NCJ Number
216463
Journal
Studies in Conflict & Terrorism Volume: 29 Issue: 8 Dated: December 2006 Pages: 707-729
Date Published
December 2006
Length
23 pages
Annotation
This article offers a critique of Robert A. Pape’s book, Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism, which examines the causes of suicide terrorism.
Abstract
Main critiques of Pape’s analysis of suicide terrorism include, first, the charge that Pape’s assertion that most research conducted on suicide terrorism to date has focused on explaining the irrationality of the act is inaccurate. Second, the author exposes the theoretical and conceptual weaknesses in Dying to Win, pointing out that some of Pape’s claims hinge on his particular interpretation of the data. The author shows how Pape’s particular interpretation of the data does not always conform to the standard definitions of “suicide terrorism” and suicide attacks. Third, the author challenges Pape’s assertion that suicide terrorism works by reanalyzing three particular suicide terrorist campaigns. While Pape claims that suicide terrorism has a 54 percent success rate, the current analysis found that suicide campaigns have only been successful in 24 percent of cases. Fourth, the author questions Pape’s claim that suicide terrorism is mainly a response to foreign occupation by illustrating how occupation is neither the only nor the dominant factor explaining suicide terrorism. The author presents his own analysis of suicide terrorism that contends a new, globalized pattern of suicide attacks have emerged that coexist with the traditional, localized pattern of suicide attacks. Pape’s analysis is unable to explain these types of globalized suicide attacks that have occurred in several countries, such as Indonesia, Jordan, Iraq, Tunisia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The key finding in Dying to Win is that religion is rarely the root cause of suicide terrorism. Rather, the goal of suicide terrorist attacks, according to Pape, is to “compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from territory that the terrorists consider to be their home land." Pape reached his conclusions through an analysis of 315 suicide attacks and 462 suicide attackers. Tables, notes