Search

This thesis is a critical examination of U.S. foreign intervention from 1948 to 2008. Using a comparative/historical analysis of seven cases – Iran, Guatemala, Indonesia, Chile, Nicaragua, Panama, and Iraq – this study finds patterns of U.S. state/state-sponsored terror and intervention. Using world-system theory and G. William Domhoff’s class-domination theory of power, this study explains how and why the U.S. government, the U.S. military, the CIA, and U.S. corporations participate in economically motivated terrorist acts to support the capitalist mode of production, U.S. investments, and access to markets and natural resources. Finally, this study reveals patterns (in addition to the use of terror) that the U.S. government follows while intervening in the affairs of foreign nations.

This study assumes that political terrorism results from conscious decision-making by groups opposing a governing system, policy or process. The kinds of terrorist activity employed depend upon such factors as the philosophy, goals, objectives, and needs of the terrorist group. This presents a comparative analysis of three types of terrorists in southwest Asia: Palestinians, Marxist-Leninists, and Muslims. The first section summarizes and compares the three groups' motivational causes, philosophies, histories and sources of inspiration. The second section compares their behavior from four perspectives: trends and patterns, level of violence, tactical preferences, and lethality. The third section identifies and categorizes socioeconomic, political and military variables associated with tactic selection and acts of terrorism.