Browsing by Subject "Guerilla Warfare"

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Open Access
Al-Qaeda after 2001 with regard to its strategy
(2010) Doğan, Sercan
After almost a decade since the September 11 Attacks, in which its sanctuary in Afghanistan has been shattered and the vigilance against it has been strengthened, alQaeda still survives and poses a threat to both Middle Eastern and international security. This research attempts to explain the survival of al-Qaeda after 2001 with regard to its strategy. Therefore, the focus of the research is on the effects of alQaeda’s strategy on its survival. Keeping in mind the conventional approach that handles al-Qaeda as a religious terrorist group, this research attempts to have a broader outlook on al-Qaeda by dealing with it as a non-state armed group. In this way, this research handles the situation as an asymmetrical conflict between alQaeda and the U.S. and its allies. Within the asymmetrical conflict, the strategy that al-Qaeda has pursued involves an indirect approach that compensated for the disadvantages it faced. The results of the research could pave the way for further research on the course of al-Qaeda in the context of the changing security environment in the Middle East.
Open Access
Conceptualizing the definition of terrorism in light of the developments in the fields of academics, history and legislation
(2005) Sözübir, Ufuk
The basic question to be answered in this thesis is: Is there a way to reach a consensus about a generally accepted definition of terrorism by using the perspectives of history and legitimacy in the World Community? The solution to the problem about the definition of terrorism is an important question because of the sensitivities displayed by the nations of different regions and their different perceptions of terror. The questions about the nature of the terrorists, their motivation, their aims and the methods they use to achieve these aims are still being debated world-wide. On the other hand, terrorists also have the ability and possibility to reach the same sources regarding history and legitimacy; therefore it may be thought that, they have a variety of options about learning how to become more deadly without taking all the population of the target community to the opposite side. To fight terrorism effectively, what is needed first is to know who the enemy is. In this thesis, the answer to this question is carefully analyzed and a solution is offered. Brief information about the background of terror events in history and jurisprudence concerning national and international community is added to help understand the subject. Instead of putting up a certain and complete definition that may lead to many misunderstandings and a danger of constriction of the concept, the preconditions to make an efficient definition of terror is explained. This is important because there are certain difficulties in discriminating terrorists from other types of criminals, especially guerilla fighters and organized criminals. In this thesis, the purpose of the guerilla activities and their methods, also the differences and common points of these two are analyzed and explained. As an accessory, the statistics of terror events between 1973- 2003 are included in the thesis.