Why We Need More Terrorist Rehab
Daniel Freedman writes at Forbes:
President Obama didn’t stop by Detachment 88 Headquarters during his recent visit to Indonesia, but if he had he would have gained valuable insights into strategies to defeat terrorists before they reach the battlefield.
Detachment 88 is Indonesian police’s counter-terrorism unit, and they’ve had both notable successes and failures in their efforts against the al Qaeda affiliated Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) group – all of which provide important counter-terrorism lessons for everyone else. I spent time in the unit’s offices during a trip to South-East Asia with a team from the Qatar International Academy for Security Studies (QIASS) tasked with analyzing terrorism risk reduction strategies.
Indonesia was the final leg of our tour across the world during which we met with law enforcement officials, intelligence agencies, and community groups involved in running disengagement programs, as well as former terrorists – to learn what worked on them. Our findings were unveiled at Interpol’s November General Assembly and the report was endorsed by the Interpol leadership.
On our travels we met with former terrorists from groups ranging from the IRA in Northern Ireland to JI in Indonesia. While their causes were different, one common theme in their advice was: Don’t underestimate how you can reform terrorists while they’re in jail and then utilize them against other group members.
“While I was operational I didn’t have time to think about what I was doing,” one former terrorist said. “I was too busy planning attacks and hiding from police. It was only when I was caught and had time to think did I begin to reflect on what I did.” He was a senior member of JI and had worked alongside al Qaeda members in Afghanistan, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, the mastermind of 9.11.
Governments don’t need to worry much about terrorists who have been given the death penalty or a life sentence. They’ll never be free. Of concern, however, are those terrorists who we only have enough evidence to hold for a fixed period of time, after which they’ll have to be released. The challenge is: How do we prevent them from rejoining their former groups once they’re free?
If the detainees haven’t been rehabilitated, in all likelihood they’ll return to terrorism. We’ve unfortunately seen how terrorists released from Guantanamo have gone on to launch new terrorist attacks. One time Guantanamo inmate Abdallah al-Ajmi, for example, drove a truck filled with explosives into an Iraqi army base on March 23, 2008, killing 13 Iraqi soldiers and wounding 42 others.
The same problem of prisoners returning to terrorism on their release also exists with other detention facilities and prisons around the world. And not only are terrorists coming out unreformed, they’ve often become even more extreme in prison – and in many instances they’ve also succeeded in radicalizing other prisoners. ...
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