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The Combating Terrorism Center (CTC) at West Point was launched in 2002 with a generous grant from Vincent Viola, a 1977 graduate of the Military Academy and the former Chairman of the New York Mercantile Exchange. The CTC is almost entirely funded by private donations. Brigadier General (r) Russell Howard, the former head of the Department of Social Sciences, directed the center during these early years, and we were fortunate to bring on board as our distinguished chair Wayne Downing, a retired 4-star general and former commander of all U.S. Special Forces. The CTC now employs a team of civilian and military faculty whose work is organized around four themes: terrorism; counterterrorism; homeland security; and, weapons of mass destruction. These faculty have developed courses, conducted research, and produced publications within the first three (under the guidance of senior advisors like Dr. Bruce Hoffman, Dr. Rohan Gunaratna, and Dr. David Franz), and the CTC has recently received a grant from the Sloan Foundation to develop courses and research on bioterrorism. These courses are offered to all upper-division cadets at West Point, and enrollment in these courses has (as one might imagine) skyrocketed from dozens to hundreds within just the last few years. The CTC has also recently inaugurated a new Minor in Terrorism Studies program - the very first academic minor program in West Points history. New security environments and new roles and expectations require new forms of education for the military profession. Officers must have a total grasp of the struggle, not just the terrorist acts. Their education must help them answer a number of new and important questions like: Why is terrorism being used as a tactic? What are the political goals of this group? It this part of an insurgency? What are the political, social, economic, cultural and information dimensions of the conflict, as well as the security and military aspects? How do these interrelate? Questions like these frame the lesson topics that are included in the basic terrorism courses. For example, in these courses we study the history of terrorism, using case studies to examine a diverse array of groups including anarchists, ethnic separatists, and religious extremists. We explore the organizational strategies of terrorist groups and the individual motivations of their members, and focus on specific dynamics such as recruitment, training, ideology, and communication. Cadets examine various facilitators of terrorism, such as transnational financial and criminal networks, and gain an appreciation for the organizational learning aspects of terrorist groups. Naturally, recent trends in terrorism are covered in these courses, and cadets conduct their own research about events in places like Spain, Indonesia, Britain, Pakistan, Nigeria, Egypt, Israel, and, of course, Iraq. We also examine local circumstances that support terrorism, including the political, economic and social conditions that existed before terrorism became a problem. And, of course, we spend some time learning about U.S. policy for combating terrorism. We examine the U.S. National Security Strategy, the Strategy for Combating Terrorism, the Homeland Security Strategy, and so forth. We also explore the seven key dimensions of national power, emphasizing that the military is only one aspect to a Counterterrorism Strategy, the others being intelligence gathering and sharing; diplomacy; legal/law enforcement; information operations; finance; and, economics. Overall, we spend very little time in these classes discussing the details of counterterrorism operations. Rather, our approach to the study of terrorism is built upon a conviction that training in tactics, techniques, and procedures in counterterrorism are only useful when the leaders have acquired an appropriate intellectual background and can master the competencies described above. Thus, we emphasize first and foremost the need to be educated, critical thinkers about terrorism and the reasons why some groups adopt a strategy of terror as a means for achieving their objectives. Source: homelandsecurity Tags: Foxnews Fox news Combating Terrorism Center CTC West Point islam jihad mujahideen muhammad evil terror