One of the main difficulties in the fight against terrorism is the meaning of the word itself and the ambiguity surrounding it. The phrase “one man’s freedom fighter is another man’s terrorist” is no less true for being clichéd. Many acts of terror are perpetrated in the name of the lofty ideals of self-determination or in the battle against an occupying state. The Palestinian situation is a case in point. Terrorist organizations like Hezbollah and the Al-Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade escape unanimous international condemnation because of their insistence that their actions are justified and necessary in light of what they view as Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories.
However, these artificial distinctions cannot be taken seriously and allowed to be used as excuses for acts of violence to be carried out against unsuspecting innocents. Repression is no excuse for murder. In this day and age, with the pervasive international media presence and the accessibility of NGOs dealing with the issue of Human Rights, there are alternatives to terror. The availability of these avenues of expression have been used effectively by non violent political activists like the Dalai Lama in Tibet, Aung San Suu Kyi in Burma and Nelson Mandela in apartheid era South Africa to gain recognition of their cause. Thus, any independence seeking groups that discount these options for violence can only be labeled terrorists.
The first governmental attempt to legislate specifically against this threat was the British government, in response to violence from Irish nationalists in 1989. It passed the Provisional Prevention of Terrorism Bill which defined terrorism as “the use of violence for political ends, and includes any use of violence for the purpose of putting the public or any section of society in fear”, providing us with the most concise definition to date of terrorism. Thus, regardless of the justifiability of their cause, any who resort to violence shall henceforth be referred to in this discussion to as terrorists.
The challenges in fighting terrorism in Asia:
In the context of Asia, this would encompass politically driven targeted assassinations by armed groups, mass scale destruction in public areas or the kidnapping of members of the public. The aims of these terrorist groups can be categorized into the following: Religious, left wing, and nationalist terrorism.
These categories are by no means mutually exclusive, and if graphically illustrated these aims would probably resemble a Venn diagram, with overlapping and borrowed ideologies underlining their actions. For instance, the LTTE of Sri Lanka can be classified as a nationalist terrorist organization with regards to its fight for an independent Tamil homeland but its economic ideology is left wing in nature. Ditto for the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in the Philippines whose goal it is to carve out an Islamic state from the Southern Philippines based upon Marxist economics.
The fact that many of these organizations receive funding from foreign donors and are affiliated to international terrorist networks contributes to the difficulty in combating terrorism. Abu Sayyaf’s first leader Abdurajak Janjalani, fought in the international Islamic brigade in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation, and Al Qaeda operatives have been reported by the US State Department to visit the Southern Philippines to expand their network of religious schools preaching their militant brand of Islam. The LTTE can rely on its large Tamil Diaspora from the next-door Indian state of Tamil Nadu for funding.
With such a complex web of interlocking terrorist ideologies and resources seemingly unlimited by international borders, the challenge ahead in facing this threat can only be discounted at the peril of Asian security.
What we can do:
The outlook for the elimination of the terrorist threat is bleak, but hardly hopeless. Following September 11th and the Bali bomb blasts, governments in the region have been rudely awakened to the extent of the threats to our security and this has acted as a stimulus for action. In Indonesia, several suspects involved in the Bali bomb blasts have been apprehended and the government has taken action to disband militant Islamic organizations like Laskar Jihad which was responsible for much of the religious violence in the Moluccas Islands. In Singapore, attacks on strategic locations were prevented when the Internal Security Department (ISD) detained twenty-one members of Jemaah Islamiah (JI).
However, the risk that Asian governments run is mistaking these isolated successes for a more holistic victory. The foundation for true victory has to be recognition on the part of governments that there is no short-term solution for this problem. This foundation then has to be reinforced with radical institutional changes via the reexamination and strengthening of the role of domestic intelligence and security agencies. Inter-regional cooperation will also be crucial to the countering of cross border terrorism.
The trend in the region generally has been towards a preponderance of conventional military spending at the expense of intelligence services. A case in point would be the strength of the Indonesian military, the TNI in contrast to it’s nearly non-existence of a central intelligence bureau. A similar situation is evident in the Philippines where the armed forces are regularly deployed against Islamic rebels in the South, with little or no covert operations. The nature of the terrorist threat being covert, governments of the region will now have to reassess military priorities.
Cognizant of the international and cross border nature of terrorism, Asia has to work closer not just within itself, but step up cooperation on an international level. Within Asia, bodies such as ASEAN have the capacity to monitor and stop terrorist funding and to provide mutual intelligence assistance. Internationally, governments of the region can cooperate with its counterparts like the European Union and the United States.
However, the extent of US assistance has to be sharply qualified. Much of the root of present day religious terrorism can be attributed to the continued US military presence in the Gulf States, especially Saudi Arabia. To allow a similar US buildup of forces in the region would only be stirring a hornet’s nest and might prove most counterproductive. This is not to say that US participation in Asia would be redundant; US intelligence in the Southern Philippines has been largely accredited for the fall in Abu Sayyaf attacks on government installations. However, this assistance, while effective in limited doses might cause long term resentment if extended to a full military presence. Thus, any US presence has to be limited to technical assistance of the kind provided in the Philippines.
These measures will to a large extent deal with the physical aspects of terrorism, but the true eradication of this threat will require undermining its ideological justification. To do this, Asian governments will have to shed their image of autocracy and heavy handedness. In many cases, armed insurgency is a result of disaffection with respective political systems that provide some sectors of society with little representation. Maoist rebels in Nepal came about as a result of opposition to the Royal family’s sweeping powers and many conflicts in present day Indonesia is a result of Suharto era repression. Thus, representation of the disenfranchised and the relaxation of oppressive policies alone have the power to sustain peace in the region, and eliminate the terrorist threat.
Thus, representation of the disenfranchised and the relaxation of oppressive policies alone have the power to sustain peace in the region, and eliminate the terrorist threat.
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