The Financing of Terror: The Plo, Ira, Red Brigades and M-19 Stand the Paymasters : How the Groups That Are Terrorizing the World Get the Money to Do

by James Adams

The Financing of James The Financing of Simon & FIRST First Edition, First Printing. Not price-clipped ($18.95 price intact). Published by Simon and Schuster, 1986. Octavo. Hardcover. Book is very good with publisher stamp on bottom page ends. Dust jacket is very good. Seller 303322 Business

293 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1986

About the author

Library of Congress Authorities: Adams, James, 1951-

Journalist ; Narrator
(CEO of UPI, formerly the Washington Bureau Chief, defense correspondent for the London Sunday Times)
(Narrator James Adams is one of the world's leading authorities on terrorism and intelligence)

Reviews

[Raughley Nuzzi]

I read this book for a class and having read the whole thing I can greatly appreciate the way my professor excerpted it. Some of the chapters provide an extremely useful insight into how terrorist finance worked in the 1980s and earlier, while others contain valuable lessons for today. Beyond the chapters on the IRA, Kidnapping for Ransom, and the narcotics-terror nexus, there was not much to recommend this book to a twenty-first century audience. The PLO's prominence in the first half feels outdated and the dramatic irony of the author's discussion of the Contras and upcoming Reagan Administration policies date the book.

Written in the mid-1980s, the book provides a good snapshot of an earlier era of international terrorism and doubtlessly contains lessons that are still valuable, if a bit dated.

[Toby Philpott]

More An Historic Document

This book is an interesting historical documentation of terrorism in the 70s and 80s. There are important lessons that the financial aspects of terror movements are what sustain them rather than the acts of terror, their foot soldiers, and their weapons (although Daesh could have been the more recent example of a return to earlier brands of terror).

Still, I personally found the book interesting and somewhat instructive.

[Benjamin]

Notes-----
Introduction
Controlling Terrorism: An Alternative Approach
Defining Terrorism
his definition: "A terrorist is an individual or . member of a group that wishes to achieve political . ends using violent means, often at the cost of . casualties to innocent civilians and with the support . of only a minority of the people they claim to . represent (10)."
Part One: State Terror
Ch. 1: Terrorism: the multinational corporation

mentions a CIA manual (Psychological Operations in . Guerrilla Wars) which outlines how the Contras could . justify killing civilians (21)
argues that the military is not a viable solution to . terrorism (31-2)
terrorists are becoming self-reliant (33-34)
argues that the solution is better intelligence
. gathering, leveraging democracy's strengths, and . resource denial (35-6)
Ch. 2: An international conspiracy? USSR didn't supply PLO w/ much aid, China did (at least at first), evidence of international cooperation btw PLO and other terrorist groups is sketchy at best.