This article, providing an example of state support for terrorists, looks at the cooperation between the Stasi and the right-wing West German terrorist Odfried Hepp in the 1980s. Based on research in ...Stasi archives, the article explains that gathering information, rather than using him as a terrorist weapon in the Cold War, was the main motivator for the Stasi to cooperate with a high-profile neo-Nazi. By looking at the details of the Hepp-Stasi alliance, it assesses what forms, results, and dangers this relationship produced. The article challenges the myth of the all-mighty East German State Security and demonstrates that the dynamics of this alliance were not always in the Stasi's favour. In the absence of other instruments of coercion, the Stasi used the personal relationship between Hepp and his officers to control him. The article offers insights into Hepps's terrorist career but also the pragmatic way in which the Stasi built its network of informants outside the GDR. It also adds nuances to the understanding of the relationship between Socialist states and terrorists during the Cold War.
This article looks at the European Communities' efforts against terrorism in the 1970s. It argues that in spite of the high ambitions to improve European legal integration, the attempts to develop an ...antiterrorism agreement were quite obviously a failure. Although the Dublin Agreement was adopted in 1979 after cumbersome and lengthy negotiations, it fell short of showing the member states' unity and resolve to fight terrorism, and it never entered into force. The tedious negotiations drained the member states' energy and willingness to such an extent that no other steps toward judicial integration or antiterrorism treaties were taken.
Abstract
On 27 February 2022, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz addressed the Bundestag and announced a watershed moment (Zeitenwende) for Germany's conduct of foreign affairs. Against the backdrop of ...the historical pillars of German foreign policy, this article reviews the core implications of the Zeitenwende doctrine. It analyses how the new policy continued or transformed traditional notions underpinning Germany's external relations: Westbindung (integration into the West) and European integration, multilateralism, the pursuit of a rules-based international order and NATO membership, hesitant leadership, Ostpolitik and Wandel durch Handel (transformation through trade), as well as a foreign policy not relying on military means. It argues that Zeitenwende represented a break with some traditional notions, such as Ostpolitik and Wandel durch Handel, and to some extent the non-military foreign policy. However, Zeitenwende also reconfirmed other traditions: Westbindung, a commitment to multilateralism and the rules-based order, as well as the reluctance to assert German leadership. With Zeitenwende, Germany remained firmly committed to the EU and NATO as the country acknowledged that it must do more for its own, and for Europe's, security. Zeitenwende represented Germany's coming to terms with, and final acceptance of, the realities of the post-Cold War European order.
This article examines regional organizations' antiterrorism efforts across the globe from 1990 until 2010. Empirically, it provides a comprehensive overview of the legal responses developed. ...Analytically, it determines long-term patterns and regional differences in these treaties, examines bones of contention, and how these were overcome. This study shows that after the Cold War, all regions developed legal antiterrorism frameworks, but states continued to preserve their sovereignty by various means; and extraditing or trying suspects remained the compromise of choice. Importantly, these antiterrorism efforts marked a watershed. Measures shifted from an approach exclusively focused on punishing and deterring terrorists toward an emphasis on preemption.
The article looks at the Group of 7 (G7) efforts to fight international terrorism in the 1970s and early 1980s. It examines the G7 statement against hijacking, the Bonn Declaration of 1978, and ...assesses how the G7 dealt with it after the adoption of the Declaration. The article illustrates that after a short phase of enthusiasm just after the Declaration's adoption, the G7 members' united front against terrorism quickly eroded. The G7 failed to secure support from other countries and realized the economic and political costs that the implementation of the Declaration could produce. Therefore, it was pushed to the backburner. The Declaration was largely of symbolic and only of very little practical importance. Yet, it still pointed to the new approach of the G7 – present until today – that moved away from a purely economic agenda towards a progressively more political one.
In the 1970s, Western European countries were hit hard by terrorism, especially by international terrorism that crossed borders easily and allowed terrorists of different origins to carry out attacks ...against both governments and people. Consequently, the necessity of fighting this menace also extended to international organisations. This article looks at how the Council of Europe dealt with the issue, and assesses the negotiations that led to the Convention on the Suppression of Terrorism from the German perspective. West Germany was very interested in establishing a sounder international legal framework against terrorism and thought that the Council of Europe would be able to make an important contribution by abolishing the political offence exception that had so far been a core feature of most extradition treaties. This clause allowed political criminals to escape punishment by fleeing to a country that would deny extradition to a different country on the grounds of the political nature of the act committed by the person in question. The article gives an account and analysis of the complex negotiations that finally resulted in the adoption of the Convention in 1977, as well as of the problems encountered and compromises reached during these negotiations.
Introduction Bernhard Blumenau; Jussi M Hanhimaki
Studies in conflict and terrorism,
01/2020, Letnik:
43, Številka:
1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Throughout history, states and terrorists have had an ambiguous relationship. Terrorist groups challenge states and yet often require the support from other governments to survive, retreat, train, or ...resupply. Then again, the modern notion of "terror" and in fact the term itself, derive from the historical case of Maximilien de Robespierre using political violence to allegedly secure the achievements of the French Revolution during "La Terreur" in the early 1790s. Such use of terror as a tool of nation-building in the aftermath of a revolution is hardly limited to the late eighteenth century: the first decade of the Soviet Union being but one more modern example.
The 1970s are often associated with East-West détente, talks about the limitation of nuclear and conventional forces, the emergence of the Third World as an increasingly important factor in ...international relations, and the subsequent erosion of détente and deepening of East-West hostility. However, the 1970s were also a high-water mark of international terrorism—particularly terrorism emanating from the Middle East—and this threat generated action on the part of the leading Western countries. The United Nations (UN) could have been an important forum in which to address this threat and develop responses, but the UN was paralyzed by the differences not only between the Western countries and the Soviet bloc but also between the West and the Third World. The definition of “terrorism” was a particular bone of contention. Nevertheless, despite this inauspicious environment, some achievements proved feasible because of a changing international context that was increasingly hostile to terrorism and the persistence and diplomatic skills of some Western countries, notably West Germany.
This article examines early antiterrorism negotiations within international organisations (IOs) and their outcomes. It assesses how international cooperation emerged in specialised, regional, and ...global IOs and provides a long-term overview from the 1960s until the late 1980s. Drawing on primary sources and scholarly literature, this article identifies the patterns, trends, and key characteristics of the successfully adopted measures. It demonstrates that early multilateral antiterrorism efforts faced several obstacles (sovereignty, national interests, mistrust, and geopolitics), and, therefore, international negotiations fared better when following a piecemeal approach within specialised or regional organisations, where the focus could be on specific aspects of terrorism (e.g., hostage-takings). A key characteristic of the successfully adopted antiterrorism instruments was the aut dedere aut iudicare principle, which allowed states to maintain perceptions of sovereignty by either extraditing or trying a suspect. The antiterrorism efforts examined here were mostly preventative in design and worked to discourage future terrorists by ensuring that safe havens were closed and that perpetrators faced justice. The shift to suicide terrorism in the 1990s would instead require new international antiterrorism efforts to focus on pre-emptive strategies, depriving terrorists of the means to carry out attacks. The roots of these measures were laid in the 1980s.
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