The Political Economy of Paramilitariy Persistence
Or
The Business of Terrorism Revisited
INTRODUCTION
Questions:
Why are paramilitaries not the same as terrorists?
This article analyses the political economy of paramilitaries. It is argued that the term
“paramilitaries” is both more value- free and less arbitrarily inclusive than “terrorism” ,enabling a
clearer identification of similarities and differences between groups using violence in pursuit of
political goals. It is further argued that, for purposes of comparison and policy evaluation,
typologising is necessary but that traditional typologies that concentrate on ideological factors
and political goals cannot accommodate the fact that paramilitary movements change structure
and motivation over time. To persist1, paramilitaries must handle functional imperatives in a lowrisk way and movements that do not succeed in this fail to continue in existence, either because
they fail to resist attrition from internal pressures or external ones [ law enforcement: detection,
imprisonment, death; political: criminalisation, extension of law, genocide, use of force; social
improvement: greater isolation, marginalisation, removal of political favour]. Above all, to persist,
paramilitaries need continued access to money. The effect of this requirement on them has been
inadequately studied, particularly with regard to their adoption of the methods of organised crime
groups, which in turn has implications for the development of typologies. The “military” features of
paramilitaries have received most analysis and they are rarely looked at as organisations trying to
maintain a secure cash flow under constant threat from law enforcement investigation. A political
economy approach improves upon a purely structural form of analysis, by permitting comparison
with organised crime, allowing the incorporation of an examination of the legal/illegal interface
and of the phenomena of persistence and structural change. It will be concluded that these
organisations are as much para-businesses as they are paramilitaries
The analysis follows those criminologists who have argued that organized crime is a business,
and, consequently, juxtaposes the recent UNODC typology of organized crime groups, to a
The article follows Easton in his use of the term “persist” as a better one than “survive”. The
author follows Easton in his interest as to the reasons political phenomena persist rather than
perish. See Easton D.
1
1
traditional typology of terrorist groups.2 If it is correct to argue that a paramilitary organization
needs to become a business to persist in the contemporary world, then this will inevitably
challenge the priority of political goals upon which traditional typologising has been centred. The
author has already published a study of the IRA and Republican Movement as a business.3 This
article expands the analysis to al Qaeda, which is ideologically different to the IRA, transnational
in character rather than domestic and with conflicting published accounts of its wealth. It then
looks briefly at a variety of other groups to extend the discussion of the relationship between
funding methods, political aims and organizational structures into areas not brought out by the
analysis of al Qaeda and the IRA.
When discussing terrorism, the definitional problem still remains central. Terrorism is primarily a
pejorative term. Any study of a terrorist organisation raises questions about the legitimacy of the
state and the morality of challenging it by violent means.4 Although individual terrorists are
charged before the courts with individual criminal acts, it can be argued that the phenomenon is
primarily a political one and that it is possible to debate the relationship between a just cause and
the employment of illegal means to achieve it. 5 Opponents seek to call organisations “terrorist” to
prevent them gaining the status of “national liberation movements”.6 An officially recognized
national liberation movement, such as the PLO, the ANC, or SWAPO before the independence of
2
Smith, D.C. [1978] Organized Crime and Entrepeneurship International Journal of Criminology
and Penology 6 1978 pp161-77
Smith D.C. [1980] Paragons Pariahs and Pirates: A Spctrum-based theory of Enterprise. Crime
and Delinquency, 26, 1980: pp358-86
Haller M.H. Illegal Enterprise: A Theoretical and Historical Interpretation Criminology, 28 [2],
1990,: pp207-35
Gambetta D. [1994] Inscrutable Markets Rationality and Society,6[3]: 353-68
Ibid.
[1993] The Sicilian Mafia: The Business of Private protection, , Harvard University
Press, Cambridge Mass
3
Tupman W.A. "Violent Business? Networking, Terrorism and Organised Crime" in I. McKenzie
[ed.] Law, Power and Justice in England and Wales Praeger 1998
Tupman W.A. “Where has all the Money gone? The IRA as a Profit-making Concern” Journal of
Money-Laundering Control Vol 1 No.4 pp303-311 April 1998
4 A. Arblaster: "Terrorism: Myths, Meanings and Morals" Political Studies vol XXV. No.3. pp413 424
5 cant remember the theorists who justified right to rebel against a tyrant. Aristotle started it did
he?
6 A. Arblaster : "Terrorism: Myths, Meanings and Morals" Political Studies vol XXV. No.3. pp413 424
2
Botswana, can qualify for observer status at the UN.7 This in turn facilitates financial support from
other states. The UN also continues to find this a political conundrum, especially where the ArabIsraeli dispute is concerned. 8 The US has followed British legal practice in evading the problem
of defining terrorism and terrorist offences and instead listing proscribed movements. Its list
includes Hizballah, Hamas and the PFLP, without whose consent a peace settlement in the
Middle East is simply unachievable. Nevertheless Executive Order 13224 blocks their assets and
property. 9
Paramilitarism is a more useful concept. It has become more acceptable to refer to “the
paramilitaries” in the context of the Northern Ireland peace process.10 The term “paramilitary”
includes those groups that maintain some form of violent capacity and yet are not in any way part
of the State and prevents the exclusion of groups because a commentator may approve of their
cause. Although institutions employed by the State and individuals employed by the State may
be used to terrorise opponents of the State one would not want to call them paramilitary unless
they were being used in a freelance way. Using the term paramilitarism also enables the
inclusion in this study of organised crime groups where these groups seek to challenge the
State’s monopoly of legitimate coercive force or provide force because the State has failed to
provide it, for example, to enforce contracts. Also by using the term paramilitarism it is possible
to look at ideological groups of right and left, religious groups or cultural groups without getting
involved in the question as to the legitimacy of their cause or their tactics.11 Finally it permits a
broader view of the violence used by such groups, expanding the scope for study beyond bombs
and shootings12
7
76th Plenary Session of the General Assembly A/RES/43/160 8th Dec 1988
http://www.un.org/documents/ga/res/43/a43r160.htm
8 discussion on definitional problems: http://www.unodc.org/unodc/terrorism_definitions.html
Rather lurid front page for “UN action against terrorism” http://www.un.org/terrorism/
9 see: http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/fs/2002/16181.htm for a statement of the history of the Order
and http://www.ustreas.gov/offices/enforcement/ofac/sanctions/t11ter.pdf for the present situation
10 para 13 of the Joint declaration by the British and Irish Governments of April 2003 illustrates
the breadth of activities that can be included under the heading of paramilitarism
http://www.nio.gov.uk/joint_declaration_between_the_british_and_irish_governments.pdf
11
para 13 of the Joint declaration by the British and Irish Governments of April 2003 illustrates
the breadth of activities that can be included under the heading of paramilitarism
http://www.nio.gov.uk/joint_declaration_between_the_british_and_irish_governments.pdf
12 P. Wilkinson the New Fascists
This also a problem for Northern Ireland. “Punishment beatings” and “kneecappings” are carried
out frequently by paramilitaries, with the result that elected politicians argue that violence has not
been truly abandoned by them.
3
Gambetta and others have argued that organised crime is increasingly a business. 13 It follows the
successful contemporary business model characterised by networks, or loose associations of
individuals and groups.14 It is no longer dominated by centralised , hierarchical organisation. 15
Gambetta has also argued that violence is itself a business; that it is a service that can be bought
and sold.16 There is a third relevant aspect of Gambetta’s analysis which began with a study of
the Sicilian Mafia. Where the state is weak, it is difficult for suppliers and purchasers of goods to
enforce contracts.17 Those who can sell violence can, in effect, become contract insurers and
enforcers. It is only a short step to becoming licensers of business activities. 18 Organised crime,
too, has a problem of contract enforcement. It is no good taking someone to court for failure to
pay for a consignment of illegal narcotics.
Is there a fourth Gambetta point or is it Andvig et al? That the temptation to take over other
businesses is irresistible if you’ve got the monopoly of violence?
It follows that, if organized crime is a business, and if paramilitarism follows the fundraising
methods of organized crime, then we should also be analyzing the business aspects of
paramilitarism. There is little study of paramilitarism/terrorism as an economic phenomenon and
the methods by which organisations fund themselves. 19 Those paramilitary organisations that
survive for a significant period of time do so by engaging in many activities other than violence.
Elsewhere, this author has argued that successful terrorist groups survive by resorting to funding
methods copied from organised crime.20 They also have to recruit; they have to train; they have to
engage in peaceful political activity, where this is legal, they have to support prisoners’ families
and they have to obtain legal services. The individuals that engage in these latter activities are
much more loosely organised than the individuals that engage in the paramilitary violence, yet are
associated with them in a non-hierarchical relationship.21 In this sense groups have moved away
from the hierarchical “army” model of paramilitarism towards the ”core group” model increasingly
developing in organized crime too, as the UNODC typology below lays out.
In terms of Gambetta’s second point, paramilitary organizations are well placed to sell violence to
organized crime and to replace them as traditional purveyors of violence. Paramilitaries also
need weapons. In the process they have to set up smuggling services. They thus have a second
13
[Fiorenti and Peltzman 1995
Yiu.Kong.Chu The Triads as Business Routledge London 2000 pp125-128
15 ibid p 29
16 Gambetta
17 Gambetta
18 Gambetta or is it Andvig et al?
19 Napoleoni L. Modern Jihad, Tracing the Dollars Behind the Terror Network, Pluto ;
20 Tupman 1998
14
21
4
business activity from which they can sell spare capacity. It is only a small step from that
realization to the linked idea that it makes sense to smuggle small volume, high value goods in
order to obtain the funds necessary for the weapons themselves. Drugs and high value raw
materials such as diamonds and other precious and semi-precious stones are obvious
commodities.22
As regards Gambetta’s third point, it is increasingly alleged that paramilitaries “licence” illicit
businesses to operate in their areas of control, for a price.. Those that survive over a period of
years can also take on a broader “policing” role, particularly where they have effective control of
neighbourhoods or regions.23 Gambetta’s second and third points are also relevant to the
potential role of paramilitaries in a globalising economy. Thus far work has concentrated on
measures to disrupt terrorist financing, but their actual activities remain sparsely documented.24
Organised crime groups engaged in financial crime or in the movement of illicit commodities may
find it more efficient and cost effective to hire paramilitary services for contract enforcement and
for escort duties. Policing a contract between drug producers, traffickers and sellers which
involves relationships between a number of countries requires a fairly sophisticated and mobile
enforcement organisation. ETA is geographically positioned in Europe and Latin America in such
a way as to be able to provide this and its relationship with the IRA means that it can also call on
fairly professional backup. The organisations moving human beings from China to Western
Europe via Russia, Moldova, and other places in former Communist countries, may also require
such a service. To provide it for the purposes of the prostitution industry may be unacceptable to
political paramilitaries but to provide it for people seeking employment may be perfectly
acceptable and also seen as part of their campaign of economic warfare. Such evidence as
exists suggests that the Chinese organised crime community likes to keep this sort of operation
within the Chinese diaspora but some of the organisations operating out of the former East
European communist states may require enforcement services in order to get paid as well as to
provide escort to the individuals concerned. The global economy certainly exists under
conditions of a weak state similar to those described by Gambetta when the Mafia grew in
southern Italy. The “war on terrorism”, by making more activities illegal, may be creating new
areas of global economic activity in which contract enforcement cannot be carried out legally.
Consequently, those organizations that can sell violence can expand their areas of operations.
The policy may be aimed at destroying terrorism but in fact is embedding it further into the illicit
economy.
22
Howard Marks Mr. Nice Vintage Random House London 1998 p78 also Chaps 4 and 5 passim
Triads, Mafia maybe IRA
24 T.J.Biersteker “Targeting Terrorist Finances: the New Challenges of Financial Market
Globalization” in K.Booth and T.Dunne “Worlds in Collision: Terror and the Future of Global
Order” Palgrave Macmillan Basingstoke and New York 2002 pp74-84
23
5
The organization of organised crime has also converged to some degree with paramilitary
organisation, copying the cellular structure. 25 Increasingly it consists of networks of people who
may only come together for a specific operation and the rest of the time may be engaged in
completely different organisations and completely different and even legal work, especially where
these individuals are lawyers or accountants.26 The same individuals engaged collectively in
illegal activity may simultaneously be engaged in legal activity. This is equally true of the IRA.
Post 1968 paramilitary activity was based on 5 man cells, or Active Service Units [ASUs] in the
Northern Ireland context. These are operationally autonomous but will have required logistical
and other support, which may have involved fund raising as well as other activities on a subprovincial basis and quite independent of the central Army Council, the body that allegedly “runs”
the IRA.27 The recent £26 million bank robbery in Northern Ireland illustrates how much we need
to know the degree to which these operations were audited by a central body, or whether the IRA
has followed organised crime in becoming what Van Duyne has described as “non-organised”.
28
This leads on to the question of other shared features of the environment which mean that
organized crime and paramilitarism operate in the same kind of way, to which return will be made
in the conclusion.
For example, neither “paramilitarism” and “organized crime” are uni-dimensional phenomena.
They consist of a variety of types of organization. In the case of organized crime, the
organizations have in common the pursuit of profit by criminalized means, including violence, and
in the case of “paramilitaries” the pursuit of political goals by violent as well as other criminalized
means including illicit business. Organised crime can also play political roles, even pursue
political power, to protect its illicit profits, and paramilitaries can pursue profit in order to further
their political goals, including engaging in “economic warfare”. Increasingly, both engage in a
mixture of legal and illegal activities and are less and less hierarchically organized in order to
make law enforcement penetration of their organisation more difficult.
Organised crime groups have been subdivided into separate types as have paramiliataries. The
typology of organized crime that follows is based on structural factors for reasons given below by
its creators, the UNODC researchers. The typology of paramilitaries that follows that is based on
political aims as will be discussed below. If Gambetta’s analysis is to be followed, some analysis
of the businesses of both and their effect on both structure and goals needs to be incorporated,
25
26
27
28
Van Duyne 1993 p10]. Statement by Northern Ireland Secretary BBC 8th January 2005
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/4156589.stm
6
especially if a clearer understanding is to be gained of the way such organizations change over
time and appropriate strategies adopted to deal with them.
7
TYPOLOGIES
The UN Office on Drugs and Crime have developed the typology below as a “typology of
typologies”. They studied 40 organised criminal groups across 16 countries and found 5 “broad
typologies of criminal groups”.
sub-types .
29
Within each they anticipate the discovery of further types or
Their intention is to provide a framework within which information on trends in
organized crime can be placed. This, in turn, should ensure that the correct strategy is applied to
the appropriate type of group. They also wish to provide greater detail as to what phenomena
exist within the concept of “transnational organised crime”. The document does not, however,
provide an economically determined model but one structurally determined. It does describe the
activities of the groups seen as examples in each of the categories.
Table 1 UN typologies of contemporary organised crime groups 30
Standard hierarchy
Regional hierarchy
Clustered hierarchy
Core group
Criminal network
Single hierarchical group with strong internal
systems of discipline
Hierarchically structured groups, with strong
internal lines of control and discipline, but with
relative autonomy for regional components.
A set of criminal groups which have
established a system of coordination/control,
ranging from weak to strong, over all their
various activities
A relatively tightly organized but unstructured
group, surrounded in some cases by a network
of individuals engaged in criminal activities.
A loose and fluid network of individuals, often
drawing on individuals with particular skills,
who constitute themselves around an ongoing
series of criminal projects.
The typologies as presented appear to be clusters on a continuum from hierarchical to
“unorganised”. There is no clear set of variables provided on which the typology is based,
although there are references to the ability to use violence as well as to the type of business
engaged in . The authors assert that most such typologies are based on structure and that they
did attempt to develop typologies on a different basis, but unsuccessfully.31 Nevertheless this
provides quite an interesting conceptual framework for comparison between organised crime and
paramilitary groups. The standard hierarchy, for example, is clearly comparable to the classical
Leninist communist party. FARC and Shining Path would fit this category and perhaps some of
29
ibid p33
UN Office on Drugs and Crime [UNODC] “Results of a Pilot Survey of Forty Selected
Organised Criminal Groups in 16 Countries” Sept 2002
31 ibid p 34 and footnote 29
30
8
the armies of the Shan States, with the proviso that they control large areas of remote rural
territory, apparently unlike any of the gangs mentioned in the UNODC typology. The Medellin and
Cali cartels would have been comparable and like FARC were Colombia based
The IRA would
be closer to the regional hierarchy in the 1970s. But both before and after the ceasefire it may be
becoming more akin to the clustered hierarchy or even, as the ceasefire progresses, to the core
group.
The first group, the “standard hierarchy”, tend to use violence, be medium sized [50-200 people]
and begin their operations with extortion. They then invest wealth in legitimate businesses such
as casinos, night clubs and restaurants. They also engage in illegal activities including gambling
houses, prostitution, cigarette smuggling and racketeering. Often illegal activities are carried out
between legitimate businesses. They also seek to corrupt officials and political representatives. 32
Surprisingly, of the 40 groups analysed as many as 13 fitted this model.33 Y K Chu in his work on
the Triads suggests that the situation in Chinese crime is quite different to that described in the
report.34
The second group, the regional hierarchy, interestingly enough is portrayed as often having a
strong social or ethnic identity and being involved in multiple activities. The researchers comment
that regional hierarchies appear to operate a “franchise model” where regional groups pay money
to the centre in order to use the name of a criminal group. 35 The example given is that of the
outlaw motor cycle gangs, not, however, the Hells Angels, but the Australian variant, who engage
in growth and sale of cannabis and the production of amphetamines, seeking to dominate
particular territorial markets . The other examples given are of the Asian and Italian organised
crime groups . The researchers may be conflating two different phenomena here. The franchise
phenomenon is quite different to a territorially-based concept of regional hierarchies and
exemplified by the distinction and al-Qaeda in its post-Afghanistan phase of activity [see below]
and the IRA. The outlaw motorcycle gangs produce and distribute amphetamines and cannabis.
They are also engaged in insurance scams, vehicle theft and trafficking, extortion and other
crimes.
36
The Japanese and Italian regional organised crime groups referred to, are not
discussed in terms of multiple economic activities which are not specified.37
The third type, “clustered hierarchy” is said to be extremely rare, consisting of a number of
criminal groups with arrangements to minimise conflict between them and to regulate that conflict
32
ibid p 35
ibid p35
34 Chu, Y.K. The Triads:
35
UNODC p36
36 ibid p 36
37 ibid p 37
33
9
when it occurs.38
The post ceasefire IRA seems to be somewhere between the regional
hierarchy and the clustered hierarchy as it varies its modus operandi in fundraising in different
parts of the province and in Ireland itself.39 The example given in the UN document is the 28 gang
from South Africa’s prisons.40
Drugs, particularly synthetic drugs is the only activity, that is
mentioned. Another example given is the Ziberman Group, which is involved in illegal trade in
tobaccos, alcohol smuggling, gambling and trafficking in stolen vehicles. 41
The last two categories, “core group” and “criminal network” represent states of “disorganization”
that are not obviously applicable to the armed component of paramilitary organisations although
there may be some common ground with the phenomenon of the Autonomistas which emerged
after the Red Brigades in Italy. They may also provide a better way of thinking about the
relationship between the IRA and the Republican movement as a whole or that between ETA and
Herri Batasuna.
Type 4, “core group”, covers such activities as trafficking in human beings, and the examples
given are two multi-national groups in the Netherlands. The report also refers to the Mclean
syndicate from Australia who specialise in the illegal importation of cannabis. On occasion, these
loosely organised criminal enterprises can assume a corporate structure with a legitimate
business front.
Money laundering and tax and investment fraud are enabled by such
organisations.42 The core group model is distinguished by its anonymity and tends to be small in
size. The researchers do argue that some of the more hierarchical structures of organised crime
in the past may now have evolved into the core group type in response to pressure from law
enforcement agencies.
Two sentences in their report are worth quoting as relevant to the analysis of paramilitaries:
“Once accepted by the syndicate, the newcomer may only associate with syndicate members
when his or her particular skills or expertise in a specific field are required. Clearly the most
important requirement of syndicate membership is the ability for other members to trust the
person in question.”
43
The phenomenon described here is similar to that which occurred when
the IRA abandoned its battalion paramilitary structure in favour of the ASU cellular structure in the
early 1970s. ETA, since the granting of autonomy to the Basque region of Spain in the 1978
Constitution, probably follows a similar model of organization, consisting of a hard core of 20 with
38
ibid
39
40
UNODC op cit
ibid
42 ibid p 40
41
43
10
a few hundred supporters.44 The individual cells are totally autonomous with a very loose link to
the leadership which until recently was based across the border in France.
The fifth typology, the “criminal network”, is described as being primarily project driven, and fits
with Chu’s analysis of the Triads in Hong Kong.45 The comment is made that this is a growing
phenomenon and less likely to be identified by law enforcement agencies.
categorise the situation that exists among the ETA exiles in Latin America.
This may also
46
A number of
different examples given: a group engaging in fraud and forgery, a group engaging in cannabis
smuggling, West African organised crime ranging from advanced fee fraud and financial scams to
trafficking in cocaine and heroin.
47
The overall argument derived from the typology is that the less-heirarchical, more network-based
groups are being overlooked by law enforcement investigators and may be much more prevalent
than realized. There is not, at first sight, a clear link between the type of economic activity
engaged in and the form of structure the organized crime group adopts. That leads to an
interesting set of questions related to an analysis of why the same business should be organized
differently in different places. The typologies presented need to be integrated with a series of
further variables: are the groups providing service to a territorially concentrated or a territoriallydispersed market: what is the nature of the competition? How great an impact has lawenforcement activity had on their businesses? Are they operating in an environment where
contract enforcement is required, such as breaking into a new market? What are the costs to the
organization of internal security? A reexamination of the data stressing the interplay between the
impact of law enforcement and the economic consequence would be extremely useful. It has long
been assumed that organized crime moves from high-risk to low-risk activities as soon as it can
capitalize itself.48
PARAMILITARY PERSISTENCE
Before beginning a discussion of paramilitarism, it is important to remember that the nature of the
sources is problematic. Like many others, the present author has been briefed by practitioners on
a non-attributable basis in the past. Where corroboration can not be obtained the researcher has
always to be concerned about being used as a propaganda tool. The figures given below have
had to be justified by reference to press sources, and these are often dubious. At one stage the
stories were all about security forces' successes against the IRA's financial network. At another
44
http://www.ict.org.il/inter_ter/orgdet.cfm?orgid=8
45
46
47
ibid p42
ibid p42
48
11
the IRA’s links with the US were exaggerated to bring pressure to bear on visiting US politicians.
Stories are exaggerated in order to sell newspapers and the Sunday Times, in particular, clearly
thinks IRA scare stories keep its readers interested. Nevertheless, it has received a number of
major security forces leaks over the years and devotes more space and depth to Northern Ireland
than its broadsheet rivals. The problem of verifiability needs to be borne in mind constantly when
considering the pseudo data of which the IRA-PLC prospectus consists.
The same must be said about the data on al Qaeda. The main source of information for the
period in the Sudan, for which most information exists, is a tainted one: the supergrass Jamal
Ahmed Al-Fadl and the evidence he gave in the trial of bin Laden's associates in Manhattan in
early 2001. It is tainted because he admits he had to flee al Qaeda after he was discovered to
have embezzled some of its funds.49 It also suffers the same problems as all defector testimony:
the danger of repeating a story that his interrogators want to hear and the danger of exaggerating
what he knows in order to increase his importance. Nevertheless, it is the most important
published source for this period.
Intelligence services may provide information but are bound to exaggerate the nature of the threat
in order to obtain greater resources to fight the threat. There is a political interest in playing down
the nature of the threat as the public may see them as failing to cope. Although it might
conversely be argued as in recent TV documentary that governments of the new right deliberately
play on the fears of the population to push through their political agendas. A lot more work like
Napoleoni’s is required before sense is made of paramilitary funding. Equally a lot more work is
required on organised crime and the UNODC project is a useful first step.
Only a small number of the hundreds of paramilitary groups that have existed since the 1960s
have survived into the Third Millennium. To do so, they have had to solve the problem of finance
and, consequently, adopt the methods of organized crime. The individuals that engage in these
latter activities are much more loosely organised than the individuals that engage in the
paramilitary violence, yet are associated with them in a non-hierarchical relationship. The
paramilitaries concerned thus come to resemble some of the looser structures described in the
UNODC typology. Gambettas notion of organized crime as a business, selling violence among
other services is thus worth applying to the paramilitary groups who have survived long-term, but
they have also engaged in a variety of other business activites.
In Northern Ireland, the great survivors are the Irish Republican Army [IRA] and a number of
Protestant paramilitaries: the Ulster Defence Association [UDA] with which is associated the
49
summary of testimony
http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/jtsm/jtsm010314_1_n.shtml
12
Ulster Freedom Fighters [UFF]; the Ulster Volunteer Force [UVF] and its breakaway movement,
the Loyalist Volunteer Force [LVF]. Of these, the majority are supposed to be on cease-fire and
involved in the “peace process”, but all continue to maintain their organization and are alleged to
be involved in various forms of violence and “racketeering”.50
Also in Europe: in Spain, the Basque separatist movement, ETA [Euskadi ta Askatasuna –
Basque Fatherland and Liberty]51; in Corsica, the FLNC [Front de Liberation Nationale de la
Corse].52; in Latin America, Colombia, the FARC [Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia] 53
and in Peru Sendero Luminoso [“Shining Path”]54
In Asia, the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka55 and the drug-trafficking armies of the Shan States in
Burma56: Kashmiris and Naxalites
In the Middle East, a number of paramilitary organizations associated with the PLO and
Hezbollah.57
And perhaps the first truly globalised group, the Afghan veterans association known to us as al
Qaeda.58
In the table that follows, the IRA and ETA provide examples of ethnic or religious minority groups
and groups that have a problem achieving their goals. In theory the IRA exists for the
reunification of the island of Ireland. ETA exists to create a Basque State incorporating provinces
of France and parts of Spain that hardly have a Basque population at all at present. Neither has
a State sponsor. Each depends partially on funding from the diaspora of Basques and Irish now
living in other countries. Each has had to create its own funding mechanisms to survive and each
has learned from the other. There are allegations that both are involved in organised criminal
50
Harper F.J. and Tupman W. entry on United Kingdom pp497-510 Szajkowski B [ed]
Revolutionary and Dissident movements of the World, John Harper Publishing, London 2004 pp
497-510
A comprehensive documentation of the Conflict in Northern Ireland is available at: Conflict
Archive on the Internet http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/
51 Background at: http://www.cfrterrorism.org/groups/eta.html and entry on Spain in Szajkowski
op cit pp 450-454
52 Background at: http://www.tkb.org/Group.jsp?groupID=74 or
http://www.ict.org.il/inter_ter/orgdet.cfm?orgid=85 or Szajkowski ibid pp121-123
53 FARC’s own webpage: http://www.farcep.org/ Council for Foreign Relations site:
http://www.cfrterrorism.org/groups/farc.html
54 Simon Strong Shining Path: the world's deadliest revolutionary force. London, G.B.: Harper
Collins Publishers, 1992. though now out of date
:http://www.cfrterrorism.org/groups/shiningpath.html : Szajkowski op cit pp400-403
55 Tamil Tigers Home Page: http://www.eelam.com/ ; Szakowski ibid pp 454-459
56 http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/pubs/intel/02021/02021.pdf gives a statement of the DEAs
conception of the state of affairs in the Shan area in 2002
57
Hezbollah: http://www.cfrterrorism.org/groups/hezbollah.html; The PLO Negotiations Affairs
Department: http://www.nad-plo.org/index.php
58 There are hundreds of websites on al Qaeda http://cfrterrorism.org/groups/alqaeda.html
13
activities and it is unclear how much of the money raised by these activities goes to the
organisation and how much stays with the individuals engaged in the criminal activity. It may be
that in the territorial areas in which both operate there exist a number of illegal businesses that
pay them a “tax” in the same way that legal businesses do to prevent the IRA and ETA interfering
in their activities.
The Corsicans and Tamil Tigers also are fighting for political autonomy and/or independence on
behalf of ethnic minorities. The Palestinians are fighting for a state of their own. FARC, together
with Sendero Luminoso are the last of the Latin American guerilla movements, perhaps even the
last of the revolutionaries of the Marxist Left, fighting for some sort of “socialist” state. They are
also of interest because they are considered to be “narcoterrorists” funded by drug money, as are
the Shan State Armies. The Shan State armies were also once fighting for independence, but
have turned into drug producers and have settled for both political and economic autonomy, at
least temporarily. Al Qaeda is fighting for the creation of truly Islamic states and increasingly
asserts leadership over the struggle for such states throughout in the Islamic world.
The following typology was developed in the 1970s for explaining to Army audiences the different
ways in which violence was used by “urban guerrilla” later “terrorist” groups. Traditional typologies
of terrorism tended to concentrate on questions of location: domestic/international; ideology:
Fascist, Maoist, Trotskyite, anarchist, nationalist; size: urban guerrilla/terrorist, or even national
liberation movement/terrorist. The typology below integrates all these different variables into a
coherent format. In its original incarnation it also included the notion of a “double minority”, where
groups were fighting each other as well as the security forces, but on reflection, that represented
a type of scenario, not a type of group. Just as the intention of the UN typology creaters was to
facilitate the development of the correct strategies against different types of organized crime, so
too the original aim of this typology was to demonstrate the different ways in which violence was
being used and to suggest that different strategies were required for diffefent types of group.
14
Types of group and different economics.
Table 2: Types of paramilitary group
TYPE OF GROUP OR SCENARIO
EXAMPLES
DOMESTIC
1. ANTICOLONIAL/ Nationalist
PLO, ANC, SWAPO, EOKA, IZL, I>R>A>
1919-22
2. ETHNIC RELIGIOUS AND CULTURAL
IRA, ETA, FLNC, Tamil Tigers, Black Panthers
MINORITIES
3. IDEOLOGICAL MINORITIES, LEFT
FARC, Sendero Luminoso, R.A.F, Red
Brigades, Weathermen/Weather Underground
4. IDEOLOGICAL MINORITIES, RIGHT
SS WOTAN 18, COMBAT 18, FANE, Ordine
Nouovo, Grey Wolves
5. GOVERNMENT SPONSORED DOMESTIC
“Death Squads”: units of Army and Police.
GROUPS
Occasionally have a name [Apostolic AntiCommunist Alliance]
6. URBAN GUERILLA
Montoneros, ERP, Tupamaros
ie groups large enough to have serious chance
of overthrowing government
INTERNATIONAL
7. EXILES
SPANISH ANARCHISTS, PFLP, PFLP-GC
8. EXILES AUXILIARIES
ANGRY BRIGADE, June 2nd.
9. INTERNATIONALISTS
Al Qaeda, Action Directe, Revolutionary Junta
10. CATSPAWS
A number of Palestinian organizations remain
clients of individual Arab states eg SAIQA
11. COUNTERREVOLUTIONARIES
Contras, MLN,
12. ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALIST [now more
The Islamic World Front for the Struggle
frequently referred to as jihadist]
against the Jews and the Crusaders now
includes most relevant groups, except Hamas
and Hezbollah
13. UNORGANISED IMITATORS
MANY IN MID-70S. numbers growing in places
like Iraq
Table adapted from:
15
Tupman W.A. 1987, 1
Beyond Terrorism: towards a theory of scenarios of political violence
Brookfield paper no,1
Tupman W.A. 1987, 2
Towards a typology of terrorism: Criticisms and definitions in the field of
Political Violence Brookfield paper no.4
The present state of insurgent organisations has required some adaptation of the typology. The
“domestic” section was categorised in relation to the state. Types 1 and 2 aim to create a state of
their own, and an ethnically defined one. Types 3 and 4 were struggling in the 1960s and 1970s
for a particular kind of state: Stalinist, Trotskyite, Maoist, Anarcho-Syndicalist, Environmentalist or
Fascist. To them one would want to add the “jihadists” of today, who need to be seen as more
than religious in outlook.59 The fifth type use violence to prevent change in the nature of the state.
The sixth type relates to 3 and 4 in the same way as 1 relates to 2. 1 and 6 are large enough both
numerically and in terms of geographical spread of support to have a realistic chance of success;
armed political parties in a sense, whereas the others are more in the nature of armed pressure
or interest groups. Categorisation of domestic types is primarily by “aim”. Structure form the late
1960s on as primarily cellular. Hierarchical military-style structure was only possible where the
groups controlled rural base areas. Guevara famously asserted that “the cities are the graveyards
of revolutionaries”.60
The “internationalist” categories have changed dramatically. Purely state-sponsored groups have
declined into obscurity, at least for the moment; “counterrevolutionaries” have vanished because
the Marxist revolutionary process has been supplanted by the process of transition to democracy
and the demise of Communism in its Soviet form. “Exiles”, “exiles auxiliaries”, “internationalists”
and what were once known as “Islamic fundamentalists” have all coalesced, at least temporarily,
around the figure of Osama bin Laden. The same might be said of “jihadists”.
So do we really need to talk about anything other than the one category here?
Given the typologies of organised crime and the suggested typology of paramilitarism, political
economic analysis needs to be incorporated into analysis of the similarities and difference
between paramilitarism and organised crime. “Going after the money” is seen as a better way of
dealing with the drugs business than trying to affect supply or demand. The FATF approach that
follows is based on the same assumptions.
59
ref to come from Larbi
60
16
What am I trying to do here? Next step is to take the typology and see what an analysis of
funding methods tells us about the different aspects of the problem [what problem?
Understanding the nature of organised crime and paramilitarism?] to do that we need to review
funding methods of paramilitarism…and make the point that there are legal and illegal…as with
organised crime the businesses are both licit and illicit.
SOURCES OF FUNDING
The FATF Statement on Terrorist Financing of 2001 is as generally agreed a starting point for any
discussion of funding as the UN typology of organized crime would be for discussion of organized
crime.61 The same information can also be categorized into traditional and newer forms of
funding:
61
The Financial Action Task force of the OECD http://www1.oecd.org/fatf
In 2001, the Financial Action Task Force [of the OECD] identified the following major sources of
terrorist funding: Drug trafficking; Extortion and kidnapping; Robbery; Fraud; Gambling;
Smuggling and trafficking in counterfeit goods; Direct sponsorship by states; Contributions and
donations; Sale of publications [legal and illegal]; Legitimate business activities
17
Table 3
Traditional sources of funding
• Armed Robbery
• Extortion
• kidnap ransom
• Voluntary contributions
• Overseas diaspora
• foreign state support
• sale of literature
Newer sources of funding
• Fraud
• Drugs
• Clubs
• Gambling
• counterfeit products
• legitimate businesses
• stock market manipulation
• franchising
The newer forms of funding are lower risk and require less disposal of coercive force. The
paramilitaries have followed organized crime groups along the same route. Possibly the only
activity they do not engage in is prostitution, with the exception of Kosovar and Alabanian groups,
although they may use their transportation systems for smuggling human beings.
The effect of the newer forms of fundraising is to draw the support organizations into a variety of
illicit roles, and expand those organizations into areas from where they would not normally
receive support for their political goals, but will for the services they provide, such as cheap
counterfeit products and even a degree of employment. The support groups thus also develop a
more equivocal relationship to political activity, becoming involved in criminal economic
enterprises.
So it may be the case that the more paramilitaries become economically active, the less
paramilitary they become. Non-violent fundraising activities may create a different structure within
which a cellular structure may be embedded or kept quite separate. Which appears to fit well with
the UNDCP typology in that hierarchical structure gives way to a number of independent activities
with an armed group enforcing internal discipline and contracts as much as fighting for “the
cause”? It is unlikely that the “core” paramilitary group becomes economically active, more that
around it are created a series of satellite organizations. If that is the case, then it would be useful
to demonstrate whether there is any relationship between political aim, structure and funding
mechanism, or indeed any other variable.
18
Table 4
TYPE OF GROUP OR SCENARIO
SOURCE OF FUNDING
DOMESTIC TERRORISM
1. ANTICOLONIAL/ Nationalist
State-sponsored, also donations
2. ETHNIC RELIGIOUS AND CULTURAL
Donations, kidnappings and increasingly by
MINORITIES
criminal enterprise
3. IDEOLOGICAL MINORITIES, LEFT
Bank robberies.
4. IDEOLOGICAL MINORITIES, RIGHT
Wealthy individuals
5. GOVERNMENT SPONSORED DOMESTIC
Employers
GROUPS
6. URBAN GUERILLA
Donations,
ie groups large enough to have serious chance
enterprise
revolutionary
tax,
criminal
of overthrowing government
INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM
7. EXILES
Bank robberies and some donations
8. EXILES AUXILIARIES
Funded by “exiles”
9. INTERNATIONALISTS
Tends to be a “war chest” left over from
previous activity
10. CATSPAWS
State sponsored
11. COUNTERREVOLUTIONARIES
State sponsored and also wealthy individuals
12. ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALIST [now more
Charities, individuals
frequently referred to as jihadist]
13. UNORGANISED IMITATORS
If funded at all, not really unorganized, but
many trained in Afghanistan in credit card fraud
and similar small scale white collar crime
The big nationalist groups can obtain state sponsorship and create governments in exile with all
the trappings. The smaller nationalist groups can copy their big brothers and impose a
“revolutionary tax” which is easy to depict as crude extortion.
The ideological and religious minorities are the ones that have to turn to crime.
It is the
combination of survival and the difficulty of achieving the goal that create the requirements for
long-term funding and the conditions where methods are borrowed from organized crime. During
an up to the late l960’s such paramilitaries primarily funded themselves by bank robberies.
These groups may also have been sporadically funded directly or indirectly through the Soviet
Union or East German secret services and parts of the PLO certainly provided training. There
19
was also a period when a safe haven was provided in Algeria. Cuba and North Korea have
frequently been accused of performing similar roles.
The internationalist category‘s South American origins tend to suggest that they would probably
have carried out bank robberies but they were also funded from stashes of money left over from
kidnappings at which they were extremely good. $66 million dollars being paid for the release of
the Boca brothers and several $30 million dollar hits being made in the late 60’s and early 70’s.
62
Kidnappings probably pioneered by Basque exiles.
There was a fairly clear relationship between type of political aim and fundraising activity until the
discovery of less high-risk illegal activities during the early 1970s. Structures began to change
during this period as law-enforcement response became more professional. Any group that had
not adopted a cellular structure was forced to do so or risk destruction. The groups that survived
are the ones already enumerated above. Survival in the short term may have been due to the
existence of a rural refuge, or the strong support of a closed ethnic group, or an overseas
diaspora, or, very rarely, the support of the international community. In the longer term, it was
how those factors were turned to economic as well as political advantage that determined
whether a group survived or vanished.
So now tie back into the UNs orgcrim typology:If there has been a change, what doe it consist of?
Is the IRA and the Chechens now following cie group/obshak model, with central unit dispensing
violence for a number of reasons: against law enforcement, for publicity, for internal security and
discipline, for contract enforcement…what else? What have fundraising changes brought about in
temrs of organization etc….? do different types of funding produce different models of
organization?
The IRA’s economic activities have been better documented than most. The table that follows
portrays the IRA as a business rather than a purely paramilitary organization.
62
20
THE IRA
Table 5 an imaginary invitation to invest
IRA PLC63
Company activities [circa early 1990s, before the ceasefire]
A small international company providing executive and leisure services in the British Isles and
North West Europe. Overseas offices in the United States and Australia. Courier services
available to various parts of he world.
Subsidiary companies provide construction and demolition services. IRA PLC also franchises
clubs and a “get you home” service. Private security services also provided for housing estates.
Insurance quotations against bomb damage can also be brokered.
The company has recently secured a niche in the import-export market, particularly of livestock
and CDs.
63
This spoof prospectus was originally presented to the Cambridge International Symposium on
Organised and Economic Crime in the early 1990s. It was later published with commentary in:
"Violent Business? Networking, Terrorism and Organised Crime" Chapter 3 of McKenzie I ed.
Law Power and Justice in England and Wales Praeger 1998 pp33-53 and in:
"Where has all the money gone? The IRA as a profit-making concern" Journal of Moneylaundering Control Vol 1 No 4 1998 pp32-40
21
Annualised statement of income and expenditure
Source
£,000
Contributions from overseas subsidiaries
1,500
Shebeen subsidiaries: bar and machines
4,275
Import-export business
2,250
Fire and Bomb Damage Insurance
[Protection plc]
6,150
Construction
5,000
Involuntary bank and post office contributions
1,250
Total Income
20,425
Non-cash contributions
Demolition equioment and executive toys
1,500
Statement of expenditure
Executives in UK [4]
Salaries
Warehouse and Support staff UK [20]
Salaries
Transport and accommodation
80
400
200
sub-total for UK
680
Executives in Northern Ireland
[40]
400
Warehouse and Support staff
[60]
600
sub-total for NI
1,000
BALANCE
1,680
Pay-outs from executive family insurance fund
2,000
Semi-retired staff in Ireland
1,000
[50]
TOTAL EXPENDITURE
[NET PROFIT
To Investments
4,680
15,745]
15,000
To Petty cash fund
745
TOTAL
20,425
22
Justification for the figures are given in the previous article. 64 But the data is worth re-examining.
A closer examination of the “businesses” described and the expenditure figures reveal some
structural aspects not brought out by the previous article. It is assumed that the IRA limits itself in
size to 100 paramilitary operatives in Northern Ireland. These cannot also be in charge of the
protection rackets, the money collecting from taxi drivers, the building companies, the
shebeens/clubs, the frauds and the pirate CD sales. Other groups of individuals must be carrying
out these activities, and will themselves have costs, although some allowance has been made in
the category “semi-retired staff in Ireland”. The picture presented by the data approximates to an
organised crime group of UNODC type 2, 3 or 4. The question is, which of the models is being
followed.
The IRA are not primarily in business for the purposes of making money but need to have ways of
making money in order to stay in business. Although “IRA-PLC” is a catchy title, it would be more
correct to talk of “Republican Movement PLC”. Irish commentators prefer to use this latter term,
without the “PLC”, of course. The former title gives the impression that the IRA controls all
branches of the Republican Movement and this cannot safely be asserted. Sinn Fein, the
women’s movement, social clubs, Gaelic Sports associations, the Catholic ex-Servicemen’s
Association, prisoners' support organisations and various licit and illicit businesses are all
organisations within a broader movement. Who controls whom, who interacts with whom and how
are not only matters for research but frequently matters of political controversy and occasionally
matters disputed before the courts. The money-making ventures alluded to in the prospectus may
or may not be under the control of the Army Council, may or may not pay a percentage to the
Army Council and may or may not take place in areas considered to be under Republican
Movement “control”.
Related problems must appear frequently on the agenda of IRA Army Council meetings. How far
should they engage in fundraising and how far in armed operations? Should the same personnel
be involved in both? Should they be kept totally separate? How can both activities be used
against the movement as propaganda? The essence of every paramilitary act is propaganda.
Urban guerilla warfare was once said to be armed propaganda.65 So fundraising and the
investment of consequent profits in themselves presumably should be used as a weapon to
undermine the British state. Fraud committed against the Northern Ireland Housing Department
would be legitimate, as would fraud against the Ministry of Agriculture Food and Fisheries as
DEFRA was known before the cease-fire, customs duties evasion or similar. Fraud against
domestic Irish credit unions would presumably be unacceptable.
64
65
23
Equally dealing drugs in the UK might be acceptable where dealing drugs in Belfast would not be.
In Dublin, however there are strong suspicions that IRA personnel are involved in trafficking in
soft drugs, if not in street dealing. Certainly the IRA has taken a leaf out of the pages of their
Basque colleagues, ETA, in gaining popular support by kneecapping or placing orders of exile on
well known drug dealers in Belfast, Derry City/Londonderry and elsewhere. Equally what the
British security forces would call protection rackets the IRA would say are in the nature of a
revolutionary tax, following the Basque model again.
From 1979, there is evidence of the emergence of a network of different individuals specialising in
different roles. To that extent the structure of the IRA appears to be converging with the changing
structure of organised crime. A network of specialists is coordinated by a central planner for a
one-off purpose or for a more long term enterprise. Just as organised crime has its ‘enforcers’, its
specialists in violence, so too do the IRA. Equally organised crime has its smuggling or
transportation specialists. Here the IRA either has its own or buys in a specialist from organised
crime, as it did to move the consignment of arms and explosives from Libya. [unattrib 1995]. This
might point to a centralised laundering operation via a financial specialist employed for the
purpose either in the USA or Caribbean.
Alison says the second sentence is very important but does it belong in a different article///worth
saving up for a follow=up?
There is, thus, some evidence that the IRA has moved into contract enforcement and licensing for
those involved in illicit businesses in both Northern and Southern Ireland. There is evidence of
organizational change, but changes in the organization of “terrorist” incidents have more to do
with security requirements than with the impact of fund-raising activities. One of the most
interesting aspects of the IRA is the way in which it has succeeded in maintaining its political
priorities despite its ventures into a variety of questionable fund-raising areas. The mechanisms
by which it preserves a high degree of integrity and thereby legitimacy with significant sections of
the Catholic community in Northern Ireland, Southern Ireland and the United States require
further study. This raises a further relevant question: does a paramilitary have to shed businesses
as fast as it creates them, in order to maintain legitimacy and integrity? And is this the same as
organized crime or different?
It needs to be remembered that the IRA has now been on ceasefire for a significant period of
time. Have its businesses been passed to individuals and family groups, such as Thomas “Slab”
24
Murphy. According to the BBC he is the IRA’s Chief of Staff.66 They also claim he controls a
personal fortune of between £35 and 40 million. Other sources have Murphy as Chief of Staff
from 1997 -98 when he was replaced by Brian Keenan. 67 None of these pieces of information can
be considered solid.
Should be concluding here or later that Republican movement now more like an obshak model: a
number of businesses with a shared security unit. Chechen model worth noting.
Research is needed into the relationship between the ways in which funding is raised and the
type of operation carried out. For example, al-Qaeda is very much a sporadically paramilitary
organisation. Its operations outside Afghanistan consist of major spectaculars which are planned
over a long period of time. Contrast that with the IRA and ETA at the height of their activities
where six events occurred on average per day, such a pace being sustained over a period of time
as is occurring in contemporary Iraq. It may be that al-Qaeda finances itself the way it does
because of the sorts of operations it wishes to engage in or it may be that it acts sporadically
because of the nature of its cash flow. The 9/11 Report suggests that it receives the majority of
its funding during the month of Ramadan, because that is when charitable donations are given
and its when donors are most vulnerable to being approached. If this were true, the flow of
money is not continuous.68 There is one big peak in the year, although smaller amounts may
come in on a regular basis. At the end of Ramadan the leadership of al-Qaeda has a fairly good
idea of what it has got to spend for the year. The IRA and ETA have more stable cash flows, with
a variety of fund-raising operations not limited to a specific period of the year.
66
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/tv/underworld_rich_list/underworld_smugglers.shtml
http://irelandsown.net/chronology.html : http://www.cpgb.org.uk/worker/269/ireland.html
68 Roth J, Greenburg D, Wille S, Monograph on terrorist Financing, Staff Report to the National
Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States 2004 p.21
http://www.9-11commission.gov/staff_statements/911_TerrFin_Monograph.pdf
67
25
Al QAEDA
Appear to be saying two things:
a is Al Q a new thing
b. is it flush or hand to mouth
May be saying its new on two counts;
A. different organisation structure: franchise
B. in deficit rather than in profit…has to cut its coat to suit its cloth where IRA can pick
and choose
All the points now need to be political economy related.
Is al Q an organisation in profit or just breaking even [or even making a losss….can it do
so? Don’t think it can…a paramilitary cant borrow money, can it, except as a fraud of some
sort…] Other orgs can commit a robbery to gain funds. Al-Q doesn’t appear to, but it does
encourage its operatives/ cells to commit credit card fraud to fund an operation.
Is it new? Predecessors came together from existing orgs. In some ways al-Q has taken
over exisiting orgs but it has also successfully encouraged others to grow, sometimes
from nearly nothing….Is the idea of approaching OBL with an idea and asking for help
funding it a new one?
Needs to start by saying these points.
Is AL-Q a New Sui Generis Phenomenon? Is this just another article and do these three pages
need summarizing into a para, saying alQ not new…has predecessors and they existed out of
desperation and financed themselves thus….failed to obtain a safe haven in Latin America,
whereas al Q managed to find first Sudan then Afghanistan, and areas of Bosnia and Chechnya
too maybe????
Before attempting to look at al Qaeda as a business and see if a similar analysis can be carried
out on it as on the IRA, there are provisos to be made. Insofar as al-Qaeda exists, it appears to
be an organisation facilitating links between separate organisations in at least 24 individual
states. This may itself turn out to be an underestimate as the dimensions of its European and
North American structures begin to emerge. It is even becoming acceptable to talk of it as a
“franchise” operation. In its present guise it does not appear to have the support of a particular
26
state, although in the past it has operated freely in first the Sudan and, until the invasion, in
Afghanistan. Its funding now appears to come from individuals and charities.69 Osama Bin
Laden has claimed that he made a massive financial loss on his time in the Sudan and it is very
unlikely he made much profit out of Afghanistan. 70 In December 2004 he announced that
operations in Iraq were costing $200,000 per week.
The previous multi-national operations of this kind were, firstly, the foreign irregulars recruited by
Wadi Haddad and George Habash during the period when they used a variety of European and
South American activists to assist them in hijacking planes and, of course, in taking OPEC
hostage. This was not really an autonomous organisation but one of auxiliaries assisting a branch
of the Palestinian movement. Funding was from within existing funds of the PLO, which had
already been moved to arms-length away accounts.
There was, secondly, an attempt in South America to create a multi-state operation known as the
Revolutionary Junta. Funding here was primarily via kidnap and ransom, allegedly carried out by
ETA veterans and by traditional bank robberies. This transferred its operations, small as they
were, to Europe under the guise of Accion Directe. Again this was a fairly short lived group
although it did attempt to organise co-ordinated actions in a number of European countries.
There is also an argument that many of the European groups of the 1970’s were in fact controlled
and funded from East European security services.
71
Some of these models may have provided a
blueprint from which the al-Qaeda model was created, and some did have a unifying anti-state
ideology in the form of international socialism. There has also been talk in the past of a very
loosely organised “International” of the right or of neo fascist organisations in Europe and North
America.
72
It may be unwise to shrug off this phenomenon as it shares with the al-Qaeda
movement the ideology of anti-Zionism.
So in this sense al-Qaeda is not as new as it appears. Other paramilitary organisations have
sought to create relationships between cells and groups operating in individual countries, and
have sought to move resources from one country to another as the security services grew
stronger or weaker in particular places, or as popular support waxed or waned in particular
countries. The Latin American groups considered that it was impossible for there to be a socialist
revolution in a single country in South America as the United States would not permit it.
73
They
saw it as inevitable that they would one day have to extend their insurgency to the US in order to
Tupman “The Business of Terrorism I and II” Intersec
ibid
71 Clare Sterling The Terror Network
72 P.Wilkinson the New Right, Searchlight
73 D.C. Hodges (ed): "Philosophy of the Urban Guerilla" "The Revolutionary Writings of Abraham
Guillen" William Morrow, New York, 1973 pp232-5
69
70
27
win. Accion Directe, when operational in Europe, actually tried to make its target NATO and to
associate itself with the struggle against the deployment of new American missiles in Britain and
Germany in particular. In this they were not terribly successful as the climate in Europe at the
time did not permit them to recruit. Non Violent Direct Action was the fashionable strategy, and
they rapidly suffered attrition, their numbers whittled down without replacement.
The
Revolutionary Junta in Latin America collapsed in the aftermath of the military coups of the early
1970’s and the harsh oppression that followed.
What is new about al-Qaeda is not the international scale of its operations but its ability to sustain
those operations, with all the implications that has for funding. It is this idea of “sustaining” actions
that was originally used to distinguish post-68 terrorism from classical anarchism.74 Its ability to
train large numbers of fighters in sanctuaries in different countries, and to involve those fighters in
military conflicts in weak states, has meant that it has returned some highly trained and highly
motivated personnel to a number of countries throughout the world.
It is thus capable of
sustaining its operations, while continuing to recruit, far longer than previous groups have been
able to. Previously, groups have consisted of a hard core of militants with some training who
have had to train willing recruits in country “on the job”. This has made it difficult to control
operations to ensure that targets are hit correctly and to prevent penetration by the security
services.
The other ‘new’ thing is the willingness to use terror as a tool simply to beget more terror, as a
recruiting strategy, rather than with specifically political objectives. Although even this is
anticipated by Franz Fanon75 who argued in “the Wretched of the Earth” that violence was
necessary to liberate people from colonialism. Violent acts are vital to show that the colonial
oppressor can be resisted. He was writing about the Algerian liberation movement of the 1950s,
but his ideas are still read and discussed by North African youth today. ETA apologised for the
Barcelona supermarket bomb, whereas al-Qaeda used September 11 partly to demonstrate to
disaffected Arab youth that there was an alternative to submitting to Western culture.
74
S.A.Efirov : "Pokushenie na Budushcheye (Assault on the Future) Molodaya Gvardiya,
Moscow, 1984
75 Franz Fanon “the Wretched of the Earth”
28
FUNDING AL QAEDA: THE MYTHS
Table 6 Alleged al Qaeda income before the 9/11 Commission Report
Source
Amount
Personal fortune from Saudi Arabia
$300 million
Personally owned businesses in Sudan,
35 companies, combined turnover??
Yemen and elsewhere
Charities
Approx $30 million per year from both sources
Facilitators who persuaded donors
added together
Drugs
Either income from escorting shipments or
direct profits
Precious stones
Tanzanite and diamonds from Sierra Leone
Foreign government
Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Gulf States
Internal US sources
suspected
Stock market manipulation
Used some of $300 million fortune via
Sudanese company al Tawa
total
Astronomical. More than any paramilitary
organisation could ever successfully spend
This is the portrait of Osama as Superman. The billionaire terrorist, master plotter and, of course,
the classic “Public Enemy Number One” so beloved of American law enforcement strategy. 76 Al
Qaeda's funding and Osama bin Laden's business affairs are difficult to disentangle as they
involve organizations which perform totally legitimate functions as well as being used as conduits
for his activities. He has used the hawala system as well as Islamic banking. “His” companies
have made profits from legitimate business.
Extortion from private individuals has taken place on a scale unimaginable in the West to the tune
of over $1 million per individual. Wealthy individuals in the Islamic world now have to choose
between risks: detection by the US or murder by al-Qaeda. Equally charitable donations by
governments to foundations which dole out money to Islamic causes will have to be more
carefully monitored by the donors as will the performance of the charities themselves.
At first sight bin Laden has a complex track record. Honey traders, internet providers, hawala
banking, cattle breeding, shrimp boats, construction, import-export, stock market trading and
76
Understanding the FBI
29
perhaps manipulation, even drug smuggling and other illegal businesses all had a place in his
empire. He is alleged to have spent large sums on infrastructural projects for governments.
Before his expulsion he carried out many philanthropic projects for the Sudanese government
and more recently is alleged to have bankrolled the Taliban. He has run training camps and
allegedly put armies into the field in Chechnya, Bosnia and Kosovo as well as Afghanistan.
Individual terrorist cells seem to have been kept on a shoestring, resorting to credit card and
cheque fraud to stay operational. Cells even repatriated money to the Middle East, the reverse of
what might have been expected. The other organisations associated with al-Qaeda have still to
be investigated financially and may present a different picture.
It is the period in the Sudan that created the image of the millionaire terrorist financier, because of
the 35 businesses created there. If the Sudanese authorities confiscated all of them when they
expelled them, then this image collapses. If front companies were created outside the Sudan,
however, they may still exist and al Qaeda is a richer organization than is now thought. In a
globalised political system, many things other than weapons need to be transported: money,
information, orders and potential soldiers. These required new businesses and created new
business opportunities. The 9/11 report authors argue that once he was in Afghanistan bin Laden
no longer needed such sophisticated communication systems, but the rest of the network outside
Afghanistan surely still did.
30
Table 7 Alleged Al Qaeda annualised income: the 9/11 commission verdict
Source of income
Notes
Amount
Personal fortune from
None. Saudi Govt forced family
$1 million
Saudi Arabia
to sell his share of family
business 1994. Received $1
million a year 1970 to 1993/4.
Personally owned
Negligible and in 1996
businesses in Sudan
appropriated by Sudanese
0
Government
Charities
Approx $30 million per year from
Facilitators who
both sources added together
$30 million
Drugs
Negligible
0
Precious stones
Negligible
0
Foreign government
None
0
Internal US sources
None directly
0
Stock market manipulation
None
0
persuaded donors
total
$30 million
Outgoings
notes
Amounts
Taliban
a yearly payment
$20 million
Training in camps in Afghanistan
For all three
Creation of networks and alliances
Categories together
Support for jihadists and families
$ 9million left
Operations/spectaculars
$400-500,000 for Sept
11th
total
$9 million
$1 million
attacks
c. $30 million
Source: p4 and p 20 of Roth, Greenburg, Wille: Monograph on Terrorist Financing
31
Figure given for Iraq of outgoings of $200,000 per week in Bin Laden’s speech published Dec 27 th
2004 77
The Monograph authors argue, in a background paper to the 9/11 Report78 that it is a myth that
bin Laden financed al Qaeda through his share of the family wealth. Equally it is a myth that he
financed the organisation through the proceeds of the sale of his Sudanese businesses. Recent
intelligence has it that in 1994 the Saudi Government forced the bin Laden family to sell Osama’s
share of the family company and place the proceeds in a frozen account79 [p.20]. It also claims
that from 1970 until 1993/4 he only received a million dollars a year from the family. 80 Again
recent intelligence now declares that the Sudanese government appropriated his assets when he
left.81 There is earlier evidence that he claimed to have lost $150 million on agricultural and
construction projects in the Sudan.82
If this picture is correct, and there must be some debate as to whether all the front companies
vanished with bin Laden’s departure from the Sudan, as there were supposed to be companies in
other parts of the Muslim world, it does explain why the “spectaculars were so painstakingly
planned and such occasional events. There simply were not enough funds left over for them. This
is a possible explanation for the need to “franchise” the operation as al Qaeda was not financially
capable of launching attacks in the many places its leadership may have wished.
THE AL QAEDA FRANCHISE OPERATION
Al Qaeda was formed in 1988. In 1998 Osama Bin Laden formed an umbrella organisation called
"The Islamic World Front for the struggle against the Jews and the Crusaders" [ Al-Jabhah alIslamiyyah al-'Alamiyah li-Qital al-Yahud wal-Salibiyyin].83 This organisation included the Egyptian
groups al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya and al-Jihad, the Egyptian Armed Group, the Pakistan Scholars
Society, the Partisans Movement in Kashmir, the Jihad movement in Bangladesh and the Afghan
77
MEMRI [Middle East media Research Institute] special dispatch 837 Iraq Jihad and Terrorism
Special Studies Project. Full text of speech available at: http://www.dazzled.com/soiraq/Index.htm
[in Arabic]
78 National Commision on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States Final Report 22.7.04
http://www.iwar.org.uk/homesec/resources/9-11/911Report.pdf
79 ibid p20
80 ibid
81 ibid
82
83
The International Policy Institute for Counter Terrorism "Al Qa'ida the base"
http://www.ict.org.il/inter_ter/orgdet.cfm?orgid=74
32
military wing of the "Advice and Reform" commission led by bin Laden himself.84 These preexisting groups would have had their own sources of funding.
Those who argue that al Qaeda has become a franchise, need to specify the kind of franchise
operation. 85 Al Qaeda is not one where the centre provides training, logo and initial investment,
and insists on the franchisee following exactly the ingredients of the product as centrally devised.
It is more like the situation in the UK pub trade, with some operations run on a tenant basis, some
by a manager and some as owner of a “free house”, all of which receive a mix of products to sell.
Bin Laden has said that al Zarqawi’s operation costs $200,000 per week, or $10.4 million per
year. Al Zarqawi is presumably the “owner” accepting bin Laden’s logo in order to receive a
steady supply of ”product”: men, arms, materiel and funding. Other organizations, such as the
Chechens, that pre-existed the formation of the Front will be in a similar relationship to the centre,
unless they have lost their leadership and have had to turn to bin Laden and his associates for
assistance with reconstruction. Still others will have been founded from next-to-nothing during the
Afghan period and since and will be dependent on the centre for their ideological position as well
as their materiel.
Some of the contradiction between the two views of bin Laden and al Qaeda’s funding may thus
be resolved by a reminder of just what the latter really consists of and by considering the different
projects simultaneously taking place. There are three different types of al Qaeda activity that
require funding. Firstly there are th insurgencies proper in Afghanistan and Iraq. Secondly,the
individual groups comprising al Qaeda continue to require funding for their domestic causes, be
these in North Africa, East Africa, South East Asia, the Caucasus, the Balkans or the Indian subcontinent. Arms, training and subsistence all cost money, although many of the necessary
arrangements were already in place before the destruction of the training camps in Afghanistan. It
is unclear how many al Qaeda veterans made their way home and how many have stayed to fight
in Afghanistan. Individual soldiers in individual conflicts were funded by approaches to the
charitable foundations and expansion of these numbers will have been disrupted by the steps
taken after September 11th.
Thirdly, separate funding is required for the cells that remain in Western Europe and the USA.
Western Europe still remains a recruitment target and perhaps a target for a spectacular atrocity,
as does the USA. The problem is predicting the nature of the planned atrocity and the funding
that might be required to achieve it. Previous operations suggest a diversity of modus operandi,
84
Jeffrey Robinson puts the argument that al Qaeda is now just a “brand” in an article in the
International herald Tribune “How petty crime funds terror” 13.8. 2004
http://www.iht.com/articles/533732.html
85
33
including illicit business such as petty fraud and false documentation and the use of legal
businesses as cover. The Moroccan group [Moroccan Islamic Combat Group] held responsible
for the Madrid bombing apparently funded themselves by cheque card fraud using a microcamera
and faking a bank robbery.86 There has also been a successful prosecution in Leicester of
members of a group who were convicted of, amongst other offences, the manufacture odf
counterfeit credit cards used to raise funding for terrorism.87
The picture given by the Monograph writers suggest that al Qaeda is not now a business,
although it may have been run as one during the Sudan period. The picture of funding during the
period in Afghanistan is primarily of funding through individuals and charities, although there is
allegation that as well as the direct delivery of funding per fighter provided for a particular conflict,
there were al Qaeda operatives within the charities “skimming” a small percentage on individual
transactions.
The creation of front companies for operations against the American Embassy in Kenya and
Tanzania now appear to belong to the same period and not to have been used again. Unlike the
IRA, which has had more money than it required to cover its outgoings for some years, al Qaeda
has had several periods of relative penury. Yet it has shown a remarkable ability to recover from
setbacks, leaving a question mark about the existence of a warchest of investments, despite the
inability of the Monograph authors to find any evidence for this.
The comparison between al Qaeda and organized crime groups cannot easily be fitted into the
UN typology as it is more akin to the alleged global crime groups such as the Mafia, the Triads
and the Yakuza. Like them it exhibits mythical qualities and there is debate as to whether there
are independent organizations using the brand name as a mark of quality. It is unlike them in that
it retains goals that are definitely political and supports at least two major insurgencies. It is like
them in the workings of its individual national organizations in the Islamic World and its cells in
Europe and the USA. These groups certainly rely on criminality to support their existence, but mix
legal and illegal fund-raising activities.
The comparison between al Qaeda and the IRA exhibits some interesting aspects. As a group in
profit, the IRA has been able to limit the number of its operatives, choose the time and place of its
operations and sustain a paramilitary campaign on a daily basis until the ceasefire, Al Qaeda,
living in a more hand-to-mouth financial climate has had to limit the number of its “spectaculars”
86
http://www.4law.co.il/skim1.htm original source Daily Telegraph 11.4.04 and Agence France
Press
87 Leicester Police Presss pack “Operation magnesium”
http://www.leics.police.uk/library/magnesium_information_pack.pdf
34
to two or three a year. Its leadership have preferred to prioritise large-scale insurgency/guerilla
war campaigns, which seems to contradict the notion that it is short of cash.
OTHER GROUPS
The other groups that have been mentioned as survivors illustrate a number of different aspects
of the impact of funding upon organization and operatios. ETA has long survived by demanding
payment of a “revolutionary tax” by Basques, which reduced after the Basque Country achieved
autonomy post-Franco but is still paid by a significant number of people. Like the IRA it has also
benefited from contributions from a diaspora. FARC, the Shan State Armies, Hezbollah, Tamil
Tigers and Shining Path all control rural areas. The first three have come to an arrangement with
drug growers and traffickers, which provides them with access to quite large sums of money.
There is no evidence that the Tamil Tigers have any such arrangement, and it is only recently that
Shining Path appears to have joined the others in a relationship with coca cultivators.
ETA the over-30 point…people get more expensive over 30…might have children, relationship,
things to lose. Not just that they become less prepared to take risks; also more expensive???
Don’t do this by group do it by political economy variable or by fund-raising activity
And then say this is a different way to the typologies and gives us new insights summarizing what
you ve said
Or where they fit into the economy of a country.
Detail looks different in this view,,,details that don’t seem to matter become important variables
rather than historical happenstance or something that cant be dealt with in exisiting analysis.
ETA, FLNC, and Tamil Tigers
ETA have always had a public face of being anti-drugs. They have shot several drug dealers in
the kneecaps, yet this has been portrayed as attacking those drug dealers who have not come to
an accommodation with them. Their main source of funding is the 10% Revolutionary Tax. Again
it is not clear how many individuals and companies continue to pay this because the autonomy
given to the Basque region by the post Franco governments has been sufficiently extensive for
Herri Batasuna to fall to about 11% of the vote in general elections. The Aznar government in
fact has banned HB and seized its assets in the name of confiscating terrorist financing. There is
even talk of ETA making another attempt at a ceasefire if it can negotiate with the new socialist
government. ETA is another Diaspora funded organisation. The role of Basques abroad appears
35
to be more important in financing it than the role of Irish abroad in the case of the IRA. ETA,
however, has consulted closely with the IRA in the past and may well have adopted some of the
other funding mechanisms of this group. It is most infamous, however, for the funding it allegedly
receives from kidnaps in South America. Until recently militants were sent to South America when
they reached the age of 30. The organisation did not see them as being reliable after that age.
This is obviously a mechanism also that would mitigate against the likelihood of the Spain based
organisation becoming an organised crime group.
It is a self renewing organisation that is
constantly weeding out dead wood that might graduate to the fundraising side of the organisation
on a permanent basis and thus become vulnerable to the chain turning into organised criminals.
FLNC on the other hand has a long tradition of involvement in smuggling activities and most of
the writing on it finds it difficult to distinguish between it as a “liberation movement” fighting for an
independent Corsica and a smuggling group.
The Tamil Tigers are frequently accused by the Sri Lankan Government of involvement with
organised crime but appear to fund themselves from Tamils in Sri Lanka and Tamils in Tamil
Nadu which is a state of India.
FARC, the Shan State Armies and “Narco-Terrorism”
Columbian groups FARC, the ELN and the AUC are frequently accused of involvement in drug
trafficking. AUC certainly is an arm of the drug growers and traffickers. It no longer appears to
be involved in combat with the FARC which appears to have come to some form of
accommodation with the drug barons. ELN, however, is in combat with them and the assumption
has to be that it has failed to achieve an accommodation. The groups of Columbia are the origin
of the term “narco-terrorists” and Shining Path of Peru has also been accused in involvement with
the same sort of operation. It has to be said that drugs are certainly grown in the area controlled
by the paramilitaries and thus the operation is at least tolerated if not organised by them.
FARC is estimated to receive $200-400 million annually from the drug trade. This represents 50%
of its income. It also raises money from kidnappings and levies a tax on the inhabitants of the
rural area it controls .88 Colombia also has the ELN, a similarly left-wing group which raises
http://www.cfrterrorism.org/groups/farc.html Council of Foreign Relations Website “Questions
and Answers on Terrorism
88
36
money through kidnappings, and the AUC which is several paramilitary groups that work directly
with the drug barons and are certainly anti-left wing, if not right wing in ideology.
Should the following go with other al Q IRA stuff?
As with the IRA, there have been continuous whispers of al Qaeda association with drug
trafficking, mostly opium from Afghanistan. Al Qaeda militants are alleged to have acted as
smugglers or smugglers escorts. It is not yet known as to how high a degree opium has been
used as a funding source, but there was no ideological problem with the Canadian and North
American cell resorting to petty crime such as credit card fraud to fund itself during 2000. Al
Qaeda morality seems to be extremely flexible when it comes to Western-regarding behaviour.
The Burmese groups show what happens when liberation movements become simultaneous with
drug growers and traffickers. The various Shan State armies, who also now appear to be on
ceasefire with the Burmese or Myanmar government until recently were still attacked by the
government troops on a regular basis but since 2000 have one by one signed ceasefires and
effectively become tolerated as de facto rulers of an autonomous area. This area is the most
important opium growing area in the world, despite the propaganda against Afghanistan. The
DEA say that 2000 tons a year of heroin comes out of this area of Burma as opposed to 70 tons
from Afghanistan. At least one of the Shan army leaders is considered to be no better than a
drug baron.
It is difficult to assess whether the leaders of the Shan State armies are now
politicians who have successfully fought for autonomy or drug barons who have successfully
fought to be left unmolested by the government to grow their drugs in peace.
Such evidence as there is seems to suggest that the transfer and conversion of a guerrilla group
into an organised crime group is more likely to occur where the illegal product is actually
produced in the areas controlled by the group as opposed to those areas where the product or
services provided by organised crime are merely sold.
The other area that would pay research is that of the Kosovars and the Albanians who are
certainly involved in human trafficking for sexual purposes. These are organisations who are
controlling both ends of criminal conspiracy, both the “recruitment” of potential providers of sexual
services and the organisation of brothels and massage parlours in the rest of Europe.
Prostitution is not a trade that paramilitaries have been regularly involved in. The situation in
Kosovo and Albania again has not been well researched but it may be that those leading the
resistance turned early to criminal elements in order to be able to obtain weapons. The result of
so doing may have been to give criminal elements a very high profile in the subsequent
37
organisation of the insurgency and resistance. The paramilitaries concerned may have been
easy prey for organised crime because of their relatively short period of existence and lack of an
ideology other than that of simple nationalism.
Conclusion
What are the shared features of the environment which mean they finish up doing the same kind
of thing? To be dealt with in the conclusion
So what factors affect what? What have I demonstrated?
Presumably am arguing that focusing on political economy and financial
issues allows for different insights into the nature of the phenomenon
paramilitarism Began by arguing that we need to look at terrorism as a
business in the same way that Gambetta looks at organized crime as a
business. Why? What are the advantages? My answer would be …because
it is! More of a parabusiness than a paramilitary if it survives for any
significant period of time.
But in detail, what else?
If organized crime a business, what insights can we borrow from study of it
to apply to terrorism/paramilitarism?
Does fiancing affect structure of vice versa?
Does wider political economy affect funding and recruitment? The mixtyre
of and availability of other contacts eg with org crim, crossborder crim,
transnat crim other than terrorists/ other params? Even legal businesses
and civ soc.
Other ideologies
Life cycle
Geographical and territorial spread?
38
Surely what I am saying is that the original political aims become confused
with the consequences of the acquisition of an economic role: selling
violence in the illicit economy. More time and effort starts to go into this
activity and the reason they continue to exist is not because of political
injustice as the presence of a weak state in certain areas both territorial
and functional.
The relationship between paramilitaries and organised crime is a little more complex than the
image presented in the newspapers. The allegation that paramilitaries are synonymous with
organised crime is not proven. Paramilitaries dispose of violence which they can sell as a service
to organised criminal groups. Their activities can resemble those of organised crime groups in
that it is difficult to distinguish between a “revolutionary tax” and simple extortion. Increasingly
they have turned to organised criminal groups to transport weaponry for them and perhaps to
obtain that weaponry too. Where it has been necessary to move money there is evidence that
they have availed themselves of the services of professional money launderers. 89 There is also
evidence that they have included illicit businesses in their revolutionary tax as well as licit ones.
The example of the Mafia and the Triads demonstrates that over a lengthy period of time groups
that existed primarily for a political purpose can slowly become taken over by their fund-raising
activities.
The examples of Albania and Kosovo seem to demonstrate that very short-lived
groups that are “successful” can also be hijacked in the same way. The Shan State Armies also
demonstrate that organisations operating in drug producing areas can become synonymous with
drug cartels. Mamyanmar is, however, a primary product producing area and not comparable to
most other states. The situation in Columbia where the majority of the economy is urbanized and
the insurgent paramilitaries have effectively become trapped in the agricultural sector suggests
that they will find it difficult to make a political breakthrough and have eventually to choose
between ceasefire and entering politics as a minority party or becoming similar to the Shan State
Armies and turning into drug cartels.
More interesting questions for study and research are those that involve more modern
economies. Where paramilitaries succeed in surviving in a very complex service-based economy
their methods of funding are likely to become more complex and it is easy for them to portray
fraud, the selling of counterfeit products and other illicit services as part of a campaign of
economic warfare.
89
39
The IRA has deliberately engaged in what it calls “economic warfare” since the early 1970s. It
may be that its “profits” have been used to regenerate places like Derry and West Belfast and that
“one man’s construction fraud is another man’s job creation scheme. The relationship between
business activities and organization is not a unidirectional one. The need to raise money can also
produce opportunities to provide services where the state is failing. Contract reinforcement is not
the only role played by the modern state. Security involves income [?is that the word I meant to
use?] now as well as freedom from violence. The picture is more complex than that of Nineteenth
Century Italy.
Did the IRA and ETA get involved in job-creation schemes, given that they operated in highunemployment area? Is there an element of that in the phenom? Or is it classic Merton: the
emergence of criminal careers alongside anomie?
The following has been “disproved” by 9/11 report.
Al Qaeda/ bin Laden has also made a virtue of economic necessity. For individual operations,
companies have been set up to provide operational cover as well as income. Because the capital
available has been greater, possibly more than any paramilitary group has ever had at its
disposal, the businesses created have been more imaginative and wider-ranging in their
technology and global scope. If the rumour of stock market movements ahead of 9/11 is true,
then it may be possible to organize future operations, or even to threaten future operations, such
as to make money out of the consequent movement in stock market prices. Just like the IRA,
though, al Qaeda remains more than a business. Both are political organizations who require
money but have managed to keep fund-raising subordinate to their political goals.
The form of organisation adopted by both organised crime and terrorism is also dictated by the
nature of police response, as suggested above in the UN typology of organized crime. The
interest in cellular structure and network arrangements is partly to make prosecution on the basis
of "shared purpose" difficult to prove. The nature of business will affect the organisational
structures of organised crime as a whole, but only the fund-raising structures of terrorist-related
movements. The structure of the coercive apparatus will be governed by the relationship between
the number required to deliver a violent event and the requirements of internal security. The
specialised nature of a paramilitary arm of a political movement may make it attractive for
organised crime to employ such a group for the purpose of contract enforcement on an
occasional basis. There is no evidence of this as yet, although there have occasionally been
allegations that individuals have been used to provide armed escort for consignments. As well as
40
violence, the IRA has available for hire a relatively large network of disciplined individuals who
can launder small sums through a multitude of bank accounts without triggering the existing alert
systems, which are oriented to noticing the movement of relatively large sums.
The greater the devotion of manpower resources to fund-raising activities, the greater the
likelihood, over time, that a political group will become an organised crime group in fact, though
not in name. Both the Mafia and the Triads started out with political aims, but have become
something quite different. The IRA is extremely unusual in maintaining its political priorities for
such a lengthy period of time. It is unclear how much of the money raised by illicit activities goes
to the organisation and how much stays with the individuals engaged in the activity. This
“franchising” of the name of the paramilitary is comparable to that noted in the UN study and
suggests that the “core group” model may be increasingly relevant.
Leftover bits and pieces that I’m still thinking about
Why do intelligence systems tend to exaggerate the income and involvement of paramilitaries?
Does it help them get leverage on intelligence organisation from other countries? I’ve
documented the Sunday Times with regard to the IRA. Why did the US first exaggerate bin
Laden’s wealth and why does it now play it down?
Don’t you need to think about the other variables; like the type of opponent and the activity of
security services. In this period, Bin Laden is frequently dealing with occupying army, such as
Russians, or Serbs and its only necessary to make things so unpleasant that the occupiers go
home [though he has managed to get US planes to do the job for him in places like Bosnia and
Kosovo]. But he also is obsessed with having an army rather than running a terrorist campaign on
a day to day basis. It is “spectaculars” he is looking for whereas ETA and IRA running day to day
campaign…which is more expensive to do? He is also until Somalia dealing with Communist
remnant regimes and therefore discreetly supported by the US. [In fact he could be said to be a
catspaw in that sense!]
Could bin Laden really have done the stuff he is supposed to have done on a budget of $30
million?
41