>>>>Dean Grillot: Dr. Cruise, thank you for joining me again. So another important issue
on the forefront of everyone's minds today is this concept of terrorism, particularly
international terrorism, and yet this is a very tricky topic to study and to understand.
I mean certainly since September 11, 2001, we've had a global response and and concern
about international terrorism. But terrorism really isn't anything new, right? We've seen
this kind of activity for some time, but yet what is this activity, I mean how would we
even define this Dr. Cruise? I mean this is where we get into something a little tricky.
>>Dr. Cruise: Yes, as you mentioned terrorism is very difficult to define. And no one really
has agreed on the definition. Most would suggest that this is a, a tactic that is used, a method,
and that the the goal is to create chaos, to delegitimize a government or to delegitimize
a way of life that's that's occurring. The State Department here in the United States,
for example, defines terrorism as, "premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated
against noncombatants by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to
influence an audience." So that's a bit of a mouthful, and other departments within our
country can't even decide if that is exactly what we're talking about we're talking about
terrorism.
>>Dean Grillot: But the bottom line there is that it's subnational groups. So not governments,
right?
>>Dr. Cruise: Although that is somewhat controversial. [laughs]
>>Dean Grillot: [laughs] That's right, but subnational groups that are targeting civilian
populations, noncombatants.
>>Dr. Cruise: Again-- what does a a civilian, what is a civilian, how we classify a noncombatant?
>>Dean Grillot: And they're targeting them for violence for the purpose of creating terror
and fear?
>>Dr. Cruise: Yes absolutely.
>>Dean Grillot: In order to accomplish a particular end.
>>Dr. Cruise: Yes.
>>Dean Grillot: So these, if you break it into these pieces-- but each piece, as you've
just suggested, can be controversial and and some might even say contradictory?
>>Dr. Cruise: Absolutely. What constitutes a noncombat? Now we know, for example, with
9/11 which you mentioned, that those that perpetrated the events on 9/11 felt that those
in the towers-- that American citizens are combatants, because they use the capitalist
system and have perpetrated these ideas of, of capitalism and U. S. dominance. So they
did not consider them as noncombatants or civilians. We certainly would, but that is
a question that's up for debate.
>>Dean Grillot: Well that's a critical issue, is that terrorists of course don't necessarily,
don't see themselves as terrorists. They see themselves as combatants, as fighters as as
some might even say freedom fighters. They're trying to fight against something or for something
that they find to be important. And yet, those who are often targeted by that say, "This
isn't right. I'm I'm not, you know, wearing a uniform and carrying a gun. I'm I'm living
my daily life." This is a very, very tricky subject and and very hard to define and and
yet we see it, you know, on a daily basis. Let's move on from there to this notion of
global war on terror. So obviously since September 11, 2001 we've had this so-called global war
on terror, and we've been fighting it in many ways. Militarily, of course, but also financially,
trying to freeze assets and track down using intelligence and other kinds of of capabilities
you know to to arrest and and detain potential terrorists. So this this global war on terror--
is that something that is akin to that global war on poverty, global war on drugs. Is this
really something that we can fight and and win a war against?
>>Dr. Cruise: Well it sounds very nice and and I think we would all agree that we would
like to fight terrorism. We would like to not have a situation like 9/11 and we would
like to protect ourselves and those around the world from having to deal with these situations.
But just like the war on poverty and the war on drugs, there really is no way to see where
we have success. Where is the end of this war? When only going to be able to declare
that terrorism is over or that terror is over? So it's kind of puts us in a difficult situation.
Now are there tactics that we can use and have been using? Absolutely. We are going
after different groups. We have a number of counterterrorism agencies involved in hunting
down Al-Qaeda, amongst other groups, and we do fight terrorism. Now whether we can successfully
fight a war on terrorism? Probably not, to the way that we would think.
>>Dean Grillot: So the question for students then is is this: You know, what is terrorism?
How would you characterize terrorism? Who would you consider to be a terrorist? And
in fighting that global war on terror, is it something that we can ultimately win, or
is it something that we can simply manage and minimize, and hope to prevent to the best
of our ability? Tell us what you think.