{"id":67254,"date":"2015-12-07T12:00:35","date_gmt":"2015-12-07T12:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=67254"},"modified":"2015-12-07T11:59:15","modified_gmt":"2015-12-07T11:59:15","slug":"the-entire-war-on-terror-has-been-a-lie-and-these-charts-prove-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2015\/12\/the-entire-war-on-terror-has-been-a-lie-and-these-charts-prove-it\/","title":{"rendered":"The Entire \u2018War on Terror\u2019 Has Been a Lie \u2013 And These Charts Prove It"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Featured<\/a>

Featured image via The US Army\/Flickr.<\/p><\/div>\n

28 Nov 2015 – <\/em>We were told<\/a> long ago that the \u201cwar on terror\u201d would\u00a0make the world a safer place. But after 14 years of permanent warfare, terrorist attacks around the world have escalated by a staggering\u00a06,500%<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If its objective was to end terrorism,\u00a0the \u201cwar on terror\u201d has abjectly failed. Since it was launched in\u00a02001,\u00a0terror attacks \u2013 and the number of people killed\u00a0by them \u2013 have sky-rocketed:<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

The above image comes from the Global Terrorism Index 2015, published by the Institute for Economics and Peace. The same index notes that 78% of all deaths from terrorism last year took place in just five countries: Iraq, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Pakistan and Syria.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Iraq<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Iraq takes first\u00a0place in the index,\u00a0with a shocking 9,929 terrorist\u00a0fatalities in 2014 \u2013 the highest ever recorded in any\u00a0country. The chart below\u00a0(based on figures from the index) clearly shows the surge in terrorist attacks in Iraq starting soon after the 2003 invasion:<\/p>\n

    \"war<\/a><\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Afghanistan<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      In second place is Afghanistan,\u00a0which became the first target of the \u201cwar on terror\u201d\u00a0when\u00a0Operation Enduring Freedom<\/a>\u00a0was\u00a0launched a few weeks after 9\/11.\u00a0One of the aims of the operation was to\u00a0stop Afghanistan from becoming a terrorist haven. Instead, the\u00a014-year intervention has overseen an increase in terrorist incidents of more than 5,000%, from 30 in 2002 to 1591 in 2014:<\/a><\/p>\n

      \"war<\/a><\/p>\n

        \n
      1. Nigeria<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

        With a year-on-year increase of more than 300% in terrorist fatalities, Nigeria comes third in the index. Together, Boko Haram<\/a> and ISIL were responsible for just over half of all claimed global terrorism fatalities in 2014:<\/p>\n

        \"war<\/a><\/p>\n

          \n
        1. Pakistan<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

          Pakistan has seen\u00a0an increase in terror attacks of more than 4,000% since 2002.\u00a0Mehdi Hasan notes<\/a> that, in the 14 years before 9\/11, there was just one suicide attack on Pakistani soil\u00a0\u2013\u00a0in the 14 years since, there have been 486 suicide bombings, killing more than 6,000 people.<\/p>\n

          \"war<\/a><\/p>\n

            \n
          1. Syria<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

            Syria\u2019s civil war began in 2011, which is made clearly visible by the graph. What is not yet clear is\u00a0whether \u2013 and how \u2013 the year of\u00a0coalition air strikes will\u00a0affect the numbers of terrorist incidents.<\/p>\n

            \"war<\/a><\/p>\n

            The war on terror creates\u00a0more war \u2013 and more terror\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

            Of the five countries experiencing the most terrorism last year,\u00a0\u201conly Nigeria did not experience either US air strikes or a military occupation in that year,\u201d\u00a0notes\u00a0journalist Paul Gottinger in his\u00a0analysis<\/a> of global terrorism\u00a0data.<\/p>\n

            In some cases, such as Iraq, it is widely acknowledged that Western intervention led to\u00a0a surge in terrorism; British intelligence\u00a0and US government reports<\/a>\u00a0have admitted as much (even Tony Blair\u00a0came close<\/a> to letting it slip),\u00a0and al-Qaeda strategist Abu Musab Al-Suri has\u00a0celebrated<\/a>\u00a0the results:<\/p>\n

            The war in Iraq almost single-handedly rescued the entire Jihadi movement.<\/em><\/p>\n

            Decades of failed Western interventions have caused extraordinary suffering to\u00a0the people of Iraq, perhaps killing as many as 2.9 million people<\/a>. As Mehdi Hasan points out in the New Statesman<\/a>: \u201cIf bombing \u2018worked\u2019, Iraq would have morphed into a Scandinavia-style utopia long ago.\u201d\u00a0Instead, the country is\u00a0in chaos\u00a0\u2013 breaking records for terrorist activity while ever more\u00a0foreign fighters\u00a0flood into<\/a> the country day-by-day.<\/p>\n

            In other cases, like Syria, the connection is less clear. What is accepted, even\u00a0by American intelligence agencies<\/a>\u00a0is that, after the deaths of\u00a0hundreds of civilians<\/a>\u00a0and thousands of fighters from coalition bombs, Daesh (Isis) is certainly no weaker now than it was a year ago; in fact, its fighter ranks may have\u00a0swelled<\/a>\u00a0from 20,000-31,500 to at least\u00a080,000 in the past year.<\/p>\n

            The Global Terrorism Index has done a statistical analysis and found two factors to be most\u00a0closely associated with terrorism:<\/p>\n

            These are the levels of political violence committed by the state, and the level of armed conflict within a country. The report finds that [\u2026] 88% of all terrorist attacks between 1989 and 2014 occurred in countries that were experiencing or involved in violent conflicts.<\/p>\n

            If there\u2019s one thing the \u201cwar on terror\u201d has excelled at, it is creating more war \u2013 and if there is a second,\u00a0it is creating more terror.<\/p>\n

            On Thursday, David Cameron set out<\/a> his \u2018moral case\u2019 for launching British airstrikes in Syria, claiming<\/a>\u00a0they will \u201cmake us safer\u201d. But it is abundantly clear that the\u00a0war on terror has not\u00a0made us safer. If defeating terrorism is the aim, then we need to start\u00a0fighting for creation<\/a>, not destruction.<\/p>\n

            ********************<\/p>\n

            First chart via the\u00a0Global Terrorism Index 2015<\/a>, the Institute for Economics and Peace.<\/em><\/p>\n

            Subsequent charts\u00a0by the author, based on data from the\u00a0Global Terrorism Index 2015<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

            _________________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n

            Rebecca Sumner is a freelance writer with a background in corporate and environmental campaigning. She joined <\/em>The Canary because she believes journalism\u2019s first loyalty should be to citizens, not corporations. She lives in rural Wales.<\/em><\/p>\n

            Go to Original \u2013 thecanary.co<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

            We were told long ago that the \u201cwar on terror\u201d would make the world a safer place. But after 14 years of permanent warfare, terrorist attacks around the world have escalated by a staggering 6,500%. See charts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-militarism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67254"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67254\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}