Council on Foreign Relations* - http://www.terrorismanswers.com/policy/guerrilla.html
No. The French revolutionaries who coined the term “terrorist” in the 1790s thought it had positive connotations, but today, it’s hard to find anyone who wants to be known as a terrorist. Instead, individuals and organizations branded as terrorists tend to prefer calling themselves “freedom fighters,” “urban guerrillas,” or “holy warriors,” among other things. For instance, Ilich Ramirez Sanchez (a.k.a. Carlos the Jackal), the mastermind of numerous terrorist attacks in the 1970s and 1980s, described himself in 1994 as a revolutionary and “above all a family man.” In seeking to be fair, media organizations sometimes shy away from using “terrorist” and “terrorism” in news reports since all parties involved do not accept the same terms—hence, the old saw that “one person’s terrorist is another person’s freedom fighter.”
Even though most people think they can recognize terrorism when they see it, experts have had difficulty coming up with an ironclad definition. The State Department defines terrorism as “premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience.” In another useful attempt to produce a definition, Paul Pillar, a former deputy chief of the CIA’s Counterterrorist Center, argues that there are four key elements of terrorism:
It is premeditated—planned in advance, rather than an impulsive act of rage.
It is designed to change the existing political order. It is not merely criminal, like the violence that groups such as the mafia use to get money.
It is aimed at civilians—not at military targets or combat-ready troops.
It is carried out by subnational groups—not by the army of a country.
What is the difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter?
It’s tough to say, according to experts—largely because they are overlapping categories. Terrorism is a tactic, and “freedom fighting” describes a motivation, so a person or group could be engaged in both at the same time. Experts say whether one calls a particular group “terrorists” or “freedom fighters” often largely depends on whether one thinks the group’s ends justify its violent means—which, in turn, depends on one’s politics. For example, Palestinian suicide bombers are described as terrorists in Israel and the United States, but many Arabs and Muslims and some Europeans view their attacks as a legitimate part of the struggle for Palestinian national liberation.
Here again, it’s hard to draw a clear line, experts say. Like terrorists, guerrillas are politically motivated, violent groups that aren’t organized like conventional armies. But unlike terrorists, guerrillas tend to organize in larger groups, seize and hold territory, and send openly armed units to attack opposing military forces.
Another key distinction is terrorists’ deliberate targeting of civilians. Guerrillas typically focus their unconventional warfare on military or government targets. Still, some guerrilla groups use tactics such as kidnapping, assassination, and bombing to frighten civilians as part of their campaigns to overthrow governments or seek power—although guerrillas often use such terrorist tactics early in a rebellion and then move on to other tactics.
Yes, experts say. Some groups could be considered both guerrilla and terrorist, depending on which targets they’re attacking. For instance, the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah won significant Western sympathy for its attacks on Israeli troops occupying a self-declared security zone in southern Lebanon, but Hezbollah associates also garnered widespread Western condemnation for their suicide bombings, kidnappings, and hijackings. Colombia’s rebel FARC and ELN movements are known both for guerrilla attacks on government targets and for terrorist operations aimed at civilians, such as bombings, assassinations, and kidnappings.
Again, it’s a question of definition. The State Department and many leading experts define terrorists as members of subnational groups, not government leaders or states—thereby placing even such dedicated abusers of human rights as Slobodan Milosevic’s Serbia beyond the bounds of the epithet “terrorist.” These experts often define Milosevic-style atrocities as human rights abuses or war crimes. But some terrorism scholars do include violence perpetrated by governments in their definitions of terrorism, if these assaults involve state violence intentionally aimed at civilians and designed to instill fear or influence public opinion. Also, states can sponsor terrorism by providing sanctuary; weapons; training; or logistical, financial, or diplomatic support to terrorist groups. The State Department lists seven countries as state sponsors of terrorism: Cuba, Libya, Iraq, Iran, North Korea, Sudan, and Syria.
Because calling individuals or organizations “terrorists” implies that they operate outside the international standards that govern war and diplomacy, besmirches the goals they’re fighting for, and tarnishes their public image. Moreover, states and international organizations often draft laws and shape policies aimed at punishing terrorists and their supporters. Groups formally designated as terrorist often cannot conduct meetings, maintain public offices, raise funds, lobby and negotiate with governments, or cross borders—and could become targets of the current U.S.-led war on terrorism.
U.S. agencies use varying definitions. In deciding whether a violent political group is a terrorist organization, the State Department—which is charged with designating which groups qualify as foreign terrorist organizations—looks at whether the group focuses its attacks on civilians, whether its leadership tolerates attacks on noncombatants, and whether it has other avenues for promoting its positions. Since September 11, President Bush has urged the world to eliminate gray areas in defining terrorism, saying that those who aid or harbor terrorists are terrorists themselves.
Different arms of the U.S. government have sometimes disagreed about who qualifies as a terrorist. When South Africa was under white supremacist rule, the Department of Defense considered the antiapartheid African National Congress a terrorist group, while the State Department disagreed. Perceptions of individuals or groups can also change over time; at different moments, U.S. officials have treated PLO leader Yasir Arafat as both a terrorist pariah and a partner in peace negotiations.
Yes. Since September 11, countries from Russia and China to the Philippines and Somalia have argued that Muslim groups operating on their territory are terrorists linked to the al-Qaeda network. These governments put forth these arguments in the hopes of winning U.S. assistance or approval for campaigns against rebellious groups; some states have been more successful in swaying American opinion in this way than others. Governments and leaders often label armed opposition groups (even nonviolent ones) terrorists to delegitimize them. Meanwhile, many terrorist organizations argue that governments also engage in symbolic acts of violence aimed at frightening the public, and they sometimes describe powerful countries, including the United States, as the “true terrorists”—either because of attacks that kill civilians or because of policies that these groups argue cause more harm than the traditional terrorists’ attacks.
For now, no. Experts say it’s hard enough to get Western political scientists to agree on who qualifies as a terrorist, let alone reach an international consensus on whom should be treated as one. After Palestinian terrorists murdered Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics, for example, U.N. Secretary General Kurt Waldheim urged U.N. members to adopt international counterterrorist measures, but some developing countries blocked these efforts, arguing that national movements struggling against “foreign oppression and exploitation” had the right to use any methods, including force. After September 11, the confusion continues. The United States has pressed other Western countries to designate various groups, including the PKK and the Tamil Tigers, as terrorist organizations, but other Westerners see some of these groups’ quests for self-rule as just and have urged leaving them off formal terrorist lists. And in April 2002, a summit of Muslim leaders issued a statement that condemned terrorism but pointedly excluded Palestinian suicide bombers from this condemnation.
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