Confronting Fear: A History of Terrorism

by Isaac Cronin (Editor)

Confronting Fear addresses the question, "How did we get here?" The events of September 11, 2001, had their origins in both the recent history of the Middle East and in events that took place hundreds of years ago in Europe and elsewhere. The writing collected in Confronting Fear provides the broadest possible basis to probe and understand these horribly destructive acts—whose purpose and rationale is complex and sometimes even contradictory—by offering both a perceptive and comprehensive long view. It gets into the mind of the terrorist, from those who present terrorism as a tool against the status quo to those who see it as a tool to bolster the status quo to those who insist terrorism is a purely ideological act. Confronting Fear includes portraits from a global rogue's gallery of terrorism, including Robespierre, Lawrence of Arabia, Abu Nidal, Carlos the Jackal, The Red Army, Theodore Kaczynski, Aum Shinrikyo, and Osama bin Laden. There are also discussions of movements that are or have been based in Japan, Russia, Germany, France, Ireland, Algeria, the United States, Afghanistan, Israel, and Palestine, with writings by experts and literary figures ranging from Simon Schama, T. E. Lawrence, and Joseph Conrad to Menachem Begin and V.S. Naipaul.

Genres: History, Politics, American History

400 pages, Paperback

First published May 23, 2002

Reviews

[Rafael Cejas]

A compilation of articles, manifests and analysis on terrorism. Originally published right after 9/11, you can tell it's a bit dated but there are some interesting insights. However, for me the selection doesn't work well as an unified collection

[Scott]

Academic compilation that had useful topics, but still not very interesting.

[Jason Weber]

A good book to read