History of Terrorism

The most commonly cited example of early terror is the activity of the Jewish Zealots, often known as
the Sicarii (Hebrew: “Daggers”), who engaged in frequent violent attacks on fellow Hebrews suspected
of collusion with the Roman authorities. Likewise, the use of terror was openly advocated by
Robespierre during the French Revolution, and the Spanish Inquisition used arbitrary arrest, torture, and
execution to punish what it viewed as religious heresy. After the American Civil War (1861–65), defiant
Southerners formed the Ku Klux Klan to intimidate supporters of Reconstruction (1865–77) and the
newly freed former slaves. In the latter half of the 19th century, terror was adopted in western Europe,
Russia, and the United States by adherents of anarchism, who believed that the best way to effect
revolutionary political and social change was to assassinate persons in positions of power. From 1865 to
1905 a number of kings, presidents, prime ministers, and other government officials were killed by
anarchists’ guns or bombs.
The 20th century witnessed great changes in the use and practice of terror. It became the hallmark of a
number of political movements stretching from the extreme right to the extreme left of the political
spectrum. Technological advances, such as automatic weapons and compact, electrically detonated
explosives, gave terrorists a new mobility and lethality, and the growth of air travel provided new
methods and opportunities. Terrorism was virtually an official policy in totalitarian states such as those
of Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler and the Soviet Union under Stalin. In these states arrest,
imprisonment, torture, and execution were carried out without legal guidance or restraints to create a
climate of fear and to encourage adherence to the national ideology and the declared economic, social,
and political goals of the state.
Terror has been used by one or both sides in anticolonial conflicts (e.g., those between Ireland and the
United Kingdom, between Algeria and France, and between Vietnam and France and the United States),
in disputes between different national groups over possession of a contested homeland (e.g., that
between Palestinians and Israelis), in conflicts between different religious denominations (e.g., that
between Roman Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland), and in internal conflicts between
revolutionary forces and established governments (e.g., those within the successor states of the former
Yugoslavia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Peru). In the late 20th and early 21st
centuries some of the most extreme and destructive organizations that engaged in terrorism possessed
a fundamentalist religious ideology (e.g., Hamas and al-Qaeda). Some groups, including the Liberation
Tigers of Tamil Eelam and Hamas, adopted the tactic of suicide bombing, in which perpetrators would
attempt to destroy an important economic, military, political, or symbolic target by detonating a bomb
on their person. In the latter half of the 20th century the most prominent groups using terrorist tactics
were the Red Army Faction, the Japanese Red Army, the Red Brigades, the Puerto Rican FALN, Fatah and
other groups related to the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), the Shining Path, and the Liberation
Tigers. The most prominent groups in the early 21st century were al-Qaeda, the Taliban insurgency in
Afghanistan, and ISIL.
In the late 20th century the United States suffered several acts of terrorist violence by Puerto Rican
nationalists (such as the FALN), antiabortion groups, and foreign-based organizations. The 1990s
witnessed some of the deadliest attacks on American soil, including the bombing of the World Trade
Center in New York City in 1993 and the Oklahoma City bombing two years later, which killed 168
people. In addition, there were several major terrorist attacks on U.S. government targets overseas,
including military bases in Saudi Arabia (1996) and the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania (1998). In
2000 an explosion triggered by suicide bombers caused the deaths of 17 sailors aboard a U.S. naval ship,
the USS Cole, in the Yemeni port of Aden.
The deadliest terrorist strikes to date were the September 11 attacks (2001), in which suicide terrorists
associated with al-Qaeda hijacked four commercial airplanes, crashing two of them into the twin towers
of the World Trade Center complex in New York City and the third into the Pentagon building near
Washington, D.C.; the fourth plane crashed near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The crashes destroyed much
of the World Trade Center complex and a large portion of one side of the Pentagon and killed more than
3,000 people.
Terrorism appears to be an enduring feature of political life. Even prior to the September 11 attacks,
there was widespread concern that terrorists might escalate their destructive power to vastly greater
proportions by using weapons of mass destruction—including nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons
—as did the Japanese doomsday cult AUM Shinrikyo, which released nerve gas into a Tokyo subway in
1995. These fears were intensified after September 11, when a number of letters contaminated with
anthrax were delivered to political leaders and journalists in the United States, leading to several deaths.

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The most commonly cited example of early terror is the activity of the Jewish Zealots, often known as

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