Terror and tyrannicide in Ancient Assyria

Introduction

Terrorism is deliberate and systematic murder, maiming, and menacing of innocent to inspire fear for political ends. This definition was proposed by terrorist analysist's in 1979, but has never been surpassed for clarity and concision. Schmidt and Youngman in their book Political Terrorism for example, cited 109 different definitions of terrorism, which they obtained in the survey of leading academics in field. Thus, for purpose of this paper I shall make no attempt at defining this ambiguous and elusive term but will nevertheless reveal its importance in helping to discuss question with which this paper is concerned. (Cahill 45)

Discussion and Analysis

Terrorism is now the well established feature of world politics and conflict. Indeed, literature on this particular form of political violence is seemingly endless. This paper shall take precedence with highly contested issue of whether terrorism can ever be justified. In what follows I shall endeavour to explore the number of issues that confront academics when discussing judgement of terrorism. Primarily, the comprehensive analysis of just war theory shall be undertaken to see if acts of terrorism can accommodate its citation. A particular focus into discriminate principle shall be discussed, as it is widely believed that the terrorist act is often judged from within this "non-combatant immunity" concept. Secondly, this paper shall focus on importance of defining terrorism and how lack of agreement regarding phenomena can often get confused with notions of revolutionary violence and national liberation. Finally, I shall conclude by exposing need for the common definitional consensus on term, if acts of political violence can be officially labelled as terrorism and ultimately their actions being condemned or justified. (Coady 231)

The just war theory tradition is basis of the long held view in West that there can be legitimate uses of war and is usually traced back to St Augustine's fourth-century masterwork, The City of God. Coady (1985) argues that consistency is required when discussing just war theory and that it is necessary to apply same standards to both kinds of political violence, state and non-state. It is under this assumption that just war theory provides the valid framework from which to discuss non-state (terrorist) political violence. (Elshtain 6)

Indeed, Valls (2000) proposes that if acts of terrorism can satisfy conditions of just war theory then they would have the moral legitimacy. In his article Can Terrorism Be Justified, Valls criticises Walzer's (1992) dismissal that terrorism may be justified and advocates that 'on most plausible account of just war theory, taking into account ultimate moral basis of its criteria, violence undertaken by non-state actors can, in principle, satisfy requirements of the just war.... [therefore] if just conflict idea can support aggression pledged by states, then terrorism committed by non-state actors can furthermore, under certain circumstances, be supported as well'. (Cahill 45)

Valls endeavour is to explore jus ad bellum criteria (concerning justice of going to war) and jus in bello criteria (which apply to conduct of war) that comprise just war theory in an attempt to show ...