost
regular
killings and assassinations have been used by various
organisations to
recruit individuals to these causes, and not just illiterate or
unemployed
individuals as shown by the conventional media narrative, but

successful
and educated young men, aggrieved by these atrocities. These
countries
have also maintained more-than-cordial relations with saudi
arabia, a
known promoter of Wahhabi extremism around the world. In
spite of
its dismal record on human rights such as its continuing
barbaric practice
of beheading and limb-amputation, its representative has
recently been
made head of the human rights Council of the Un.87 There
needs to be
sea change in the foreign policies of these countries that have to
realise
that they cannot bomb, maim, torture or kill their way to a
solution.
an intra-politico-religious struggle for one upmanship in the
Middle
east, manifested as a struggle between the saudi led monarchies
and
the shia dominated Iranian bloc, has seen the major western
powers
lining up behind the sunni faction, spurred by the 1979 break
between

the Iranian theocracy and the americans. an unfortunate
blowback of
the meddlesome and double-dealing policies of the Us, Uk and
France
has been the disintegration of states like Iraq, syria and Libya,
and
the infestation of various extremist groups, some under the
facade of
‘moderate’ rebels, supported by these western powers while
others as
extremists such as the IsIs or Daesh, nusra Front, ahrar al sham
and the
like.88 The western countries need to reconsider their
interventionist
policies in the Middle east and disengage from the region as
subtly as
possible. saudi arabia, on the other hand, needs to be ostracised
for its
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behaviour and not rewarded with ironic nominations in the
world body
polity.
y Shifting of Affiliations: as mentioned earlier, the two
simultaneous
processes of convergence in the form of religious movements

and
divergence in the form of ethno-nationalism are the result of the
globalisation process in the wake of the new world Order in the
post Cold war world. Both promote divisiveness, one
reinforcing
commonality, and the other, differentiation. however, in the
present
times, it has become critical to choose between the lesser of
these two
evils. states, despite the critique of the neo-liberals or the
anarchists
or any of their mid-variants, are here to stay. The structure of
the
state has become so enmeshed with the lives of human beings
that
the coerciveness of its institutions has been almost taken for
granted.
nationalisms, especially ethno-nationalisms are structure-
focussed and
though many have involved bitter protracted struggles, with
colossal loss
of lives, still have a concrete end game in sight which is
temporal in nature.
The conflict over land, political autonomy between the parent-
state and

the emergent state-to-be can be resolved by various conflict-
resolution
mechanisms. religious movements, on the other hand, by
purporting to
be all encompassing and spiritual in nature, do not allow such
discretions
to come into play. It is either a case of all or nothing. religious
fervour,
for establishing a kingdom of God, whether a Caliphate or
various
unsuccessful preacher-led militant commercial religions of the
Us, has
usually ended in mass casualties due to the refusal of the
adherents to
accommodate or even consider an alternative. It is also
comparatively
easier to incite an individual by appealing to his/her sense of
spiritual
righteousness by pointing out alien attempts at desecration of
his/her
god. Therefore, it is pertinent that any attempt at a religious
incitement
be diverted towards a nationalist based one, if not thwarted
completely.
Counter-narratives, especially in the form of nationalist

sentiments, have
to be promoted as against religion based ones in order to
subsume
sentiments under a political organisation rather than a
proselytising one.
Conclusion
At the end, it would suffice to say that the phenomenon of lone
wolf
terrorism is not a new one. Post Cold war, it can be said to have
started
from the Oklahoma City bombing in 1993 and has continued
with the recent
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Orlando Club shooting of 2016. From Timothy McVeigh to
Omar Mateen89,
the scale, intensity and frequency of attacks have changed,
varied with time
and location, with the acts becoming more bold with time,
resulting in more
casualties. however, the post 9/11 lone wolf attacks cannot be
said to have
occurred in a vacuum. The structural factors mentioned above
have slowly
shaped the landscape where lone wolf attacks were a given. The
recent

Bangladesh attacks90 and the truck related killings of 84 people
in nice on
Bastille Day in France91 just drive home the fact that the
frequency of lone
wolf attacks has increased exponentially and will continue to do
so unless
a long-term plan to counter them is evolved. These attacks
increased in
frequency due to the surprising growth of the internet,
especially the social
media. however, their counter has to simultaneously focus on a
number of
fields, social media rebuttal being one of them. This has to be
supplemented
by community leadership and mentoring, change in the foreign
policies of the
western countries, inclusive and equitable development by own
governments
and, most importantly, a rehabilitation programme for anyone
returning from
Iraq or syria so as to ease his entry back into the normal world.
References
1. Joint Pub 3-07.2, “Antiterrorism,” US Department of
Defense(DoD) dated November 24,

2010.
2. “Lone Wolf (Terrorism),”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lone_wolf_(terrorism).htm.
3. Jeanine de roy van Zuijdewijn and edwin Bakker, “Personal
Characteristics of Lone-actor
Terrorists,” Countering Lone actor Terrorism series, no 5,
Policy Paper 1, http://www.
terrorismanalysts.com/pt/index.php/pot/article/view/preventing-
lone-wolf/html.
4. Prof Mark hamm,
http://nij.ncjrs.gov/multimedia/transcripts/video-hamm-
transcript.htm.
5. “Rafaelo Pantucci,” http://icsr.info/wp-
content/uploads/2012/10/1302002992ICsrPaper_
aTypologyofLonewolves_Pantucci.pdf.
6. Jason Bourke, The New Threat from Islamic Militancy
(2015), pp. 164-165.
7. Ibid.
8. Joseph Lieberman and Susan Collins, “Violent Islamist
Extremism, the Internet, and the

homegrown Terrorist Threat”, Majority and Minority staff
report by United states
senate Committee on homeland security and Governmental
affairs, May 08, 2008.
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid.
11. report by human rights watch,
https://www.hrw.org/reports/2002/us911/Usa0802-01.htm.
12. “Targeting Blacks: Drug Law Enforcement and Race in the
United States,” Human Rights
watch report, https://www.hrw.org/reports/2008/us0508/.
13. “Toulouse and Montauban Shootings,”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toulouse_and_
Montauban_shootings.
14. Ibid.
15. Paul Cruickshank and Tim Lister, “How did Mohammed
Merah become a Jihadist?”, http://
edition.cnn.com/2012/03/26/world/europe/france-shooting-
suspect/index.html?hpt=hp_
c1, March 26, 2012.

23
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n
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. 69, 2017
16. Ibid.

17. “Rotten Heart of Europe”,
http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/03/23/the-rotten-heart-of-
europe-belgium-attacks-abdeslam-molenbeek/.
18. “Obituary: Toulouse Gunman Mohamed Merah”,
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-
europe-17456541, March 22, 2012.
19. Interview with ebba kalando, editor, France 24, to whom
Merah confessed his killings.
Interview embedded in
http://edition.cnn.com/2012/03/21/world/europe/france-
shooting-
suspect-profile/ .
20. Cruickshank and Lister, n. 15.
21. “Faisal Shehzad”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faisal_shahzad.
22. “2011 Frankfurt Airport Shooting”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Frankfurt_airport_
shooting.
23. “We Shall Meet At Dabiq”, Dabiq, the online ISIS
magazine, Issue 13, “The Rafidah”, p. 9.

24. “Anders Behring Breivik”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/anders_Behring_Breivik.
25. “2014 Shootings at Parliament Hill, Ottawa”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_shootings_
at_Parliament_hill,_Ottawa.htm
26. Connor Simpson, “Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, College Weed
Dealer”, The Wire, www.thewire.
com/national/2013/04/dzhokhar-tsarnaev-dealingdrugs/64529/,
april 24, 2013.
27. Ibid.
28. “Amine El Khalifi,”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amine_El_Khalifi.
29. n. 21.
30. Lorraine Adams and Ayesha Nair, “Inside the Mind of the
Times Square Bomber”, http://
www.theguardian.com/world/2010/sep/19/times-square-bomber,
september 19, 2010.
31. “Maryland Man Charged in Plot to Attack Armed Forces
Recruiting Center”, http://edition.
cnn.com/2010/CrIMe/12/08/maryland.plot/.
32. http://www.adl.org/combating-hate/international-extremism-

terrorism/c/profile-yonathan-
melaku.html.
33
.http://criminalminds.wikia.com/wiki/John_allen_Muhammad_a
nd_Lee_Boyd_Malvo.
34. “How A Public Schoolboy Became A Terrorist”,
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/
uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/5850765/andrew-Ibrahim-how-a-
public-schoolboy-became-
a-terrorist.html.
35.
http://politicalscience.osu.edu/faculty/jmueller/45aBDO7.pdf.
36. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/nov/21/jose-
pimentel-bomb-suspect-fbi.
37. n. 18.
38. “Nidal Hasan,”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nidal_Hasan.htm
39. n. 18.
40. “Little Rock Recruiting Office Shooting,”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Little_rock_
recruiting_office_shooting.

41. “Soldier Killed at Arkansas Army Recruiting Center,
Update: On July 25, 2011, Muhammad
pleaded guilty to charges of murder and attempted murder and
was sentenced to life
without the possibility of parole”,
http://archive.adl.org/main_terrorism/arkansas_army_
recruit_center_shooting.html#.Vu6_sTbwxaY.
42. https://www.fbi.gov/dallas/press-
releases/2011/dl022411.htm.
43. “Uncomfortable Truths of the Times Square Attack”,
https://www.stratfor.com/
weekly/20100505_uncomfortable_truths_times_square_attack.
44. http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-san-
bernardino-shooting-terror-
investigation-htmlstory.html.
45. Tim Franks, “Dagestan and the Tsarnaev Brothers: The
Radicalisation Risk”, BBC World
service, Makhachkala, www.bbc.com/news/magazine-
23004244.htm, June 24, 2013.
46. “Stockholm Bomber Family Blame Britain for

Radicalisation”, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/
news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/8200044/stockholm-bomber-
family-blame-Britain-for-
radicalisation.html.
24
m
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Pa
Per
n

o
. 69, 2017
AkshAt UpAdhyAy
47. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/12/stockholm-
suicide-bomber-profile.
48. “Baruch Goldstein”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baruch_Goldstein.
49. n. 38.
50. “Boston Marathon Bombing”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Marathon_
bombing#MIT_shooting_and_carjacking.htm.
51. n. 25.
52. “2015 San Bernandino Attack”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_san_Bernardino_attack.
53. n. 28.
54. “Sweden Suicide Bomber Taimur Abdulwahab al Abdaly
was Living in Britain”, http://www.
telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-
uk/8198043/sweden-suicide-bomber-
Taimur-abdulwahab-al-abdaly-was-living-in-Britain.html.

55. “Jose Pimentel”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jose_Pimentel.
56. “Arid Uka”, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/arid_Uka.
57. ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (1983), pp. 57-58.
58. Lieberman and Collins, n. 8, May 08, 2008.
59. Ibid.
60. Ibid.
61. Dr Christina Schori Lang, “Cyber Jihad: Understanding and
Countering Islamic State
Propaganda”, GCsP Policy Paper 2015/2- February 2015,
Geneva Centre for security
Policy, www.gcsp.ch/download/2763/72138.pdf.
62. Ibid.
63. Ibid.
64. Ibid.
65. Ibid.
66. Charlie Winter, “The Virtual ‘Caliphate’: Understanding
Islamic State’s Propaganda
strategy”, Quilliam Foundation,
https://www.quilliamfoundation.org/wp/wp-content/
uploads/publications/free/the-virtual-caliphate-understanding-
islamic-states-propaganda-

strategy.pdf.
67. Ibid.
68. schori Lang, n. 61.
69. Ibid.
70. “Soviet-Afghan War,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet-
Afghan_War.htm.
71. Jamie Tarabay, “How the Afghan Jihad Went Global”,
Aljazeera America, america.aljazeera.
com/articles/2013/11/12/how-afghan-jihadwentglobal.html.
72. “Afghan Civil War (1989-92)”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/afghan_Civil_war_(1989-92).
htm.
73. Yousaf Butt, “How Saudi Wahhabism Is the Fountainhead of
Islamist Terrorism”,
Huffington Post, www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-yousaf-butt-
/saudi-wahhabism-islam-
terrorism_b_6501916.html, January 20, 2015.
74. Allan Hall, “Saudi Offer to Build 200 Mosques in Germany
for Syrian Migrants is Slammed
as ‘Cynical’ because the kingdom has not Offered to Take any

refugee Themselves”,
Mail Online, www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3242354/saudi-
offer-build-200-mosques-
Germany-syrian-migrants-slammed-cynical-kingdom-not-
offered-refugees-themselves.
htm, september 20, 2015.
75. Declan Walsh, “Wikileaks Cables Portray Saudi Arabia as a
Cash Machine for Terrorists”,
The Guardian,
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/05/wikileaks-
cables-saudi-
terrorist-funding.htm, December 05, 2010.
76. Butt, n. 73.
77. Benjamin Teryima Ashaver, “Poverty, Inequality and
Underdevelopment in Third World
Countries: Bad state Policies or Bad Global rules?”, Department
of Political science Benue
state University, Makurdi-nigeria, IOsr Journal of humanities
and social science, Volume
15, Issue 6 (sep - Oct 2013) pp 33-38.

25
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78. Daniel Greenfield, “French City with 40% Muslim
Population is the Most Dangerous City

in europe”, Frontpage Mag,
www.frontpagemag.com/point/214086/french-city-40-muslim-
population-most-dangerous-daniel-greenfield.htm, January 04,
2014.
79. Anthea Butler, “Shooters of Color are Called ‘Terrorists’
and ‘Thugs’. Why are White
shooters called ‘Mentally Ill’?”, The Washington Post,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/
posteverything/wp/2015/06/18/call-the-charleston-church-
shooting-what-it-is-terrorism/,
June 18, 2015.
80. “Avaaz: The World in Action”, https://secure.avaaz.org/en/.
81. Twitter,
https://twitter.com/hashtag/bringbackourgirls?lang=en.htm.
82. Robert Spencer, “Al-Qaeda’s new “Inspire” mag: “How to
Make a Bomb in the Kitchen
of your Mom”’, Jihad watch,
https://www.jihadwatch.org/2010/07/al-qaedas-new-inspire-
mag-how-to-make-a-bomb-in-the-kitchen-of-your-mom.htm,
July 01, 2010.
83. Asawin Suebsang, Mother Jones, “The State Department Is

Actively Trolling Terrorists on
Twitter”, www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/02/state-
department-cscc-troll-terrorists-
twitter-think-again-turn-away.htm, March 05, 2014.
84. Nesrine Malik, “Why do Deaths in Paris get More Attention
than Deaths in Beirut?’, The
Guardian,
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/18/death
s-paris-beirut-
media.htm, november 18, 2015.
85. Butler, n. 79.
86. TJ Petrowski, “The Refugee Crisis is a Crisis of
Imperialism”, Counterpunch, www.
counterpunch.org/2015/09/11/the-refugee-crisis-is-a-crisis-of-
imperialism.htm, september
11, 2015.
87. Salil Tripathi, “Why is Saudi Arabia Heading a UN Human
Rights Council Panel”, The
Daily Beast, www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/09/22/why-
is-saudi-arabia-heading-the-
un-human-rights-council.html, september 23, 2015.

88. Seumas Milne, “Now the Truth Emerges: How the US
Fuelled the Rise of ISIS in Syria
and Iraq”, The Guardian,
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jun/03/us-
isis-
syria-iraq.htm, June 03, 2015.
89. “Omar Mateen”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omar_Mateen.htm.
90. “July 2016 Dhaka Attack”,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_2016_Dhaka_attack.htm.
91. Alan Yuhas, Matthew Weaver, Bonnie Malkin and Kevin
Rawlinson, “Nice Attack: Truck
Driver named as France Mourns 84 killed in Bastille Day
atrocity: as it happened”, The
Guardian,
https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2016/jul/14/nice-
bastille-day-france-
attack-promenade-des-anglais-vehicle.htm.

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ARTICLE
Leaderless Resistance: The New Face

of Terrorism
G E O R G E M I C H A E L
Over the past several years, the face of terrorism has undergone
substantial change. Although the US government is
understandably con-
cerned about well-established and enduring terrorist
organizations, there
is a noticeable trend indicating the increasing prevalence of so-
called
lone wolf attacks by individuals and small cells with little or no
connec-
tions to larger groups. Since 9/11, authorities have broken up
several
small Islamists cell that plotted terrorist attacks. In recent
years, several
lone-wolf incidents have gained headlines. For instance, in
April 2009,
Richard A. Poplawski, a young man who expressed racist views
on
extremist websites, open fired on police in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania kill-
ing three officers.1 Just a few weeks after that incident, an anti-
abortion

activist, Scott Roeder, murdered a physician who performed
late-term
abortions.2 In June, a lone gunman, a little-known, but long-
standing
right-wing extremist, James von Brunn, opened fire at the US
Holo-
caust Museum in Washington, DC killing one guard.3 Then in
Novem-
ber, Major Nidal Malik Hasan, a Muslim-American psychiatrist
in the
US Army, went on a shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas
which
killed 12 and left 31 wounded.4
More incidents followed in 2010. On 18 February, a 53-year-old
software engineer and tax protestor, Joseph Stack, slammed his
private
plane into a building in Austin, Texas that contained offices of
the
Inland Revenue Service, which triggered a massive fireball that
set the
edifice aflame.5 And on 1 May, Faisal Shahzad, a US citizen
who was
born in Pakistan, attempted to detonate three bombs in a sports
utility

vehicle that was parked in the heart of Times Square in New
York
George Michael, Associate Professor of Nuclear
Counterproliferation & Deterrence Theory,
US Air Force Counterproliferation Center, Maxwell Air Force
Base, Alabama, USA. Email:
[email protected]
Defence Studies, Vol. 12, No. 2, (June 2012), pp. 257–282
ISSN 1470-2436
http://www.tandfonline.com
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14702436.2012.699724 � 2012 Taylor
& Francis
City.6 Although he reportedly made contact with the Pakistani
Taliban
during a trip to Pakistan in 2008, after his arrest Shahzad
insisted that
he had acted entirely alone while in the United States.
In the summer of 2009, federal authorities announced an effort

to
detect lone attackers who might be contemplating politically-
charged
assaults. Dubbed the ‘Lone Wolf Initiative’, it began shortly
after the
inauguration of President Barack Obama in part because of the
rising
level of hate speech and increasing gun sales.7 In fact, as early
as 1998,
the FBI publicly announced that small fringe groups could be
planning
attacks on their own initiative as the case of Eric Robert
Rudolph illus-
trated. The young man supposedly drifted in and out of white
suprema-
cist groups before embarking on his one-man campaign of
violence,
which included bombing abortion clinics, a gay bar, and the
Centennial
Park at the 1996 Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta.8 After
9/11, the
FBI feared that certain events, such as the war in Iraq, and
increasing
tensions in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, could become
potential cata-

lysts for future attacks.9 This was tragically illustrated in
February 2002,
when a seemingly normal 15-year-old Florida youth deliberately
slammed a single engine plane into a Florida office building.10
Despite these episodes of sporadic violence, some observers
dismiss
the notion of ‘‘leaderless resistance’’ as primarily a nuisance in
that it
poses no substantial or existential threat to the nation and could
thus be
more aptly consigned to the field of abnormal psychology. To
be sure,
several of the perpetrators mentioned above had histories of
mental ill-
ness and it is difficult to tell with certainty if ideology was
determinative
in their decisions to carry out their attacks. In that vein, the
case of
Luke Helder comes to mind. In May 2002, the 21-year-old
college stu-
dent planted 24 pipe bombs in mailboxes, six of which
exploded. Scat-
tered over several states — Iowa, Illinois, Nebraska, Colorado,
and

Texas — Helder explained that the geographic placement of the
bombs
was intended to make a ‘smiley face’ pattern on the map. No
one was
killed, but four letter carriers and two residents were injured.11
Others, however, believe that the leaderless resistance trend
should be
taken seriously, if for no other reason than the disruption lone
wolves can
inflict, as demonstrated by the Beltway snipers in the fall of
2002. As a
result of their violent escapades, John Allen Muhammad and
Lee Boyd
Malvo were charged with, or suspected, in 21 shootings in
Alabama, the
District of Columbia, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland,
Washington, and
Virginia. All totaled, they were believed to have killed ten
persons and
wounded three others in the Washington DC metro area alone.
Although
their campaign does not appear to be ideologically-driven, it
could never-

258 DEFENCE STUDIES
theless serve as a model for an individual or group with a
political
agenda.12
In the current climate of fear in America, leaderless resistance
has
the potential to be seriously disruptive to the normal
functioning of
daily life. In that regard, jihadists operating in the United States
would
not have to resort to more ‘‘spectaculars’’ in the style of 9/11 to
be
effective, rather any kind of seemingly random assassinations
and
bombings could be psychologically devastating to the American
pub-
lic.13 Furthermore, the most notorious lone wolves in the
United
States – Timothy McVeigh, Ted Kaczynski, and Bruce Ivins
(the
alleged anthrax terrorist) – wreaked havoc cheaply.14 Inasmuch

as lone
wolves operate alone, they are presumably more difficult to
monitor
because they lack ties to organizations that could already be
under sur-
veillance. As the case of the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski,
demon-
strated, a highly-intelligent and motivated terrorist working
alone can
carry on a campaign of violence over the course of many years.
Increasingly, individuals and small groups are responsible for
some
of the most lethal acts of terrorism. To be sure, well-established
orga-
nizations, such as Hizballah, Hamas, the FARC (Revolutionary
Armed
Forces of Colombia), the Tamil Tigers, and Al-Qaeda, continue
to
mount operations; however, individuals and much smaller cells,
some-
times inspired by the ideologies that inform the more
established
groups, are able to autonomously mount operations without
central

direction. In the contemporary world, the likelihood of major
armed
conflicts between nations has diminished. Moreover, with the
collapse
of the Soviet Communism, the world has entered a ‘unipolar’
era in
which one sole superpower predominates. Sometimes referred to
as
the ‘new world order’, this development has drastically changed
the
security environment within which terrorists operate. In many
parts of
the world, the setting is not conducive to large, clandestine
groups
insofar as many foreign governments are coordinating their
counterter-
rorism efforts with the US government, as they seek to
dismantle ter-
rorist organizations and deny them funding and resources. This
trend
accelerated after 9/11. Moreover, new surveillance technology
has
enabled governments to better monitor dissident groups and
potential
terrorists. As a consequence, larger groups cannot operate as

effectively
as they had in the past in that they are more vulnerable to
infiltration
and disruption.
On the other hand, the emergence of new technology also has
the potential to serve as a force multiplier for terrorists. For
example,
the Internet allows like-minded activists to operate on their own
259LEADERLESS RESISTANCE
initiative without the direction of a formal organization –hence,
the
emergence of leaderless resistance as a new operational strategy
and
the miniaturization of terrorist and insurgent movements around
the
world today. These developments mark a major departure from
pre-
vious paradigms of warfare and insurgency.
In essence, ‘leaderless resistance’ is a kind of lone wolf

operation in
which an individual, or a very small cohesive group, engages in
terrorism
independent of any official movement, leader or network of
support.15 In
order to be effective as a strategic approach, leaderless
resistance assumes
that multiple individuals and groups hold a common ideology
and are
willing to act on shared views in a violent or confrontational
manner.
As John Robb presaged in his book Brave New War: The Next
Stage of Terrorism and the End of Globalization, the rise of
small-scale,
‘do-it-yourself’ terrorism could become more worrisome than
the
centrally planned attacks about which the US seemed most con-
cerned.16 In fact, the US Department of State observed a trend
whereby more dispersed, localized, and smaller-scale groups are
increasingly active in terrorism, often with great lethal effect.17
The
prospect of leaderless resistance is worrisome for authorities
insofar as
all that connects the various individuals and cells is a common

ideol-
ogy thus making them more difficult to detect and deter. In his
book
Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution, Howard Rheingold
explained
how ordinary people could harness new technologies to attain
politi-
cal and social goals. For example, in 2001, ‘smart mobs’ in
Manila
overthrew President Joseph Ejercito Estrada in organized
demonstra-
tions coordinated by forwarding text messages via cell phones.
Simi-
larly, anti-globalization activists used mobile phones, websites,
laptops,
and hand-held computers as part of their swarming tactics that
halted
the meeting of the World Trade Organization in November
1999.18
This essay reviews four case studies to illustrate how the
concept of
leaderless resistance has been developed and implemented by
radical
dissident movements, including the extreme right, the anti-

globalization
movement, eco- and animal rights terrorists, and the global
Islamic
resistance movement. The popularity of the leaderless resistance
among
such a disparate array of extremists and dissidents suggest that
the con-
cept is increasingly popular and viable as a tactical approach.
The American Extreme Right
Actually, the American extreme right has done the most
theorizing on
the concept of leaderless resistance. At the present time, the
extreme
260 DEFENCE STUDIES
right is a relatively small and marginalized movement that does
not
enjoy broad based support from the public. Moreover, most in
the
movement realize that the forces arrayed against them –the

government
and well-financed monitoring organizations (e.g., the Anti-
Defamation
League and the Southern Poverty Law Center) –are collectively
vastly
more powerful than they are. Consequently, there has always
been a
conservative majority in the movement that believed that it
would be
foolhardy to prematurely engage in revolutionary violence. Such
an
approach would almost certainly lead to organizational suicide.
Thus,
the more conservative elements advocated a strategy that would
concen-
trate on utilizing propaganda to build a revolutionary majority,
which
came to be known as the theory of mass action.19
A leading proponent of mass action approach was George
Lincoln
Rockwell, the founder of the American Nazi Party that was most
active
in the decade of the 1960s. Rockwell believed that events and
trends,

such as racial integration, school busing, the Vietnam War, race
riots,
and rising crime, would engender urban mayhem and thus create
favor-
able conditions for his party. Extrapolating the trends, he
predicted that
a full-blown race war would commence by the end of the
1960s.20 In
light of his projected crisis atmosphere, he entertained the idea
that his
party could actually win national power by 1972, but in 1967,
he fell to
an assassin’s bullet, and with his departure, some elements of
the
extreme right became disillusioned with the conservative
approach.21
Foremost among them was Joseph Tomassi, a member of
Rockwell’s
successor organization who eventually departed and founded the
National Socialist Liberation Front (NSLF), a neo-Nazi
organization
that patterned itself on the left-wing models of the Weatherman
and the
Symbionese Liberation Army. Correctly, he saw that in the

early 1970s,
the idea of creating a Nazi-style party that would win the
support of a
majority of the population was futile. Nevertheless, he believed
that it
was still possible to strike blows against ‘the system’ provided
that revo-
lutionaries were prepared to act resolutely and alone. Whereas
the state
demonstrated over and over again that it could infiltrate and
effectively
neutralize any dissident organization, it had yet to develop the
capability
of thwarting the actions of individuals or small groups acting
alone.
However, the NSLF campaign was reckless and its
revolutionary arm
was quickly crushed, and like Rockwell, Tomassi was killed by
a
disgruntled member. Although the organization never succeeded
in
striking a serious blow against ‘the system’, according to one
observer
its ‘contribution to the leaderless resistance concept [was]
incalcula-

ble’.22 Still, the approach had still not been given a name and
the idea
would languish until the early 1990s.
The leaderless resistance concept really crystallized and gained
cur-
rency as a result of the October 1992 meeting in Estes Park,
Colorado
convoked by a Christian Identity minister, Pastor Pete Peters.
This
event provided a forum for the articulation of a new leaderless
resis-
tance approach. Whereas prior to the meeting the concept was
only
vaguely recognized by some, it was now given a name and
disseminated
to a much larger audience. This event, more than any other,
popular-
ized the notion in the extreme right subculture.23 At that event,
Louis

Beam, a longstanding activist, released the seminal essay
‘Leaderless
Resistance’ in which he argued that the traditional hierarchical
organiza-
tional structure was untenable under current conditions.
A firebrand orator, Beam was previously a leader of a Klan
organization
and at one time served as the Aryan Nations’ ‘ambassador at
large’. In the
Vietnam War, he served as helicopter door-gunner and was
awarded the
Distinguished Flying Cross. In 1988, he was one of the
defendants at the
Fort Smith Sedition Trial at which a who’s who of some of the
most radi-
cal elements of the extreme right were accused of plotting to
overthrow
the government. All defendants, however, were acquitted.24
Pastor Peters
included Beam’s essay on leaderless resistance in a published
report on
the meeting.25 In his essay, Beam identified the late Colonel
Ulius Louis
Amoss as his source of inspiration for his theory. A former

operative of
the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), Amoss had written about
mount-
ing resistance in the event that the United States was taken over
by Com-
munists during the Cold War. According to Beam, an organized
approach
was untenable under current conditions insofar as the
government was
too powerful and would not allow the existence of any
potentially serious
oppositional organizations. The leaderless resistance model
proffered by
Beam rejected the pyramid structure in which the leadership is
located at
the top and the mass of followers at the bottom. He reasoned
that in a
technologically advanced society, such as contemporary
America, the
government, through means such as electronic surveillance,
could
without much difficulty, penetrate the structure and reveal its
chain of
command. From there, the organization could be effectively
neutralized

from within by infiltrators and agents provocateurs.
Beam considered the Communist cell system, but determined
that it
was inappropriate for the contemporary American extreme right
because
the movement could not presently avail itself of the resources
that the
Communist cells had, namely, central direction, outside support,
and
adequate funding. As a strategic alternative, Beam invoked the
‘phantom
262 DEFENCE STUDIES
cell’ model of organization as described by Colonel Amoss.
This
approach drew upon the ‘Sons of Liberty’, or the ‘Committees
of Cor-
respondence’—the Revolutionary War patriots who resisted
British colo-
nial rule –as a strategic basis of resistance for the contemporary
extreme

right. According to Beam’s historical interpretation of this
movement, it
operated in small cells independently of the others with no
central com-
mand or direction. Applying this model, Beam argued that it
became
the responsibility of the individual to acquire the necessary
skills and
information to carry out what needed to be done. Members take
action
when and where they see fit. Organs of information, such as
newspa-
pers, leaflets, and now the Internet, enable each person to keep
informed of events. Beam conceded that leaderless resistance
was a
‘child of necessity’, but argued that all other alternatives were
either
unworkable or impractical. Furthermore, he pointed out that this
approach presented an intelligence nightmare for authorities
insofar as it
is much more difficult to infiltrate ‘a thousand different small
phantom
cells opposing them.’26 The essay was disseminated through
computer
networks of which Beam was a pioneer in exploiting during the

1980s.27 Beam’s revolutionary approach quickly caught on and
ushered
in a period of theorizing and debate on the topics of resistance
and
terrorism within the extreme right. Moreover, the government
and
monitoring groups were quick to take notice and saw this as
evidence
of the development of a loose, but widespread, extreme right
terrorist
network.28
Richard Kelly Hoskins, a Christian Identity minister from
Lynch-
burg, Virginia, also popularized the leaderless resistance
approach in his
1990 book, Vigilantes of Christendom, in which he offered his
bizarre
interpretation of historical events. According to Hoskins,
throughout
history, righteous ‘Phineas Priests’ fulfilled a sacred role by
assassinating
those who have transgressed God’s law.29 Not long after the
first publi-
cation of the book, several right-wing terrorists identifying

themselves
as Phineas Priests engaged in criminal acts, including robbery
and ter-
rorism; however, the name appears to denote more of a ‘state of
the
mind’ fellowship than a formal organization.30
The late Dr William L. Pierce of the National Alliance
contributed
to the popularity of leaderless resistance with the publication of
a novel
titled Hunter, which is in some ways the sequel to The Turner
Diaries –a
fictional story of an apocalyptic race war that convulses
America –—
which is believed to have inspired several episodes of right-
wing vio-
lence including the campaigns of the Order and the Aryan
Republican
Army, the Oklahoma City bombing, and the London bombing
spree of

David Copeland.31 Hunter tells the story of a lone wolf
assassin, Oscar
Yeager, who initially murders interracial couples. By doing so,
he
believed that the symbolic effect might encourage others to
replicate his
acts. As the story goes on, Yeager’s worldview develops along
the way,
as he begins as merely a racist and later becomes a full-blown
anti-Sem-
ite. Under the direction of a rogue FBI agent, Yeager wages a
one-man
terror campaign against politicians and politically liberal
activists, among
others.32
Since the early 1980s, the American extreme right has evolved
from a
movement characterized by ultra patriotism, to one increasingly
oriented
to a revolutionary outlook. This can be explained in large part
to the fact
that various social trends over the past several decades have
significantly

changed the texture of the United States. For those in the
extreme right,
America is not the same country they once knew. What is more,
many in
the movement consider the ‘damage’ done too great to be
repaired by con-
ventional methods. Only radical solutions, it seems, can save
the nation
and race. From their perspective, this increasingly desperate
predicament
demands that the old order be torn asunder and a new order be
built upon
the ruins. Out of this destruction it is believed that the remnants
of Wes-
tern civilization will create a new golden age characterized by
creativity
and racial solidarity.33 However, in order to arrive at this
much-heralded
new era, some trigger event or catalyst is necessary to usher in a
revolu-
tionary epoch, which would include great tribulation and
sacrifice. On
that note, the presidential candidacy of Barack Obama seemed
to alarm
some segments of the white nationalist movement. In October

2008, two
young men, Daniel Cowart of Bells, Tennessee, and Paul
Schlesselman of
West Helena, Arkansas, were arrested for an alleged plot to rob
a gun
store, target students at a largely black high school, and then
attempt to
assassinate Obama.34
Despite the popularity of leaderless resistance in the extreme
right sub-
culture, the movement has failed to implement an effective
strategy. The
principal weakness of the American extreme right has been its
lack of
ideological coherence and its failure to develop a platform that
would
appeal to a sizable portion of the public. This has inhibited the
movement
from developing a sense of unity that would allow it to mobilize
effec-
tively and on a broad scale. By contrast, as a political activist in
the 1920s
and earlier 1930s, Adolf Hitler demanded that the various
German nation-

alist parties merge with his NSDAP and adopt its platform. As
Hitler
wrote in Mein Kampf, only with the power of a singular
ideology could the
political right prevail over its Marxist opponents. Similarly, the
Communist movement of the early twentieth century, despite its
various
264 DEFENCE STUDIES
factions, developed an ideology around which activists could
organize and
seek political power. More recently, Osama bin Laden’s vision
of Islam-
ism attracted radical Muslims around the world, despite the fact
that his
formal organization has been severely damaged by military
action from
the United States and its allies. In contradistinction, the
American
extreme right’s lack of ideological coherence has undercut any
unified
sense of mission among its followers and thus makes an

implementation
of the leaderless resistance approach less feasible. Scattered
elements of
the left-wing oriented anti-globalization movement have taken
up the
leaderless resistance theme as well.
The Anti-Globalization Movement
Back in 1999, two researchers at the RAND Corporation, John
Arquilla
and David Ronfeldt, first predicted that the old hierarchical,
organiza-
tional structures of terrorist groups were giving way to a flatter,
or hori-
zontal organizations that would be more networked-based. As
they
presaged, new information technology enabled the development
of these
networked-style insurgencies to take hold. This allowed for
‘swarming’–
a new operational innovation whereby dispersed nodes of a
network of
forces converge on a target from multiple directions to
accomplish a

task. The overall aim is for members of a terrorist network to
converge
rapidly on a target and disperse immediately until it is time
again to
recombine for a new pulse.35 They identified swarming as a
form of
Netwar, which they define as ‘an emerging mode of conflict
(and
crime) at societal levels, short of traditional military warfare, in
which
the protagonists use network forms of organization and related
doc-
trines, strategies, and technologies attuned to the information
age’.36
What distinguishes netwar from previous forms of conflict is
the net-
worked organizational basis of the practitioners. Many of the
groups are
leaderless, yet their members are able to combine in swarming
attacks.37
The emergence of so-called amateur terrorism is related to the
spread
of information technologies that allow dispersed groups and

individuals
the ability to conspire and coordinate attacks across
considerable dis-
tances.38 For instance, the Zapatista movement in Mexico has
employed
a form of netwar. Reaching out to a range of non-governmental
organi-
zations (NGOs), it has impelled the Mexican government to call
a halt
to military operations on several occasions.39 Swarming is most
effective
when it is designed around the deployment of small, dispersed,
and
networked maneuverable units.40
The Internet facilitates swarming in several ways. For example,
in
the fall of 1999, diverse elements of the anti-globalization
movement
converged in Seattle to disrupt an important meeting of the
World

Trade Organization (WTO). Through the Internet, various
groups and
activists were able to coordinate their efforts and swarm, or
come
together. Much of the cohesion of the activists stemmed from
impro-
vised communications, including cell phones, radios, police
scanners,
and portable computers. Employing these media, they were able
to link
into continuously updated web pages and other new sources
which gave
reports from the street.41 As Paul de Armond observed, the
WTO pro-
tests succeeded because of a combination of strategic surprise
and tacti-
cal openness. The ‘Battle of Seattle’ was fought not only in the
streets,
but also in the infosphere.42
During the melee, a loose coalition –the ‘Black Bloc’–composed
of anarchists, legitimate demonstrators, and opportunistic
criminals
were able to come together for short-term activism.43 The
police

were not prepared for this type of postmodern networked
conflict.44
The main organizer of street activity was planned by the Direct
Action Network (DAN) whose members provided a nucleus of
blockades around which crowd actions were directed.45 Another
major actor was organized labor, mainly the AFL-CIO, a
hierarchical
instruction that emphasizes a top-down leadership structure.
Although
their main body had no interest in joining with DAN, after a few
days of protests, there was a spillover from the union’s crowds
into
DAN’s street action. Whereas the AFL-CIO planned on holding
a
march in downtown Seattle to bring attention to their labor con-
cerns, DAN and other like-minded activists sought to shut down
the
WTO meeting by enclosing the conference site.46
As the protests in Seattle demonstrated, the anti-globalization
move-
ment has adopted new swarming tactics and has formulated its
own ver-
sion of leaderless resistance. The leading proponents, the Italian

Marxist
Antonio Negri and Duke University Professor Michael Hardt,
theorize
that Autonomist Marxism can serve as a model for overthrowing
the glo-
bal capitalist system.47 Rather than the masses of workers
acting in unison
in revolt as Lenin and Mao prophesized, Negri and Hardt argue
that a
patchwork of autonomous ‘multitudes’ can effectively oppose
the current
capitalist version of globalization and replace it with an
alternative global-
ization based on socialism.48 Thus a variegated collection of
protest groups
–anarchists, environmentalists, and working-class laborers –can
organize
against a common foe. Although they may lack a single leader,
an organi-
zational hierarchy, and a common ideology, they are
nonetheless held
266 DEFENCE STUDIES

together by a shared opposition to the current process of
globalization as
evidenced by the protests that paralyzed Seattle in 1999.49
Despite a myriad of differences, Negri and Hardt maintain that
the
multitude can find commonality and work together to attain
democ-
racy and create an alternative globalization. Whereas previous
revolu-
tionary movements were led by vanguard parties with
centralized
leadership, they argue that a new networked ‘movement of
move-
ments’ can successfully effect change. They cite the 1999
protests of
the WTO as the embryonic display of this model. A variety of
move-
ments, groups, and activists came together to oppose the
‘neoliberal’
orientation of the global economic order sometimes referred to
as the
‘Washington Consensus’.50 Anti-globalization activists created
their own

‘Independent Media Centers’ in those cities where the major
protests
occurred.51 By exploiting new forms of communication, such
an Indy-
media, activists can break the information monopoly of the
corporate
media and become actively involved in the production of
informa-
tion.52 Increasingly, dissident and terrorist groups are taking
advantage
of the so-called new media. In recent months, other left-wing
move-
ments, including the numerous ‘occupy’ protests and the
Anonymous
‘hacktivist’ group, have implemented a leaderless strategy. The
radical
environmentalist and animal liberation movements have also
proven
adept at using the leaderless method.
Eco-extremism and the Radical Animal Liberation Movement
For over two decades, elements of the radical ecology and
animal libera-
tion movements have demonstrated adeptness in implementing

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