How Terrorist Groups End

The Rand Corporation has released an interesting new book, How Terrorist Groups End.  The research centers around the ineffectiveness of current U.S. strategy against al Qaida, while providing recommendations for the future.  As with all Rand publications, the book can be purchased from their website or for those who prefer electronic texts, can be dowloaded in .PDF format. 

An Economist review of the research described it this way:

“Many studies have asked how  terrorist groups are born; relatively few have described how such groups are best put out of business. A recent effort to do the latter, by RAND Corporation, an American think-tank, is therefore welcome. It considers the fate of some 650 groups (defined widely), between 1968 and 2006, asking in particular what put an end to them. In the process it casts some useful light on a hoary old question of counterterrorism: whether military force or smart policing is the more effective method for tackling terrorists and insurgents… The recommendations of the report are not just of interest to anti-terrorist organisations; their opponents may be worried that the insights can help to bring about their own demise. Possibly to guard against this possibility one jihadist apparently translated much of the RAND report and posted a copy online within only a few days of its original publication.”