Terrorism Creates New Opportunities

Around the world, no matter an individual's age, race, religion or gender, terrorism in some form affects society as a whole. There is no universal definition of terrorism written anywhere, although Wikipedia defines terrorism as the use of violence or threat of violence in the pursuit of political, religious, ideological, or social objectives (Wikipedia.org). Terrorism isn't exactly war but also isn't exactly direct terror; it's something in between. Typically, when terrorist attack they are competing for political power or control of territory; all in support of an ideology. The international fear that terrorists could possibly get enough money to purchase black market weapons, or get the materials to construct a nuclear-based weapon highlights the modern threat of nuclear terrorism, as well.

Terrorism creates new opportunities to increase fear and chaos through political agendas, criminal activity, espionage, subversion and sabotage. The strategy and tactics disrupt America's social order creating a paradigm of freedom versus security, and threatens the relationship between society and the government. Attending the multiple CWA panels allowed me to argue how terrorism is the greatest asymmetrical warfare threat America faces today, and to propose my own personal solutions to ending terrorism. The panels I attended focused on both the negative and positive effects of immigration as well. The panelists gave their testimonies immigrants themselves, and their experiences since immigrating to America.

One panelist, Delina Garcia argued that Americans have this ego' that only American-born citizens can claim the title - American. Crafting a creative, effective, and coherent domestic international policy to address the threat of terror is necessary. This paper is going to address the social effects that terrorism has on the entire globe, and my own personal solutions to ending terrorism.

Terrorism is the biggest threat to societies and political establishments today, and creates an indescribable fear inside of us that is nearly impossible to cope with. I want to mention that this paper is not attacking any specific religion or specific person, but rather than me proposing my own personal views on it as well as explaining how terrorism creates social problems around the world. Our social values are extremely important because they shape the way we think, how we act, and help us grow as induvial. Our social values help shape the culture of societies. Our social values are extremely affected by terrorism, and if we want the government to counter terrorism then we are going to have to give up some of our social values and liberties. It is too easy to retrieve another individual's private information with all of the technology surveillance.

We need to use this to our advantage in attempting to preempt or prevent terrorist attacks. A few panelists stated that one step we could take in preventing cyberterrorism is to stop posting all of our pictures of everything we do on the internet, or posting all of our emotions and how we feel about our political opponents. Protecting our identities and not giving away our profiles to the internets is a way of mitigating against terrorism. We can compare our habits to Chinas policies on surveillance. They are using Google glasses, which take facial image recognition pictures and runs it back to a database. We can expect more of these devices to arise as a fight against terrorism and ties into the freedom of privacy and security we need to sacrifice to ensure safety across the nation. The two main social factors that terrorism affects in some way are both safety and security. I believe that we are about to enter an era where interstate conflict will have a bigger role in the US government policymaking related to security then we have seen in the past.

Every single person today has in some way been affected by terrorism whether that be indirectly or directly by an attack. Not knowing what the next asymmetric threat is going to be takes a financial toll on the government; whether that is in a proactive prevention strategy or with the reactive recovery they have to do after being attacked. Regions are affected both physiologically with the social and political impacts of terrorism. Counterterrorism efforts are in line with both domestic and global terrorism as well. There are various forms of terrorism such as political based, combat, economical, religious, and eco-terrorism. The attacker chooses which he wants to perform and are only limited to the resources and drive that these terrorists have.

Global terrorism by definition are acts of violence that are committed by induvial or groups whom want to either exhibit terror based on political or religious ideologues (What is Global Terrorism). The War on Terror increased after the 9/11 attacks in New York, because Americans formed coalitions to counter terror across the globe. Panelist Ross Wilson spent most of his time talking about the response from the US government and the ways in which we're making it harder for ourselves and the US to protect and defend itself. It's very difficult to kill the idea that terrorists stand for and represent. The wars based on terror have continuously gone on in places such as Africa, South America, and the Middle East.

These groups have received support by countries such as Iran, North Korea, and Syria. In these places we are viewed as we see them, as terrorist. The issue needs to be addressed or it will be an ongoing issue unless we address it head on. All of these attacks share the common theme of having a negative impact on our society, and it is our duty to improve our security. Enhancing interrogation hasn't had increased support for terrorism, and wasn't necessarily affective tool for countering terrorism.

International terrorism is terrorism that goes on beyond national boundaries, and are targeted at people or places from which the terrorists operate (The Secret Service). The attacks on 9/11 is a clear example of global terrorism. These terrorists don't simply have the ability to understand how attacking innocent people is an extreme unacceptable ideology. Governments find it difficult to fight back during these attacks, because of the lack of information they receive from foreign lands and their groups. President G.W. Bush told Congress, "Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists" (G.W. Bush quotes). This set the bar for Americans and across the globe because we let the terrorist know that we were putting our foot down. The impacts that terrorism has on our society range from financial and human costs, and costs on our military activity and trade implications.

An American I can argue that the costs of global terrorism impact nearly every government and the population within them. In the end the costs are financial, but that doesn't compare to the damage that is done to innocent families after losing a loved one from an attack. Suicide bombings are a common type of attack as well as mass shootings, and vehicle attacks on crowds. There has been a series of coordinated terrorism such as the attack on December 2, 2015 in San Bernardino, California.

This attack left 14 people dead after being shot during an office holiday party by a couple inspired by the Islamic State, and ISIS claimed responsibility for this attack. (nydailynews). There are hundreds of lists with terrorist attacks, and this demonstrates how serious global terrorism is. Isis is not the only one demonstrating global terrorism, as North Korea has tried gaining political advantages using threats of nuclear attacks. These threats have been towards North Koreas enemies and allies, and have been carried out with testing of missiles to demonstrate their capabilities. Launching missals creates fear for any countries safety and security.

Another form of terrorism to look into is domestic terrorism, because it doesn't vary much from international terrorism. As defined by Wikipedia, Domestic terrorism or homegrown terrorism is terrorism targeting victims "within a country by a perpetrator with the same citizenship" as the victims. There are many definitions of terrorism, and no universally accepted definition (Wikipedia). These attacks are contemplated and carried out in one's own country, and against their own citizens. This completely backs up my argument that terrorism has an effect on society, being that there is an installed fear that terrorism doesn't just have to come from a foreign country, and these individuals are roaming our streets every day.

This fear challenges the moralities and freedoms related with democracies. Domestic terrorism isn't too difficult to identify because unfortunately it happens, because it is only limited to how creative an individual is and the resources they have access to. I myself has witnessed domestic terrorism in my own town in Colorado Springs, CO near UCCS. A man named Robert Lewis Dear, Jr shot up a planned parenthood using an assault rifle on November 27, 2015 killing three people, injuring nine, and killing a police officer(nytimes). In Parkland Florida a 19 year old by the name of Nikolas Cruz shot up his high school killing 17 people, and was acknowledged as the nation's worst school shooting in history.

The motive behind this domestic terrorism was believed to be the past of his violent and troubled life (The Washington Post). There was a war zone in those classrooms that day that left a trail of blood, terror, and agony. There are too many domestic terrorist attacks to list, however these attacks will continue unless we drastically increase our security, because it will only take another induvial to come with another plan and strike again.

The number of these attacks are increasing as well as the number of innocent lives being taken, and there is no doubt that it is having a social impact on our culture here in America. Increasing security is absolutely going to help make Americans feel safe in their own home, and help us understand the anger and rage that are leading to these attack in order to put an end to the social disorder of terrorism. I believe that strong values and resilience will conquer and beat terrorism all together.

Trauma is a huge impact that terrorism has on society as well applying to both political and economic terms as well. The terrorist's goals is to make people feel vulnerable, insecure, or weak. The government and military promise to protect us, but it isn't under their control when terrorists find a way to undermine them. Unfortunately, terrorism isn't going to go away overnight, and it is sworn across the globe in both developed and undeveloped countries.

Dictatorships and free democracies it is both a religion and tactic of those who feel obligated or estranged to have pure hatred towards innocent people. Terrorist have a couple things in common, one being that they don't value their own life or care if they die, and the second is slaughter is considered a reward for them. Government are not willing to fight terrorists on their level where their citizens are being targeted and overburdening eccentric warfare. Terrorists are not as easy to identify as we think, because they aren't in forms of armies. Practicing violence such as bombing or attacking them is not going to make the problem go away, but end up antagonizing them even more. These terrorist are hidden among civilians, in our work place, or possibly our neighbor.

They play the role of being a civilian by day and a terrorist by night. Achieving destruction and death is the mindset and goal they have, and they don't plan on backing down until they achieve it. There are no boundaries or lines that terrorists aren't willing to cross if their terrorist ideology is motived by religion, because they have no political borders. Solutions are limited for counterterrorism other than strong informational efforts, quick strikes where terrorists hide, and a few long-term strategies. I believe that government putting in more effort to end poverty will help to move in positive steps by changing the hearts and minds of induvial who believe the only way out of poverty is violence. This will especially impact the minds on younger children as well who were raised in a violent state of mind. Spreading love and compassion in society will result in having more positive conversations in the violent world.

In the panel International Terrorism: The Next Chapter panelist summarized his solution to terrorism as preventing nuclear weapons before they are built, and stopping the kind of welfare before it takes off, because one the missiles are unleashed there is no logical fire break, and it will keep going. Another solution to preventing terrorism is by keeping them out in the first place and increasing immigration rules. This is going to result in us giving up some of our freedom and liberties. We are blessed enough to live in a country where we are free to express our religion, ideas, speech and basically do as we please.

Although these freedoms we are given need to be sacrificed if we are going to put an end to terrorism because these allow terrorists to plan their attacks in the shadows. These terrorists feel to comfortable to board our airplanes or walk into our children's school. Americans although are not willing to give up some of their personal freedom and crack down on terrorism if that means they have to go through extra security. The government has played their part in helping protect citizens, but it is going to take citizens going the extra mile to prevent future attacks. Increasing security has been proven to work in the past as we have imposed more security in airports and airplanes, however there is going to have to be an agreement met between Americans and their own person freedom.

Americans were shattered and heartbroken after the 9/11 attack, and in society today the US needs to address terrorism head on. We have all the power we need to set more regulations and becoming more educated on these threats and methods that terrorists use. Building successful government around the world who are living in troubled religions, and destroying the violent ideologies that terrorist have will one day in the future help this social issue come to an end.

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