Moscow Suicide Bombings: Different than London, Madrid or 9/11?

By Brigitte L. Nacos

Seeing the horrific pictures of the Moscow underground bombings is remembering similar images of suicide terrorism against commuter systems in Madrid, London, New York/Washington, and elsewhere. If this week’s subway bombings had a particular shocking angle for Russians and people elsewhere, it was the fact that two women killed themselves at the heights of the morning rush hour in order to kill as many commuters as possible. Although female terrorists are far from being exceptions among terrorist groups of all stripes, they are still viewed differently than their male counterparts—as the exception to the rule. And that is precisely the reason why the leaders of terror groups recruit women for tactical reasons: Even the best security forces tend to be less suspicious of females than of males. That makes for a higher success rate of female terrorists.   

Given the greater shock associated with female terrorists, they and their deeds tend to receive extra media attention that the masterminds of terrorist spectacular crave. No wonder, then, that the lethal attacks in Moscow resulted also in mass-mediated speculations about these female bombers’ motives and, more generally, in explicit or implicit condemnation of the Russian government and perhaps even justification of terrorist violence in this context. 

In an op-ed article in the New York Times, Robert Pape of the University of Chicago and two of his students wrote the other day about the perpetrators of the incident:

“The bombers’ motives spring directly from their experiences with Russian troops, according to Abu al-Walid, a rebel leader who was killed in 2004. “These women, particularly the wives of the mujahedeen who were martyred, are being threatened in their homes, their honor [is] being threatened,” he explained in a video that appeared on Al Jazeera. “They do not accept being humiliated and living under occupation.”

In other words, using the justification of a late terrorist leader, these deadly terrorist attacks are the result of wrongheaded policies and actions of the Russian government and military. And this explanation is seen to transcend the particular case of Chechen women to cover Chechen terrorists—called rebels or separatists in most news accounts and opinion articles—and nationalists or separatists elsewhere who resort to terrorist means. According to the op-ed piece,

“As we have discovered in our research on Lebanon, the West Bank, Iraq, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka and elsewhere, suicide terrorist campaigns are almost always a last resort against foreign military occupation. Chechnya is a powerful demonstration of this phenomenon at work.”

In almost all of these cases, terrorist violence has been carried out in the name of religious martyrdom, mostly of the jihadist variety or--in the case of the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka--a pseudo-religion in the sect-like organization. When more secular oriented groups commit copy-cat suicide terrorism, this comes down to competition or out-bidding in a society with various terrorist groups as Mia Bloom explains well in her book “Dying to Kill.”

In his book “Dying to Win,” Pape rejects the idea that suicide terrorism is closely linked to religious fanaticism. In the above mentioned op-ed article he relies again on the words of a terrorist leader, this time the mastermind of the Moscow bombings Doku Umarov, to prove that secular objectives, the independence of Chechnya, cause terrorist acts like the one in the Moscow subway system—not the desire to establish an Islamic caliphate in the Caucasus. 

But there are contrary reports about a sea change among one time Chechen nationalists, among them Umarov, that transcends Chechnya and now includes Dagestan and other Russian republics: As Ellen Barry of the Times reports from Moscow, “In 2007, Mr. Umarov announced an ideological sea change, declaring himself the emir of the Caucasus Emirate, which aimed to establish a Shariah-based state independent of Russia. With him came many of the former separatist fighters.”

And in an interview with Bloomberg, Masha Lipman, a political analyst at the Moscow Carnegie Center, said “Radical Islam is on the rise. Whereas Russia was dealing with a secessionist war in Chechnya in the 1990s, today it’s dealing with radical Islam and with extremists whose motto is to destroy as many infidels as possible. The local governments may be pro-Russian, pro-Moscow
and loyal, but they can’t control the situation in the region.”

Ultimately, whether Chechen nationalism or religiously framed ambitions are the primary forces behind the more recent suicide bombings in Russia, the idea of understanding political violence of this sort begs the same question: Does opposition against hated policies and especially military deployment/occupation justify violence against civilians? Should horrific acts of terrorism convince governments to change their policies?

Those who argue along those lines or imply this sort of reasoning should also be prepared to classify 9/11, the bombings in Madrid and London as well as recent actual acts of terrorism and a number of foiled plots in the United States (i.e., the Fort Hood shooting; the would-be underwear bomber) as explained by Western occupation of Arab lands. After all, bin Laden’s jihad began in protest against Western troops in Saudi Arabia and the suicide bombers in Madrid, London, and elsewhere responded to foreign occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.

By definition terrorism is political violence that deliberately targets civilians. It must be rejected regardless of the particular circumstances.