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Certainly, there is considerable difference between the measure of violence that the
terrorists of our time are ready to apply and the terrorist violence of earlier epochs.
Whereas the terrorist anarchists of the past were technically limited—provided they did not
constrain themselves by self-imposed limitations—today‘s terror activists appear to be
bereft of any ethical considerations regarding the means and methods they are using. Due
to this fact, and also because of the constantly growing destructive capacity of modern
weapons and war materials, the threat of terrorism becomes ever more severe.
Extensions of the Term Terrorism
In the early 1990s, the term terrorism became extended by two new terms, namely ―drug-
terrorism‖ and ―gray-zone phenomenon.‖ Drug terrorism refers to the targeted use of drug
trafficking by governments or terrorist organizations to reach political goals. The term gray-
zone phenomenon is used to describe the threat against the stability of nation-states
emanating from non-state actors as well as the destabilizing developments and impacts
resulting from external non-governmental actors. These dimensions throw a light on the
dynamically altering character of sub-national conflict as it arose to an ever increasing
degree after the end of the Cold War.
Tackling the phenomenon of terrorism must not leave aside another significant aspect that
plays—or at least can play—a decisive role in the attempt to grasp the threat in its entirety.
This aspect relates to the fact that terrorism has to be considered in many cases as a
psychopathological phenomenon. It is not in a few cases that rational deliberations are
missing what is in the foreground as a driving motive is simply the urge, the passion to kill.
In his book ―The New Terrorism—Fanaticism and the Arms of Mass Destruction,‖ Walter
Laqueur portrays the long ignored fact that has already been described in Wordsworth‘s
famous commentary on a Shakespeare play about the ―motive hunting of a motiveless
malignity,‖ with these words:
―Some creed is usually needed—even blind rage has to find a focus—but how often could a
terrorist of the extreme left, but for some biographical accident, say, the influence of a
friend or some charismatic figure he encountered, have turned to the extreme right or some
sectarian group, and vice versa?‖[9]
This makes more than clear that ideological motivation of whatever political or religious
nature does not necessarily have to be the driving force behind terrorism.
Observations on the History of Ideas and the Origins of Modern Terrorism
Already in antiquity we find organized terrorist groups who tried to spread terror
systematically. Terrorism as an attempt—by way of criminal violence—to generate fear on a
broad scale to attain political goals, can thus look back on an ancient and long tradition. In
the history of terrorist violence we find the members of an Islamic secret society who
perpetrated their terror attacks between the eleventh and thirteenth century in the Middle
East. This society, later called the Assassins (from the French ‗assassin‘—murderer), was
created by the Persian Hasan-I Sabbah. Subsequent to his conquest of the northern Persian
fortification of Alamut in the year 1090, he and his followers threatened the Crusaders as
well as Muslim sovereigns with murderous attacks carried out by his fanatic assassins.
Although these ceased to be a major force, ―their main contribution was perhaps originating
the strategy of the terrorist disguised—taqfir, or deception—as a devout emissary but in fact
on a suicide mission, in exchange for which he was guaranteed the joys of paradise.‖[10]
Terrorism in the narrower, modern understanding goes back to the assaults and violent acts
of the anarchists in the nineteenth century. One of the most prominent forerunners of
modern-age terrorism is the Italian (Republican) extremist Carlo Pisacane. Initially
belonging to the Italian high aristocracy, Pisacane turned away from his class, relinquished
his related societal position and dedicated himself to a year-long fight against the Bourbons,

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until he finally, in 1857, lost his life in a failed revolt. To him is ascribed the apparition of
the notion of ―Propaganda of Action.‖[11] The Italian extremist clearly articulated that the
people have to be shaken up, and simultaneously fear among the enemies to the revolution
has to be spread.
Such ideas were particularly attractive to the revolutionary forces in Tsarist Russia. In the
spirit of Pisacane, Michael Bakunin became another influential theoretician of terrorism in
the nineteenth century. He was active not only in Russia, but also in Germany during the
revolution of 1848-49 in France and in Switzerland. In his Principles of Revolution,
published in 1869, Bakunin made it clear that he and his friends would never accept any
other method than destruction. The final goal is revolution because evil can only be
terminated through violence and Russian soil will only be cleansed by fire and sword.
Furthermore, Bakunin wrote and published a Revolutionary Catechism in which he gave
rules of conduct for terrorists. He coined the term, ―anonymous terrorist,‖ referring to one
who was supposed to radically break with society and deny all its laws, customs, and
conventions. He advised the terrorists of his time to dispose of the most dangerous enemies
(all those who were conspicuous because of their intelligence or particular talents) at the
beginning. This was to terrify both the government and the people alike. Literally futuristic
was his advice to cooperate closely with criminals and criminal organizations.[12]
Revolutionary Terrorism in Tsarist Russia
Prior to World War I, it was the Russian terrorists who dominated the scene and were also
the most successful. The first organization to put the theories of Pisacane and Bakunin into
practice was the Russian ―Naradnaja Wolja‖ (People‘s Will, sometimes also translated as
People‘s Freedom) founded in 1878. This consisted of a small group of Russian
constitutionalists who stood in direct opposition to the Tsar‘s reign. In the face of the
―Apathy and Estrangement of the Russian masses‖ the members of the group attempted—
by way of absolutely courageous deeds—to draw the public‘s attention to the goals and
ideals of the organization. However, in stark contrast to the terror organizations of the late
twentieth and the beginning of the twenty-first century that distinguish themselves by
bloodshed and carnage on a large, indiscriminate scale, the Naradnaja Wolja took a
particularly discriminating stance on the violence it applied. The Russian terrorists of those
days transformed the ―propaganda of violence‖ into assaults that were exclusively directed
against individuals who were deemed to be ―embodiments of the autocratic regime of
repression.‖[13]
Nationalist Terrorism on the Balkans and in Ireland
Terrorism was also believed by its early proponents to be able to determine the course of
history. After the Austrians had taken power in the region, a group of Bosnian-Serb
intellectuals, including university students and even high school pupils (later becoming
known as the Mlada Bosnia or Young Bosnians), formed against the Hapsburg reign. One of
their members, Gavrilo Princip, eventually triggered, through his assassination of the
successor to the Austrian throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, on June 28, 1914, the chain of
events that led to the outbreak of the First World War and the ensuing totally new political
order in Europe. Behind the Young Bosnians stood the secret society ―Narodna Odbrana‖
(Defense of the People), which was originally founded in 1908, to foster the Serbian cultural
and national activities. However, it soon assumed a more pronounced political and
subversive orientation and gained notoriety for terrorist activities against the Hapsburg
Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. The Narodna Odbrana was able to recruit new members,
especially among the young Bosnians and Herzegovinans, and it was not long until the
terrorism of this group achieved ever higher levels of brutality. In 1911, the even more
radical group ―Crna Ruka‖ (Black Hand) split off from the Narodna Odbrana. Although there
were originally close ties among the Serb military leadership, the Crna Ruka and the Young