The Making of a Terrorist: Recruitment, Training and Root Causes (3 volume set)

The Making of a Terrorist: Recruitment, Training and Root Causes (3 volume set). Edited by James J. F. Forest. Westport, Conn.: Praeger Security International, 2006. 1,280 pages. $300.00. Reviewed by Lieutenant Colonel MatthewW. Markel, a strategist at the Army Capabilities Integration Center.

With The Making of a Terrorist, editor James J. F. Forest of West Point's Combating Terrorism Center and his contributors have created a useful and practical reference for commanders, planners, and analysts. As its title suggests, the threevolume set aims to provide an understanding of terrorist phenomena, focusing on the actual mechanics of terrorism. Even the volume on Root Causes, whose title suggests a fruitless search for a single, grand strategic solution, actually provides useful insight about where we can anticipate the emergence of terrorism. This volume derives particular strength from its case studies of actual terrorist organizations, an unpleasantly diverse and multitudinous group that includes Islamic extremist organizations, Marxists, nationalists, and racists, just to name a few. What emerges from these studies is a collage of terrorist practices as they are, and not a neat, coherent, and artificial portrait of causes and cures for terrorism. The Making of a Terrorist, therefore, provides essential and accessible background reading for the military practitioner in theWar on Terrorism. At $300, I would not recommend it to the individual with a passing interest, but I would recommend its inclusion in operations and intelligence libraries at the division-level and above, and for the whole array of combat developers.

Operational Patterns and Opportunities: Recruitment and Training

While serving in the Directorate of Strategic Plans and Policy at Combined Forces Command - Afghanistan, we constantly found ourselves attempting to define our role in counterterrorism. The understanding of basic terrorist methods and inherent vulnerabilities provided by The Making of a Terrorist would have expedited our efforts. The volumes on recruitment and training depict case studies of particular terrorist systems in various contexts that relate to lines of operation for campaign planning. The key insight that emerges from these volumes, however, is how vital and fragile sanctuary is to the development of an effective terrorist.

Successful counterterrorism begins with intelligence, of course, and The Making of a Terrorist indicates several remunerative areas of concentration in intelligence operations. Those areas of concentration...