Anti-American Terrorism (V1) - Paperback

by Pluchinsky Dennis a (Author)

One of the major international security concerns that surfaced in the post-World War II period was the emergence and evolution of international terrorism. The dominant theme in the evolution of this threat has been anti-American terrorism. No other country in the world has had its overseas interests subjected to the level, lethality, diversity, and geographic scope of international terrorist activity than the United States. This four-volume work recounts the development of this threat through 12 US presidential administrations over a 70-year period. It assesses the terrorist threat in the US and overseas and how the government has responded with counter-terrorism policies, strategies, programs, organizations, legislation, international conventions, executive orders, special operations units, and actions. The evolution of the field of terrorism in academia, think tanks, institutes, and the private sector over these 12 administrations is also chronicled.

Front Jacket

Since the 1960s the US has seen its overseas interests threatened by terrorist groups more than any other country. During this period, the nature of these attacks, coming from left-wing, anarchist, religious, and nationalist terrorist groups, has varied and evolved immensely. For the first time, Anti-American Terrorism chronicles the development of these threats, considering the issues that triggered them, the states and terrorist organizations that carried them out, and the targets attacked and tactics used. From Johnson to Obama, this book devotes a chapter to each US presidential administration, and assesses in scrupulous detail the anti-American threat posed by Marxist, state sponsors, Islamic revolutionary, and Palestinian terrorists, before describing and comparing the counter-terrorism strategies, policies, tools, programs, and actions constructed to confront these threats. Drawing on his extensive and varied experience as an academic and 28 years working as a US government terrorism analyst, Dennis Pluchinsky provides an invaluable historical record of the development of and reaction to anti-American terrorism. This timely account will be of use to academics, policymakers and analysts alike, for it is only in fully understanding the terrorist threat that we can refine our response to it.