Essay --

What is commonly referred to as Islamic terrorism is based on grievances in the Muslim world that stem from the perception that the United States is only continuing what the "West" has done historically: interfere with and invade Muslim countries. "It isn't McDonalds, it's not bikinis, or our form of government," noted one panelists. The United States needs to focus more on using soft power and repairing its reputation rather than hard military power. It is important to distinguish among different types of terrorists and deal with each kind accordingly. The strategy used against one type might prove to be counterproductive or have the opposite effect on another group. Panelists agreed it is critical to differentiate between tactical/local terrorists and strategic/global ones. Tactical terrorists use violence to achieve a specific political (usually local) goal and are willing to negotiate with their announced enemy. They usually have a political wing along with their military one, which signals that the group can be negotiated with and that it has the potential to transform into a more political and social force. Strategic terrorists in contrast are not too concerned with politics and are instead in a state of perpetual global war against perpetual enemies. They reject all other opinions and believe they have a monopoly on truth. Negotiation with such a group is impossible. The goal of an effective counterterrorism strategy would be to fracture the alliances that global/strategic groups have with local/tactical ones. This could be done by deterring the local/tactical ones from aiding and operating with Al Qaeda types. Making sure the cost of cooperating with Al Qaeda might include the loss of a local group's political objective is... ...with the creation of Resolution 1624 to deal with the incitement of terrorism. So you've got this web, a proliferation of committees on a bureaucratic level to make them look like they're doing something in the Security Council. But really, there's a lot of overlapping mandates. And a lot of people, including the U.S. government, are scratching their head, wondering really how effective all of these new committees can be in dealing with the problem. And to add to that, an executive directorate was created with 20 new experts by the counterterrorism committee, that now goes on site visits all over the world. So they have two components to dealing with terrorism. It's really more focused on capacity building, helping states to get the wherewithal, the means to deal with terrorism, than there is any of these compliance issues, reporting them to the Security Council.