Centre Européen de Recherches Internationales & Stratégiques

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1 Centre Européen de Recherches Internationales & Stratégiques Master of Arts in International Politics Lecturer: Guy Olivier FAURE Academic Year Asymmetric Warfare... 2 Negotiating with terrorists... 10

2 Lecture title: Asymmetric Warfare Lecturer: Guy Olivier FAURE (Université Paris V Sorbonne) Date: January 31, INTRODUCTION 1.1. Definitions Asymmetric warfare Asymmetric warfare is a special type of conflict as the resources of the two belligerents differ in essence. In classical warfare, there are two armies, each one with its own territory and with information on both sides (how many tanks, how many ships etc.) Usually both parties know a lot about each other. In asymmetric warfare there are totally different methods. The enemy has no clear defined territory and there is no confrontation between two armies. The enemy is invisible. Then each party tries to exploit the weaknesses of the other: we get urban warfare, guerilla warfare. The most challenging is urban warfare: no army is really trained to go from basement to basement. The fighters move amongst people: we do not know who the terrorist is. On the opposite of classical wars, there are also no clear regulations; there are no limits: everyone is a target. These new enemies do not have any respect for any traditional codes or laws. Just after the Vietnam War an article was published on Why big nations lose small wars (1974): Vietnamese people compensated their weaknesses by strategic ways (for example, explosive devices and people bombing themselves). In North Caucasus, Muslim people fight Russian armies. There is a new phenomenon, the black widows. These are widows (that have lost their husband, brothers, or other close relatives in one of the two Chechen wars) surrounding themselves with explosives and going to a place where there are a lot of Russian people to bomb themselves. People are not afraid to kill themselves and see their death as a reward. 2

3 Terrorism In , the Boers (Dutch farmers) led guerilla wars against the Brits. The most ancient asymmetric wars have been found in the fight between the Zealots against the Romans. Then, what is terrorism? Terrorism is a method of instilling an anxiety, a fear through threat, intimidation. It is the use of violence against innocent, non- violent people to provoke a public reaction. Terrorism is carried out by hijacking, firing rocket, using chemicals, nuclear stuffs, suicide bombing, taking hostages, etc History of modern terrorism Terrorism existed long ago. - Russia: anarchists plotting the assassination of the Tsar - Sarajevo: murder of the Archduke of Serbia, leading to WWI - Palestine: anti- colonial actions. Zionist groups fighting the British mandate over Palestine. - Algeria: first FLN (National Liberation Front) attack. It was the beginning of a long and bloody war until now in Palestine - End of the 60s: ETA in Spain and ERA in Ireland, PKK in Turkey, etc. Many terrorist groups at that time and it did not end up. - Red Brigades in Italy, Action Directe in France, Red Army Fraction in Germany - Rogue States are State who provide support to terrorist groups (resources, training, shelter, etc.): North Korea, Iran, Libya Lockerbie: flight from London to New York, destroyed over Scotland by Libyan terrorists Armed Islamic Group: Very specific technic to threat and instill fear by cutting throats September 11: what do we see? Iconic symbol of the Two Twins and innocent people killed. Real traumatism. 3

4 What goes on in this world? Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, and Yemen are on the top 5 terrorist States, and four of them are Muslim countries. The first victims of terrorism are Muslims. Growing trend of terrorism in the world To go into more details The size of the red dots shows the magnitude of the incident (number of people killed). All the continents are concerned by this terrorism. Only birds and Artic penguins are not exposed to terrorist threats. 2. WHO ARE THE TERRORISTS? 2.1. There are different types of terrorists: - Political terrorists o o Irreducible opponents : they target a country, they fight the government to take power (FARC in Colombia for example) Separatists: they want to create their own country (Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka for example, Muslims in the South of Thailand, Uyghur in Chinese Turkmenistan, etc.). They deal with political issues. They want to control or to have their own State. 4

5 - Religious terrorists: these opponents are more difficult. If you negotiate with these terrorists, this is a hell. As a negotiator, you receive instructions from your government to save the life of hostages. And these terrorists receive their instructions from God. Anything you can say or do is directly disqualified. Usually they want something they consider as good like establishing the caliphate of God. Hezbollah in South Lebanon: At the same time they are political and religious terrorists Al Qaeda martyrdom: They consider that part of their duty is to become a martyr. Terrorism is a road to martyrdom. Then no one is afraid to die. They define themselves are soldiers of Allah. This is a holy war for them. They are fighting against the Judeo- crusaders, meaning the West. They have another target, the renegades: Muslims who do not support them, Muslims who do not belong to their strict Islamic orientation. They consider them as traitors to Islam so these renegades must be eradicated. Their heroes are suicide bombers. They have special rituals: video of the Last Will where suicide bomber wears special dress. This is a kind of wedding ceremony: shaving arms and hands, putting a lot of perfume, etc. There is a sacralization of suicide: the bomber is offering its life to God. And its death is celebrated as a wedding. Family is rewarded and is proud of his sacrifice. There is the belief that after the death the martyr would receive 72 virgins to serve him. It is pure devotion to God and there are training camps for this ultimate sacrifice called camps to Paradise. 5

6 The Video of the Last Will is shared with the family and in the tribe to get a very high status. Suicide bomber is happy; it is a wedding with 72 ladies. This is not sad Terrorists group structure: In the old days there was a pyramidal model: Leninist type organization. This is a centralized system of commands with a top and a base. Any clandestine army was structured this way. If you could hit the top, you could destroy the system. Al- Qaeda does not have this weakness. It is structured on the rhizome model: it is like bamboo growing or strawberries plants. You plant and after some times there is something that grows and expands to other places. There is no center, no core. If you destroy one plant, you do not destroy the other plants growing elsewhere. There is very little structure, very little coordination, so it is difficult to reach the whole network. It is highly ideologically driven. These small cells are very difficult to identity first, very invisible so extremely difficult to infiltrate. If you infiltrate or destroy one cell, you do not reach the core. Al- Qaeda means the base (the ideological base). The fact of killing Ben Laden did not solve the problem. Symbolically this is an achievement but this is not the end of everything. Fighting terrorism is very costly. If ever you get someone suspected to be a terrorist getting to Europe, in accordance laws protecting individuals we have to let it him but we have to keep a look at him day and night. You need 15 people for one suspected person: so if there is about suspected people in Europe, you cannot mobilize people. It is impossible to mobilize so much people. The means that we have are not sufficiently effective, as we would like them to be. 6

7 For example: there are about a dozen of main minorities in Afghanistan. They do not speak the same languages and have different religions. There is no way to build up a nation- State when tomorrow the American army would have withdrew. It is clear that the system would collapse. What is going to happen in Afghanistan will be each valley driven by one tribe and each tribe having its own ideas with no national project Profiles of terrorists: There are several types of terrorist. The main divide is: - - Absolute terrorist: this type of terrorists considers that his action is a self- contained act. The idea is to punish the enemy (suicide bombers for example). He does not negotiate. Why? He considers that there is no possible compromise with the Devil, people not sharing its belief. He is an absolute soldier. Contingent terrorist: he wants to get something in return of his action. He accepts the idea of a negotiation. For example, hostages are taken up as monetary value. When dealing with contingent terrorism, we talk about negotiations. 7

8 3. NEGOTIATING? Should we negotiate? When a terrorist takes hostages, it is not to negotiate. He tells you what he wants and you have to fulfill his demand. So we have to find a way for making him accepting a negotiation. Today the most dominant concept is engaging rather than isolating terrorists. For some time people thought that isolating was the solution. Unfortunately it proved to be inefficient. The point now is to get some influence on terrorists by negotiating with them. Once we have decided that we could negotiate, ethically and practically speaking, then there is another issue: legitimacy. This is a problem for governments that are extremely reluctant to negotiate with terrorists because they want to avoid the recognition of the terrorists. Negotiation means recognizing the other as equal and legitimate. It raises the status of terrorists. But sometimes we have to accept this. What we usually find is talks. When the hostages are made free, there is absolutely no concession. In reality this is a lie. The reality is completely different: there is no such thing as a free meeting. This is impossible to get hostages free without concessions. Terrorists want something in return so we have to make their demands as lower as possible. Even countries that are committed to never negotiate, in reality they negotiate. There are several countries that really try to stop negotiating, but this is too costly: hostages are killed. Example: In January 2013 a GIA terrorist group moved from Mali to Algeria and took up a gas plant. More than 800 people were made hostages. At the end there were 37 hostages and 29 terrorists killed. 8

9 4. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 4.1. What about the gender issue in Al- Qaeda? What about the female forces? Originally women were out of the game. The principle was not take women even as hostages. Things evolved through times and women became to be considered as a part of the fight. So, why could women not being kept as hostages? Jihad has taken women and children. When we talk about suicide bombers, they can be both women and men. (Black Widows in South Caucasus for example). There is now a way to frame women. Originally Al- Qaeda was not supposed to take hostages because you could not buy human being. But the belief evolved and they probably wanted to get more means of action. They started to understand that taking hostages was really something valuable. There was a sort of international index of hostages by country. There is a market for hostages Concerning finance, is it possible to trace and monitor terrorist activities? There are many ways to get the money without being trapped. First of all, there are governments supporting the terrorists (Rogue States). Terrorists know all the many possible opportunities there have to get money without being tracked About video of Last Will, it looks like mental illness and doctors would say that there is no way to negotiate with a mental ill patient. Or are they completely rational with their ideology? Suicide bombers are rather strongly ideologically driven people. They are not sick but they are strongly manipulated by the idea of their people. There is a long and strong psychological process to push people to consider suicide as a heroic act. 9

10 Lecture title: Negotiating with terrorists Lecturer: Guy Olivier FAURE (Université Paris V Sorbonne) Date: February 1, STRATEGIC OPTIONS If we look at the different possibilities that are offered when we deal with terrorist groups, there are several options: 1. No negotiation: for example, UK had prisoners made by Al- Qaeda in the Maghreb and these prisoners were finally murdered, as they could not be used as a currency for negotiations. Al- Qaeda moved from Mali to a gas plant in Algeria: Algeria sent military but those soldiers did not really care about the prisoners and 37 of them died. There is no such a thing as a free meal: no negotiation is a policy but it is not so much applied. And when it is applied, there are a lot of victims. 2. Secret negotiations: this is the most current practice. For example, the CARTER administration negotiated with Teheran when the US embassy was kept as hostage. CARTER negotiated and finally the hostages were made free, secretly. 3. Regular negotiations: when a country has no more government. In Iraq, some French journalists were taken as hostages and used as currency. The French government negotiated with the terrorists. For instance, it ransomed $10 million for the freedom of Florence AUBENAS. For the two journalists of France Television, the price was about $15 million, which was "business as usual". 4. Negotiation to prepare for an assault: this is something that is done in situations of sieges. Before acting, the first thing to do is getting information about how many terrorists there are, who they are, where they are, what are their weapons, etc. Example: the siege of the Japanese ambassador s house in Lima Terrorists made everyone prisoners in the house. The siege lasted for many months so everyday they had to bring medicine and food to the house. The authority introduced chessboards and inside the pieces there were some bugs. Hostages would play and talk about the terrorists during their game. After some times, an assault was organized and no hostage was killed. 10

11 5. Manipulation smartly organized: for example, Senator BETANCOURT in Columbia. She was running to become maybe the head of the State. She was taken by FARC. She was kept for several years. International pressure was put on the Columbian government to enter into negotiation with the terrorists. Finally, the military introduced their own people into the FARC. They managed to make them believe that it was necessary to regroup all the different foreign hostages. When the hostages were regrouped, a helicopter took the hostages making them believe that they were agents of the Red Cross. All hostages were released and not a single person was killed. You can make such an operation once but you cannot repeat it. 2. NEGOTIATING WITH HOSTAGE TAKERS 2.1. High stakes This is not like diplomatic or business negotiations. There are lives at stake. Negotiators may put their own life at risk too. To put pressure on the negotiators, terrorists kill hostages Most antagonistic relation This is a very antagonist negotiation: it is not on the interest of both sides like in business. There is no cooperation; nothing is shared in common. This is a sort of lose- lose rational because the authority is going to lose prisoners, hostages, money and the terrorists might lose maybe not on the spot but later, because nothing is forgotten. At the end there are only losers. One recurrent thing that happens during the lose- lose game is that one part loses more. There are many situations in which the other party suffers more. During the World War I, the Germans designed a lose- lose battle in Verdun but they did not predict that they would lose as much as the French. And this was the beginning of their defeat No trust There is a process of demonization: you do not negotiate with a devil. When we look at the perceptions of the terrorists, there are seen as cold- blood killers. On the other side, terrorists see America as the head of the snake. Normally hostage takers do not negotiate; they only come with their demands. There is no trust and anything can happen at any time. The priority is to free hostages. We cannot regard too much what means are used. Some good movie: Dog Day Afternoon with Al PACINO. This is exactly representing the reality. 11

12 3. BASIC GUIDELINES There are people trained to negotiate with those people. 1. Do not negotiate over values or beliefs: there are no shared values, even not over human life so there is no way to agree. We can fractionate concessions if it is money, weapons, etc. but not values. We can meet or we cannot meet values. The only way is to avoid dealing with values. 2. Seek to de- escalate: the first way to de- escalate is through the language by avoiding critical things. The general idea is to have terrorists going from violence to politics again. The aim is that violence is no more used, as the terrorists have no other ways to express their demands. 3. Getting absolute terrorists shifting to contingent terrorists: the idea is to get some dialogue with terrorists. Example: Egypt, the Jemaah Islamiyah group The Egyptian government freed around of their members who were in jail so the terrorist group stopped using violence. 4. Fragmenting the terrorist group: Terrorist groups have several opinions within the group; so one idea is to play on internal divisions. There are always hardliners and soft- liners. There are normally two circles: on one side there is the negotiator with the terrorists and on the other, the authority, the decision- maker. The negotiator may be influenced by terrorists so it is important to keep the decision- maker free from that influence. 4. THE NEGOTIATION PROCESS There are 3 stages and everyone has a different rational. This is the challenge: you can be performing very well on one and not so much on the other ones. 1. The first stage is pre- negotiation: establishing a channel of negotiation. With new technologies this stage is now easier than in the past. There is a heavy risk to have hostages killed: the first hour is the tensest one. The aim is to lower the tension and to establish channels of negotiations, to start talking. 2. Establishing a formula: the formula is a list of issues accepted by both sides (what are we going to discuss? Money, freedom of hostages, etc.). There are some things that would not be discussed. 12

13 3. Working out the details: how many prisoners can be freed? How much money for the ransom? Normally at this stage what you do is to work at lowering the level of expectation of the other side. There is very little room for concessions. This game can last some time. There are many parameters intervening in the negotiation process (time pressure, public opinion, hostages families, etc.). 4. The implementation of the agreement: this is really a Pandora box. Anything can happen and there are often bad surprises (hostage already killed). We get a lot of dramatic situations. 5. CASE: AIR FRANCE FLIGHT AF Hijacking of the plane In December 1994 (24-26 December), just at Christmas time, people were leaving Algeria to reach France and celebrate Christmas in France. The airplane was ready to take off and 4 terrorist wearing Police uniforms entered in the airplane. Suddenly they revealed they were soldiers of Allah (terrorists from the Armed Islamic Group). They dressed as crewmembers so they would not be shot by snipers. There were 220 passengers in the airplane. They forced every woman to wear a scarf. Then the connection was established with the control tower and the terrorist commando asked to free two leaders of the Islamic Salvation Front who were prisoners in Algeria. Two passengers were killed on the spot: an Algerian policeman and a Vietnamese diplomat. To make sure that people understood their message, they threw the bodies outside the airplane on the tarmac. Everybody understood how much the terrorists were committed Negotiations with the Algerian government Then what to do? As it is an Air France flight, the French government is involved. The French government planned to send a SWAT force (GIGN) to attack the plane but the Algerian government did not agree. The French team was sent to Mallorca and trained for a possible assault with a similar plane. The Algerian authority spotted who was the head of the terrorist group. They took the mother to talk to his son: the head of the terrorist group went crazy and decided to kill one hostage every half hour and he killed one hostage on the spot. Normally when terrorists start killing people, you have to attack. But the Algerian were not prepared to attack. Finally the French government started arguing very toughly with the Algerian government. After some time the Algerian government agreed to let the plane take off. Before that the French government managed to negotiate with the terrorists: freeing women and children (about 60 people were released) in exchange of the taking off of the plane. 13

14 5.3. Negotiations to get the plane making a stop in Marseilles The airplane had been several days on the tarmac and did not have enough fuel to get to Paris. They had to get a refilling in Marseilles. There was an agreement on that. During the flight the pilot discussed with the head of the terrorists. He asked if he could have his word that the plane would not be destroyed during the flight. The airplane landed in Marseilles. Something very unexpected happened. The terrorist asked 25 tons of refill (while only 8 were really needed to get to Paris). We know today that the aim was to use the plane as a flight bomb over the Eiffel Tower. The assumption was confirmed later. Terrorists asked for a press conference in Paris and there was an insistence on organizing it in Paris and not in Marseilles. The French authorities then understood that they had to act in Marseilles. They managed to keep the discussion going so terrorists would be exhausted Getting information Then GIGN men dressed as service men were sent in the airplane to get information on the terrorist: the doors of the plane were not blocked. From outside it was then possible to open then without any risk. It was really strategic information. After some times, the terrorists lost their patient and they took one of the crewmembers and threatened to kill him. Finally he was not killed because the discussion took another orientation The assault At the 54 th hour SWAP forces came from the back of the plane and opened one door. This was a complete surprise for the terrorists because they did not think the doors could be opened from outside. There was a real battle inside the plane: 3 terrorists were killed in 6 minutes and the last one took 20 minutes to be killed. No passenger was killed. This is a huge drama because having to live such a situation during so many hours definitively changed the life of the hostages. There were 3 negotiations: 1. With the Algerian authorities to have the airplane taking off 2. With the terrorist to have a stop in Marseilles 3. With the terrorist to prepare for the assault Negotiation, assault, dramas, blood and death are always on the agenda. 14

15 6. NEW TRENDS OF TERRORISM What are the purposes, the strategies of modern terrorism like Al- Qaeda? They are extremely active and there are a lot of American publications about Al- Qaeda becoming weak but in reality Al- Qaeda is far more organized and active than 10 years ago. 1. Introducing confusion in the Western intelligence: misleading information 2. Punishing American allies: attack in Spain, UK, France and Denmark are also targets. 3. Establishing a network in weak States 4. Recruiting combatants in non- Muslim countries: Al- Qaeda is spreading much beyond the traditional area of the organization. 5. Trying to increase Western military involvement in the Muslim world: this is a trap. The idea is to create a feeling that all the Muslims are attacked and so that there is duty to defend Islam. In Mali the French military intervention; Mr. HOLLANDE has fallen into the trap. 7. NOT THE END OF HISTORY: TERRORISM AFTER 20 YEARS This is not the end of the history. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, some American thinkers like FUKUYAMA wrote about the end of the history. This is a mistake. This is not the end of terrorism. So what is it after 20 years? 7.1. Urbanization The world is more urbanized. In the 2030 s, the majority of the people on the planet will live in cities. There will be 30 megacities and between 10 and 30 million people. Most of these cities will be made of slums. That will mean uncontrolled area. Two billion of people will live in place where there is no control. So there are lots of opportunities for terrorists to root, develop, grow and act Weakening of the nation- state What we observe all around the world is a weakening of the Nation- State. The concept of territory is collapsing with globalization. The European Union is a typical example. The rules of the game are defined outside of the country. There are no more boundaries. If you are in Paris, you can drive anywhere in Europe without control. Things have changed tremendously. 15

16 7.3. Weakening of central control What we also observe is that more countries are collapsing. After the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia, the desegregation of the world is not over. There are new countries emerging. There is a weakening of the central control A new profile of terrorists There is a new profile of terrorists: gangs, private armies, and criminal organizations. You can buy nuclear weapons now. Moldavia is market for these weapons. With the new profile of terrorists, there is a culture of heroine and Kalashnikovs. There are political organizations that turn into criminal organizations. This is the case for the FARC for example. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, they started dealing with drugs and taking hostages to get resources New techologies When we think about asymmetric warfare in the future, we have to think about the drone. The purposes of the drone are not only to collect information but also to kill people. This is a sophisticated engine. This type of drone is obviously born for the kill (missiles). This is a new technology to get data without any privacy left. In addition it has a very low cost (a few hundreds euro only). It can collect information but also spread viruses, illness. 16

17 Cyber wars: when you are America, you can do a lot of things and cyber wars are totally illegal. There is a complete asymmetry with the advances of technology: the ones that do not own such technology cannot do anything. The cyber world is a virtual world but the consequences are real: you can end up with real deaths. When a country is too much organized on digital system, you can real destroy the management of the country. This is a very type of asymmetric war. The division between sources and the targets is important. The green are the sources and the red are the targets. You can mess up a system without showing the source of the mess. Recommended books: FAURE Guy Olivier and ZARTMAN William (ed.), Negotiating with Terrorists: Strategy, Tactics, and Politics, Routledge, 2011, 256 pp. FAURE Guy Olivier and ZARTMAN William I., Engaging Extremists: Trade- Offs, Timing, and Diplomacy, United States Institute of Peace Press, 2011, 300 pp. This is not the end of history and to conclude, we have to live with terrorism. We have to negotiate. We have to work for a better world. There are some trends that we cannot control like urbanization and technology. But in the end it will always depend on what we decide to do. We should integrate. We cannot just threaten other parts of the world; we cannot ignore them (North Korea for example). We have to find ways to solve the threats. 17

18 8. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 8.1. We now live in a world with freedom of expression and everybody is allowed to express its own ideology. With these forms of expression, what criteria can we use to identify a group as terrorists? Actually a terrorist is not defined according to the purpose of its action but according to the means of its action. Terrorism uses fear, threat as a target. Sometimes people hesitate: is he a terrorist or a freedom fighter? He can be both. During WWII, the French Resistance named themselves Resistant and German called them Terrorist. Resistant would kill German soldiers: they were part of the war. The idea was to instill some fear but they would not kill German women or children, they would not bomb innocent people. There is a thin limitation between a freedom fighter and a terrorist. In the case of Mandela, he had to resist but he did not use violence or murdered innocent people. Gandhi was also a symbol of non- violence: non- violence is a powerful weapon because it puts an incredible pressure. Resistance wants to resist to violent people, which is totally different from terrorism that uses violence as a mean of action. During WWII, German sent V1 and V2 to destroy London: this is a kind of terrorism. The aim was to create fear and to kill innocent people. It had nothing to do with the law of war, with the Geneva Convention. We do not define terrorism by the purpose but by the methods used. Therefore, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were typically terrorist acts: this is not a regular at all. Common people were targeted. The aim was to create fear. Terrorism is a very common thing in life How do normal and educated people become terrorists? Jihad has an attraction and they recruit a lot of people. They took major channels: Internet and through communities. There are a lot of people who are Muslims but who do not live in Muslim countries and they get a sense of community by integrating these groups. The second stage is that this community is not a normal one and it instills the idea of threat. So these people end up acting with religious purposes. The problem is to try addressing the roots: there are social reasons. It is not easy to infiltrate these communities. Al- Qaeda is very smart and very organized. When you think that someone is a terrorist, you need 15 agents checking one person to assure he is going to do something. There is research now done to understand how people can join these ideologies. We have to understand the process. 18

19 8.3. Is there a secret or a special fund? Is this money in some way affected by the current financial crisis? Who pays? First of all, there is not only money involved. It is also about prisoners. Another thing that is often asked by terrorist is to get a media exposure. Governments pay money when there are hostages. Governments have the duty to help their nationals anywhere in the world. What terrorists do with this money? They improve their system and they can buy weapons. In Moldavia or Dubai for example you can buy anything you want. Terrorists just buy what they need to strengthen their power What about the motives of terrorists? The existence of terrorism can give a lot of good reasons for State to enhance their control on different things and to intervene illegally in new area. There is no general accepted definition of terrorism. We use a working definition. Motives can always be framed by both ways in a positive ways. So we do not use motives to create a definition. Purposes are connected with values and there is no way to rank values. You can only observe that every part has its own values with different priorities in values. This is like cultures. There are a lot of cultures in the world. Terrorists have their own motives, which may be good but their means are not acceptable. Terrorists have taken lives and this is not acceptable. 19