War, Peace, and International Relations. An Introduction to Strategic History

to regard war and politics as separate realms. Similarly, the significance of war’s socio-
cultural context frequently has not been sufficiently appreciated. If this is now an ‘age of
terror’, or at least an age wherein terrorists and insurgents pose the most immediate
dangers to world order, there is no alternative to treating the socio-cultural context of
warfare with the utmost care. This is because the struggle in irregular warfare is always
for the allegiance, or acquiescence, of people. Since irregular warfare is about the will
of people, the social and cultural dimensions of strategy have to take pole position among
the needed strategic competencies.
Thus far, this book has discussed terrorism and irregular warfare principally in
historical context. It is necessary now to turn from the strategic historical narrative to a
more analytical examination. Chapter 18 explores the nature, purpose and changing
character of irregular warfare, including terrorism.

Questions

1. What were the consequences of 9/11 for world politics?


2. How effective has the US-led ‘war on terror’ been so far?


3. Why is the American policy of forcible pre-emption and prevention so contro-
   versial?


4. What military benefits are claimed to flow from the information-led RMA? Are
   those claims justified?

Further reading

A. J. Bacevich American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy(Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press, 2002).
—— The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War(New York: Oxford
University Press, 2005).
T. Benbow The Magic Bullet? Understanding the Revolution in Military Affairs(London:
Brassey’s, 2004).

9/11 and the age of terror 243

Key points

1. The events of 9/11 provided the dominant threat to international security that
   US policy and strategy had been missing since 1989.


2. Regular armed forces are not usually proficient in combating highly irregular
   enemies.


3. Al Qaeda caught the world by surprise on 9/11, despite its history of terrorist
   acts.


4. The events of 9/11 galvanized the United States into behaving vigorously and
   proactively as the hegemonic power.


5. The information-led RMA of the 1990s and beyond was not especially helpful
   in waging the ‘war on terror’.


6. The global electronic media are now a major factor in the waging of warfare.