Revolutionary Warfare and Terrorism; written by the victors?
When one thinks of terrorism, the immediate thoughts would probably lean towards the current state of events in the world. Religious extremism, most notably Islamic extremism has dominated the media with reports of suicide bombings, beheadings and mass murder. The end result of these attacks are carefully orchestrated and perform their intent of inciting terror in global populations notably effectively. Is there a difference however; between modern day terrorism and revolutionary warfare? Revolutionary warfare incites terror on behalf of a state goal, but is not terrorism in the eyes of the victor.
Political scientist Bernard Fall had coined the term revolutionary political warfare …show more content…
The Vietnam War, fell under the term of Revolutionary political warfare and is referred to as such when discussed in literature today. While there has been numerous accounts of sprung traps and random bombings by the
North Vietnamese army and Vietcong, terrorism has hardly if ever; been used to describe the means of guerilla warfare which took …show more content…
Vietcong executions and mass murders have been documented; as well as napalm strikes levelling entire villages by the United States. According to Winkler (2006), terrorism was common in Vietnam during the
Vietnam War. From 1967 to 1972, terrorists killed more than thirty three thousand South
Vietnamese citizens; with targets including doctors, political figures, police officers and individuals who supported the South Vietnamese political structure. Those numbers today would be hard to disguise as being of little significance, but as history writes itself and time passes on the facts become less tangible.
When discarding predetermined labels and examining the actions taken by both terrorists and political revolutionaries, it is almost impossible to differentiate the two. A theoretical bombing that takes place in the country of Malaysia, which wipes out its parliament and prime minister, when fresh in the minds of the populace would in fact incite widespread terror.
When one thinks of terrorism, the immediate thoughts would probably lean towards the current state of events in the world. Religious extremism, most notably Islamic extremism has dominated the media with reports of suicide bombings, beheadings and mass murder. The end result of these attacks are carefully orchestrated and perform their intent of inciting terror in global populations notably effectively. Is there a difference however; between modern day terrorism and revolutionary warfare? Revolutionary warfare incites terror on behalf of a state goal, but is not terrorism in the eyes of the victor.
Political scientist Bernard Fall had coined the term revolutionary political warfare …show more content…
The Vietnam War, fell under the term of Revolutionary political warfare and is referred to as such when discussed in literature today. While there has been numerous accounts of sprung traps and random bombings by the
North Vietnamese army and Vietcong, terrorism has hardly if ever; been used to describe the means of guerilla warfare which took …show more content…
Vietcong executions and mass murders have been documented; as well as napalm strikes levelling entire villages by the United States. According to Winkler (2006), terrorism was common in Vietnam during the
Vietnam War. From 1967 to 1972, terrorists killed more than thirty three thousand South
Vietnamese citizens; with targets including doctors, political figures, police officers and individuals who supported the South Vietnamese political structure. Those numbers today would be hard to disguise as being of little significance, but as history writes itself and time passes on the facts become less tangible.
When discarding predetermined labels and examining the actions taken by both terrorists and political revolutionaries, it is almost impossible to differentiate the two. A theoretical bombing that takes place in the country of Malaysia, which wipes out its parliament and prime minister, when fresh in the minds of the populace would in fact incite widespread terror.