Maritime Terrorism History, typology and contemporary threats
Maritime Security is a quite complex goal to achieve, due to the variety of threats and challenges it entails. At the high end of the spectrum of these challenges we can find the ‘traditional’ interstate disputes, mainly focused on the threat or the actual use of force against sovereign entities. The aforementioned threat of use of force is mostly linked to the external aggression due to maritime disputes, threats to States’ sovereign rights or generalized armed conflicts, with the case of South China Sea being the most indicative contemporary example. The low end of the spectrum has to do more with law enforcement and transnational, cross-border maritime crimes and it involves mostly non-state rather than state actors. According to the UN1 definition, these threats include illegal fishing, deliberate damage to the environment, trafficking related crimes by sea, piracy and armed robbery at sea, and finally maritime terrorism.
In this framework, this article will focus on maritime terrorism, aiming to provide a developed typology of the phenomenon and conclude with some useful recommendations from the authors’ perspective.
The European Commission Joint Communication to the European parliament and the Council entitled “For an Open and Secure Global Maritime Domain: Elements for a European Union Maritime Security Strategy”, defines maritime terrorism as “any violent act with political ends against ships, cargo and passengers, ports and port facilities and critical maritime infrastructure”.2 The Asia Pacific (CSCAP) Working Group has offered a broader definition of maritime terrorism, which considers “…the undertaking of terrorist acts and activities within the maritime environment, using or against vessels or fixed platforms at sea or in port, or against any one of their passengers or personnel, against coastal facilities or settlements, including tourist resorts, port areas and port towns or cities.”3
These definitions are by no means exclusive, they do not cover all possible scenarios and as such they are neither globally accepted nor a panacea. Yet, they form the basis to further discuss and debate the nature, typology and implications of the phenomenon, in order to better understand and address it respectively.
Terrorist tactics are unconventional and unpredictable by nature and highly dependent on innovation and surprise. Although the total number of maritime terrorism incidents recorder worldwide is very small, the international community considers the risk very high and the probability of more maritime terrorist attacks to occur as quite likely.
The ‘SAGE Encyclopedia of Political Behavior’4 identifies four different forms of maritime terrorism, based on the criteria of utilisation of the maritime space and the selection of targets, while also examining its recent history and referring to some characteristic incidents.
The first type refers to the utilisation of the maritime space as the medium through which terrorist attacks could be possibly launched against land based targets. An indicative example of such an incident and of a major attack inland in particular, is the Mumbai bombings that took place on November 26, 2008. Ten terrorists in inflatable speedboats disembarked in the port and carried out a series of twelve coordinated attacks.
The second type could include the use of ships to support capacity building for terrorist groups. For instance on January 3, 2002 the vessel Karine A was seized in the Red Sea, transporting armament for strikes against Israel.
The third type includes the hijacking of seagoing vessels and hostage taking of the passengers by terrorists in order to negotiate and achieve their political goals. Several maritime terrorism incidents of this type have occurred and the infamous hijacking of Achille Lauro in the Mediterranean is perhaps the most well-known. The incident occurred on October 7, 1985, when the Palestinian Liberation Front seized the Italian flagged cruiser Achille Lauro, off the Egyptian coast and held 511 passengers as hostages, demanding the release of Palestinian fighters from Israeli jails. A wheelchair-bound Jewish-American passenger was killed and then pushed overboard during the incident. In a similar incident, Palestinian terrorists, belonging to Abu Nidal Organization, launched an attack against the Greek flagged cruiser City of Poros, on July 11, 1985. The ship was hijacked off the Aegina Island and nine tourists were killed, while another 98 were injured.
The fourth and perhaps most obvious type, involves terrorist attacks against seagoing targets of high value, whose destruction could signify an effort to challenge and traumatise great powers’ prestige and dominance and through it the western perception of life. The two more significant incidents of this type of maritime terrorism took place off Yemen in 2000 and 2002 respectively. More precisely on October 12, 2000, the US guided missile destroyer USS Cole was struck by an anchor handling skiff loaded with explosives in a suicide attack in the port of Aden. The casualties were 17 dead and 39 wounded, but beyond the significant death toll, it was the first time ever that a symbol of US military power suffered such an unprecedented blow at sea by a terrorist group. Furthermore, on October 6, 2002, again off Yemen, the French oil tanker M/V Limburg was attacked off Ash Shahir. This was another symbolic attack, against the Western exploitation of natural resources and dominance through economic prevalence. Despite that only one crew member was killed, there was an enormous ecological catastrophe with almost 100,000 tons of crude oil spilled into the Gulf of Aden. Al Qaeda took responsibility for both the aforementioned attacks.
Another noteworthy maritime terrorism attack took place in Manila Bay off Corregidor Island on February 27, 2004 and the perpetrator was Abu Sayaf Group; it was the bombing of Super Ferry 14, which killed 116 people, making it probably the maritime terrorist act with the highest number of casualties ever. In the last five years, there has been one significant terrorist incident against a vessel; on July 27, 2010, the Oil Tanker M/V M Star was attacked in a similar way to USS Cole, when a speedboat driven by a suicide bomber crushed on it at the Strait of Hormuz, resulting in injuring one crew member. An Al-Qaeda affiliated group, Abdallah Azzam Brigades, took responsibility for the incident.
The above typology has been developed based on incidents and attacks which have occurred but following the 9/11 terrorist attack against the US, several scenarios that could have devastating implications have been considered. These scenarios include for example the use of a merchant vessel beyond suspicion to transport a weapon of mass destruction (WMD) in a major port, or the deliberate sinking of a similar vessel to close a major choke point and disrupt major sea lanes of seaborne trade and maritime transportation or the boarding and seizure of a superyacht or a cruiser full of passengers in order to negotiate a political goal. Scenarios of this kind urged the international community to act proactively and develop conventions such as the SUA convention (Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the Safety of Maritime Navigation) and the ISPS code (International Ship and Port Facility Security Code as an amendment to the Safety of the Life at Sea (SOLAS) Convention), in order to enhance port security and implement robust maritime security governance. Yet, the successful implementation of these conventions requires international cooperation and compliance at global level; their adoption has definitely been a significant step forward, but their efficiency and sufficiency remains to be seen.
Nowadays, some of the groups that in the past have demonstrated their maritime capabilities or intensions to use the maritime domain remain idle. In this category, we can find the Egyptian Al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya, which attacked cruisers in the Nile during the early 1990s, most Palestinian organisations, especially the Abu Nidal organization and the PLF responsible for the spectacular hijacking of city of Poros and Achille Lauro respectively, Free Aceh, which until its agreement with the Indonesian government back in 2005 had been especially “active” in the Strait of Malacca and of course the notorious Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), which will be later further analyzed. There are also smaller splinter groups from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in the Philippines and Jemaah Islamiah mainly in Indonesia which could have the know-how and capabilities to conduct maritime terrorist attacks.
The groups which are still active and have proven their interest and capabilities in the maritime domain are Abu Sayyaf Group, Hamas, Hezbollah, Lashkar-e-Taiba and the affiliates of Al Qaeda. The Lebanese group Hezbollah has received training in seaborne operations from the Iranian military and is deemed very effective. Abu Sayaf is always dangerous, especially after the Super Ferry 14 incident; Hamas has been using for a while the maritime domain and of course Al Qaeda has been the perpetrator of most attacks in the recent years. Allegedly Al Qaeda owned 15 to 20 ships, which would have been used for attacks but since this was never realized, we cannot be sure about the truthfulness of the information. Nowadays, the continuation of the extreme Islamist battle against the West is not Al Qaeda (at least it is not the most dangerous group), but the Islamic State or Daesh. So far Daesh has refrained from using the maritime domain, but we cannot be certain about its future attacks.
We left LTTE as a special case study for the end of our analysis. The aforementioned group managed to operate a fleet comparable to a small state. It had Sea battle regiments, Underwater demolition teams, the notorious Sea Tiger strike groups, Marine engineering and boat-building unit, Radar and telecommunication unit, Marine weapons armory, logistics unit, reconnaissance team and intelligence section, even a Naval Academy/ Maritime school. The terrorist groups aspiring to create a state like Daesh are bound to seek for a navy, but this does not seem feasible in the near future.
What, when and where should we expect as future incidents? Taking into consideration the capacity building of Daesh, this hybrid, which is quasi-state and army and quasi- terrorist group, a maritime terrorism incident in the broader Middle East and especially in the Mediterranean Sea should be expected in the near future. The group has potential to launch maritime terrorism attacks, it is financially very strong due to extortions, illegal oil trade and illegal trafficking of cultural property and has a strong presence in the Libyan coasts and neighbouring countries. The EU operation EUNAVFORMED-SOPHIA and the scheduled Operation in Libya (LIAM) when and if it takes place are bound to cause a reaction from the group, most likely in the maritime domain. As a parenthesis, we need to highlight that many European citizens became jihadists in Syria and other “local” wars under the Daesh banner and may play a crucial role as regards maritime terrorism, especially nowadays that Daesh loses ground and is in need of spectacular attacks to remain relevant. There are other factors that indicate the Mediterranean Sea as the future area of a maritime terrorist attack. The failure of the “Arab Spring” and especially the crackdown of the moderate Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt have also helped in the radicalization of youth with expertise in the maritime domain. The Med lies off Africa, Asia and Europe and thus to both the perceived terrorist and the perceived target. Actually, 60% of terrorist groups & half of all which have been involved in the past in maritime terrorism are extremely active in Med countries. The presence of vital Straits (Gibraltar, the Dardanelles and Suez Canal) makes it all the most possible to witness a maritime terrorist incident in the Med.
We expect the region of a potential terrorist incident (Med and probably close to Libya), we know the most possible perpetrators (Daesh, or one of the Al Qaeda franchise in the region), we need to try to understand how and estimate when we are going to face such an incident. Both Al Qaeda and Daesh adore drama. They would probably want to achieve a spectacular attack, being faithful to the principle highlighted many years ago by the foremost expert in terrorism, Brian Jenkins: “Terrorists want a lot of people watching, not a lot of people dead”. Actually Daesh prefers to record and upload a spectacular death, like burning someone alive, than thousands of deaths. The hijacking of a ship is hard to achieve but not impossible. A suicide attack against a target in the maritime domain is probably the type of attack which is both impressive and relatively easy. It can also be achieved by a well-organized and centrally guided group like Daesh, but also from some “lone wolves”.
As a parenthesis, we need to highlight that the absolute fragmentation of the Al Qaeda branches or associated organizations has led to a new kind of terrorism: the “armies of one” or “lone wolves”. Isolated radicals may decide to sacrifice themselves for their “cause”, without any instructions from any group and without any extensive training. Mohammed Merah assassinated seven people in Toulouse and Montauban, Michael Adebowale hacked to death a British soldier and two Chechen immigrants were responsible for the Boston Marathon bombing with three people killed and more than 250 wounded while the Nice Promenade des Anglais attack by a lorry was carried out by Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel leaving behind 87 dead and more than 400 injured. Of course, “lone wolves” are neither new nor solely Islamic in nature. Nonetheless, for the first time in history this trend seems to becoming the official strategy, as explicitly and continuously mentioned in Al Qaeda’s newspaper, “Inspire”.5 As regards the time of the possible maritime terrorist incident, we think that Daesh under tremendous pressure in Syria and Iraq will try to achieve such an attack as soon as possible, probably within a year; so the threat is imminent. There is no evidence to support this claim of course, other than hindsight.
As a conclusion, we think it is proper to provide some recommendations for countering the threat of maritime terrorism. Intelligence is the most important factor. Hence, we should have an information sharing mentality, a “responsibility to share”, instead of a “need to know” traditional approach, which unfortunately was reinforced by Wikileaks. The next recommendation is that the key players in the maritime domain - if they want to avoid catastrophic consequences - should understand the urgency and the need to cooperate closely in order to improve capabilities instead of just ignoring a grave threat. Last but not least, addressing the root causes of the phenomenon is always the best solution. We need to understand why someone commits suicide or fights with fanaticism, we need to see the mentality and address the grievances, or at least the ones that are logical, of the perpetrators.