The Meaning of Terror

　　Ordinary citizens are in a somber mood,government officials look for answers and the businesscommunity counts its losses. The dark clouds of terrorismstill hang over Kenya following the black Saturdayof September 21, 2013.

　　A week after the Westgate Mall terror attack inNairobi, the stench emanating from the rubble ofwhat used to be one of Kenya’s high-end shoppingcenters and the twisted fragments of burnt-out vehiclesnearby was a gloomy reminder of that horrificday. There was no mistaking that the country had receiveda heavy blow to its underbelly from al-Shabaab,the Somali militant group.

　　“The Westgate terror attack has forever left an indeliblestain, not just in the hearts of victims and family,but also in the presumably clean fabric of security intelligentsia,”Javas Bigambo, a governance consultant withInterthoughts Consulting in Nairobi and a commentatoron African affairs told ChinAfrica.

　　With at least 62 people dead, and the business communityreporting that they lost more than Sh45 million(about $530,000), this attack was second in severityonly to the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombing in Nairobi, inwhich the global terror group al-Qaeda claimed responsibilityfor the deaths of more than 200 people.

　　Far-reaching effects

　　But besides the casualties and economic impact,experts in behavioral analysis and international securityoperations agree that this unprecedented attack onKenyan soil would have far-reaching effects on thecontinent, and even the world at large.

　　“The Westgate attack points to a dramatic comebackof al-Shabaab as a home grown jihad movement,”Peter Kagwanja, CEO of the Africa Policy Institute, aninfluential think-tank, wrote in the Sunday Nation, aweek after the incident.

　　“Globally, the attack has shocked theconscience of the world, propellingcounter-terrorism back as a central tenet,”he wrote. His argument was that althoughthe Somali terror group had lost theirstronghold in Southern Somalia, it would beimprudent to celebrate victory.

　　This is because terror groups are amorphousand fast-changing, which means thatalthough the groups identify their targets, thetargets are often unknowing, able to respondto an attack only after it has occurred, or, once theenemy is defined, on the battlefield.

　　“Terrorists are merely fixated on the unquestionablefact that the world has refused to submit to their eviland petrifying maneuvers,” Bigambo said.

　　Root causes

　　But how did this attack come about?

　　In September 2012, the African Mission in Somalia(Amisom) Forces captured the Somali port city of Kismayu,which had been a key source of al-Shabaab’s revenuefrom the sale of charcoal, illegal taxes and fishing.This was about 45 percent of its revenue stream,according to a UN Monitoring Report on Somalia andEritrea released in July 2013.

　　But the militants had by then become affiliated toal-Qaeda and changed their tactics of recruitment andoperation. Between October 2011 and September2013, there were 24 terrorist attacks in East Africa, 17 ofwhich were in Kenya.

　　The Westgate Mall in Nairobi is owned by Israelisand some observers say this could be adeliberate way of al-Shabaab reaching outto other global merchants of terror.

　　“There is an attempt by al-Shabaabto tell the world, ‘look, we are down [afterlosing Kismayu] but not yet out.’ There isa global appeal in their propaganda,” saidMaurice Amutabi, a Kenyan scholar specializingon African history and culture.

　　By luring foreign terror-prospects withthe promise of money, a better life,and the chance to take part in a globaljihadist movement, the terrorists haveidentified a cheaper means of marketingtheir evil, much to the misfortune of theindividuals persuaded to join the effort and all who areaffected by it.

　　Psychological effects

　　“There were physical injuries and deaths, but the terroristsalso intended to dent our psychological resolveto fight terrorism,” said Dr. Gladys Mwiti, the Chair ofKenya’s Psychology Association.

　　Mwiti, who was part of the counseling teams in theaftermath of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide, September11 attacks in the United States, the 1998 U.S. Embassybombings in Nairobi, and the 2008 Mumbai attacks, saidterror attacks often have the potential of morphing froma personal issue, into a cultural, even societal issue.

　　“In a situation where people are very free andsociable, this attack can begin to curtail their freedom.People might start asking themselves if it’s worth goingto big shopping malls,” she said.

　　In the case of Mumbai and the United States, theattacks led to observable friction between Muslims andmembers of other religions.

　　“We know that terrorism is not a synonym of Islam,but people affected by this terror would associate thetwo. We should be very careful not to throw away thiscoexistence because that is exactly what terroristswant,” she said.

　　“The experience we have is that many people havebeen affected by this attack. A lot of it is that people areangry with the whole attack. It is not just the frustration,but there is a lot of sadness. The effect is that peoplemay be scared of getting together and ofbeing happy, but we must not give in tothat,” she added.

　　But this threat also has something to dowith the mindset of terrorists themselves.

　　In an article appearing in the Journal ofConflict Resolution (Vol. 49), Jeff Victoroff,a psychiatrist at the University of SouthernCalifornia, observed that the mindset ofterrorists seems to benefit from growth inglobal commerce and improvements ininformation technology, which “facilitatescooperative aggression by far-flung but likeminded-conspirators,” as well as by the risein religious fundamentalism.

　　When people can reach weapons withease, he wrote, there is the potential for“macro-terrorist acts,” which could bemasterminded by small groups or evendisgruntled individuals, who, according toVictoroff, aim to “influence the target audienceand change that audience’s behaviorin a way that will serve the interests of theterrorist.”

　　As with the Westgate attack, terroristsoften target non-combatants who do notexpect to be attacked.

　　Global problem

　　Al-Shabaab used twitter to post updates of their attack,thereby drawing benefit from the growth in Internetaccessibility in Africa.

　　Holding hostages was a new tactic by al-Shabaaband psychologists say that apart from benefiting frommedia coverage of their tweets, the attack also servedto provide satisfaction of revenge and humiliation of theenemy.

　　According to the Global Terrorism Index, there were3,582 global attacks between 2002 and August thisyear. This figure could be worrisome, considering that itcorresponds to the period when the “War on Terror” waslaunched.

　　Al-Shabaab’s boast that it would attack all countrieswith troops in Somalia, means Westgate was a warningto Uganda, Ethiopia, Burundi and all allies of troops fightingin Somalia.

　　“This [terrorist threat] is now an African, if not a globalproblem. This is going to be a menace in the region forsome time,” David Pulkol, a former director of Uganda’sintelligence gathering arm, External Security Organization(ESO), told ChinAfrica.

　　Pulkol, who led Uganda’s ESO in the early 2000s, saidthat security forces in the region must now “deliver thedeadliest injury on the might” of al-Shabaab, especiallysince most government decisions to enter Somalia andfight terrorists still enjoy legitimacy back home.