Adam Dolnik

This book is now essentially 10 years old from its first publication. I read it precisely for this reason. I was interested to see whether a systematic analysis of a variety of terrorist groups could 'predict' the current state of affairs regarding terrorist attacks in the West. The short answer is no, it couldn’t. Whilst the author does an admirable job detailing the histories, achievements and innovations of 4 well known terrorist groups as well as mentioning several others in less detail, the conclusion regarding 'super terrorists' of the future (or our present day), falls well off the mark. Whilst it does mention home grown terrorists, they are not running around delivering CBRN attacks (thank goodness!). This simply goes to show that terrorism, regardless of the initiating cause, does not follow anything but the broadest of outlines and is exceptionally difficult to gauge in terms of potential future attack or operational capability from an academic perspective. I think it best to leave it to the counter-terrorism agencies who have a hard enough job of it even with relatively up to date intelligence and a myriad of technologies. Having said that, this was an interesting read and I would recommend it, but more for its historical overview rather than predictive element.… (mere)