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Several people have given their opinions on what the U.S. can do to make itself safer from terrorist attacks. We need to identify what terrorism is, how it operates, what the conditions are for its perpetuation, and how the underlying causes can be treated.

Terrorism can roughly be considered an attempt at verbal, symbolic, or physical intimidation against a civilian populace to change a policy. Within this broad range of activities falls a host of terroristic tactics. The reason why I include verbal and symbolic intimidation is because of the Ku Klux Klan. When the group was at its zenith, it committed less hangings than when it started. Why? Because the mere sight of a burning cross could cower people into submission, the symbolic act was enough to scare them. Police states rigging elections use the same principle when they have armed guards standing outside of voting booths.

There's no good definition of how terrorism should be considered in context to the intimidation of a civilian populace. For example, terrorism is usually defined as attacking civilians instead of military or government personnel. Yet this definition fails. For one thing, air strikes generate more civilian than military casualties, which lead historian Niall Ferguson to call bombings a way of achieving a "tainted victory". The death of innocents is usually attributed to "collateral damage", a way of referring to non-combatants killed in a conflict.

To avoid this conundrum, the definition of terrorism is generally considered to be a *direct* attempt at targeting civilians, rather than a consequence of an attack on a military target. This definition has problems too, because the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were intended to hurt civilian populaces and force the surrender of Japan.

I think the best definition of terrorism is a specific form of violence generally used by a group fighting an asymmetrical style of warfare. As noted by Napoleon, God favors big battalions more than He does small ones. In a straight engagement, the use of force against a bigger, better equipped, and better trained army is suicide. In order to carry out attacks and be successful, a smaller army must commit itself to using asymmetrical warfare to bring about a war of attrition. This tactic was endorsed in the Civil War explicitly Generals "Stonewall" Jackson and James Longstreet, but was rejected by General Robert E. Lee as too unmanly. As Napoleon predicted, the larger battalion won in a direct engagement,

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