War & Terrorism Support Group

Terrorism refers to a strategy of using violence, social threats, or coordinated attacks, in order to generate fear, cause disruption, and ultimately, bring about compliance with specified political, religious, or ideological demands. The targets of terrorist attacks typically are not the individuals who are killed, injured, or taken hostage, but rather the societies to which these individuals belong. Terrorism is designed to subvert existing political atmospheres, often with the aid of the mass media's influence. Other intended effects of terrorist activities on targeted societies include the curtailment of civilian standards of living and civil liberties associated with greater security demands, economic hardship linked to the costs of war, hopelessness to defend against assaults, depression, and disintegration of morale. These objectives are parallel to the objectives of unconventional warfare.

Violence refers to acts of aggression and abuse which causes or intends to cause criminal injury or harm to persons, and (to a lesser extent) animals and property.1 The term "violence" also connotes an aggressive tendency to act out destructive behaviours. Violence falls into essentially two forms —random violence, which includes unpremeditated or small-scale violence, and coordinated violence, which includes actions carried out by sanctioned or unsanctioned violent groups —as in war (ie. inter-societal violence) and terrorism. Since the Industrial Revolution, the lethality of modern warfare has steadily grown to levels considered universally dangerous. As a practical matter, warfare on a massive scale is considered to be a direct threat to the prosperity and survival of individuals, cultures, societies, and the world's living populations.