Action will delineate and define you.
—Thomas Jefferson, 3rd U.S. President
Many authors and academics have commented on the difficulty in defining terrorism.286 In fact, the many government departments engaged in the homeland security
enterprise each utilize different, and sometimes competing, definitions of terrorism.287
Title 22, United States Code, Section 2656f(d) defines terrorism as “premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience.” Terrorism, as defined in by the Code of Federal Regulations, is: .” . . the unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.”288
The various departments within the U.S. government engaged in the homeland security enterprise each have extrapolated variations on the statutory definitions for use within their own departments, to highlight the focus of each individual department’s counterterrorism efforts. The State Department definition includes “politically motivated violence perpetrated against non-combatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience.”289 The FBI distinguishes between
international and domestic terrorism on its website, and relies on the statutory definition of the terms.290 Specifically, it relies on the Code of Federal Regulation (CFR) definition
as “the unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or
286 Alex Schmid, Political Terrorism; A Research Guide (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books, 1984), x.; Hoffman, Inside Terrorism, 33–34.
287 Hoffman, Inside Terrorism, 30–31, 35. 288 28 C.F.R. § 0.85.
289 22 USC § 2656f(d).
290 The Federal Bureau of Investigation, “Definitions of Terrorism in the U.S. Code,” accessed January 19, 2014, http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/investigate/terrorism/terrorism-definition.
coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.”291 The DHS focuses on acts “to intimidate or coerce a civilian population to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; to affect conduct of a government . . .”292 The DOD defines it as, “The unlawful use of
violence or threat of violence to instill fear and coerce governments or societies. Terrorism is often motivated by religious, political, or other ideological beliefs and committed in the pursuit of goals that are usually political.”293
According to Bruce Hoffman, all the definitions used by the United States offer various but incomplete perspectives on terrorism. He notes that the State Department’s definition emphasizes “both the ineluctably political nature of terrorism and the perpetrators’ fundamental ‘subnational’ characteristic. . . .” but is deficient “in failing to consider the psychological dimension of terrorism.”294 The FBI definition, on the other
hand, “does address the psychological dimensions of the terrorist act.”295 While finding
that the FBI’s definition includes the social and political objectives aim of terrorists, Hoffman finds that its definition “offers no clear elucidation of the differences between them to explain this distinction.”296 The DHS definition focuses on its missions
“concentrating on attacks to critical infrastructure and key national resources that could have grace societal consequences.”297 “The Defense Department definition, significantly,
also cites the religious and ideological aims of terrorism alongside its fundamental political objectives – but omits the social dimension found in the FBI’s definition.”298
To complicate the issue further, the meaning of the word has changed over time and “as the meaning and usage of the word have changed over time to accommodate the
291 28 C.F.R. § 0.85; National Institute of Justice, “Terrorism,” 2011, http://www.nij.gov/topics/ crime/terrorism/Pages/welcome.aspx.
292 Hoffman, Inside Terrorism, 31; Homeland Security Act of 2002, January 23, 2002, o. FR 5005–7. 293 Department of Defense. “Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms,” 2010, http://www.dtic. mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/data/t/7591.html.
294 Hoffman, Inside Terrorism, 32. 295 Ibid.
296 Ibid., 33. 297 Ibid. 298 Ibid.
political vernacular and discourse of each successive era, terrorism has proved increasingly elusive in the face of attempts to construct one consistent definition.”299
While the departments of the U.S. government engaged in the homeland security enterprise use different definitions of the term terrorism, all the departments recognize the FTO list, all have input into the list, and all have a role in addressing the consequences facing the groups added to the list. Furthermore, all the departments recognize the FTO list as constituting the organizations that the United States has determined to be terrorist organizations that threaten the security of the United States. The consequences of an FTO designation includes a prohibition against persons knowingly providing material support or resources to the FTO for which violators can be prosecuted by the Department of Justice (following an investigation by the FBI, DHS, and other departments), the blocking of all property and interests in property of the organization in the United States, or come within the United States, or the control of U.S. persons (by the Treasury Department and DHS),300 and trying to neutralize each group’s
activities abroad (DOD and the intelligence community).
As with the changing definition of terrorism over time, the nature of the groups represented on the FTO list have also evolved. Prior to 9/11, the focus of U.S. counterterrorism foreign policy was on neutralizing the threat posed by communist insurgent groups that might undermine the government of an allied nation. Following 9/11, the U.S. focus shifted to al Qaeda, and its associated and affiliated organizations. The shift in focus was appropriate, and is reflective of what Bruce Hoffman described in Inside Terrorism as the changing meaning of terrorism over time.301 The FTO list then
represents what the United States perceives to be those terrorist organizations that pose the greatest risk to this nation, based on the actions taken by the group over time. The changes in the list over time reflect the evolving priorities and the evolving threats, and therefore, reflect how the United States defines terrorism.
299 Hoffman, Inside Terrorism, 20.
300 U.S. Department of State, “Secretary of State’s Terrorist Designation of Jundallah.” 301 Hoffman, Inside Terrorism, 3–20.
Thus, while the federal departments engaged in the homeland security enterprise do not have a common definition of terrorism, and academics and authors have not agreed on a single universal definition, the FTO list reflects the criteria used by the United States in actually defining terrorism, by highlighting this nation’s priorities and by identifying U.S. enemies. Similarly, as groups are removed from the FTO list, terrorism is further re-defined by identifying shifting U.S. priorities and those groups perceived to no longer be a threat. As noted by Nadav Morag, “it is less important to determine what terrorism is than to determine who the terrorists are because, clearly, legal sanctions cannot be applied to the phenomenon of terrorism but can be applied to terrorist organizations and individual terrorists.”302
As determined by the current FTO list, the United States defines terrorism as the following.
• al Qaeda, it affiliates, and its associates
• any organization that lends support or promotes the interests of al Qaeda • any organization that attacks a U.S. interest, such as a U.S. embassy, or
attacks or harms a U.S. citizen
• any organization that attacks Israel or attempts to undermine its existence • any organization that seeks to undermine a peace process advanced or
advocated by the United States
• any organization that seeks to undermine a country in a geographical location or region is strategically important to addressing U.S. counterterrorism efforts
302 Morag, Comparative Homeland Security, Global Lessons, 68.