Influencing Transnational Terrorist Organizations: Using Influence Nets to Prioritize Factors

摘要

Since the attacks of September 11, 2001, government agencies and scholars have combined to generate a wide range of studies and literature describing individual factors believed to influence the transnational terrorist threat against the United States. Given the fiscal reality of limited resources, the United States cannot fully fund and implement a complete set of measures to counteract all the identified factors. The purpose of this study is to consolidate this array of factors; and more importantly, to suggest a framework for analyzing the interactions and relative importance of each factor to support resource allocation decisions. A comprehensive literature review identified 13 factors having potential influence. These factors were then analyzed using an Influence Net approach. Utilizing notional interaction and influence assessments, the suggested framework highlighted six of the factors with relatively greater potential to influence the terrorist threat. These six factors span the temporal spectrum from near-term impacts targeted against the existing terrorist threat to long-term strategies directed at influencing the 'next generation' terrorist threat. Focusing on the near-term, eliminating or neutralizing both the terrorist leadership and their followers was highly influential in the model. Improving intelligence capabilities as well as our information operations and public diplomacy campaigns significantly impacted both the near and long-term threat. Finally, influencing the long-term terrorist threat was best accomplished through a combination of reducing resentment toward the United States, with Israeli policy as a driving factor; and reduction of the underlying causes of terrorism, with elimination of repressive regimes as the primary factor.