Digital Commons Network^™

Making Decisions About Screening Cargo Containers For Nuclear Threats Using Decision Analysis And Optimization, Jamie Dauberman

Theses and Dissertations

One of the most pressing concerns in homeland security is the illegal passing of weapons-grade nuclear material through the borders of the United States. If terrorists can gather the materials needed to construct a nuclear bomb or radiological dispersion device (RDD, i.e., dirty bomb) while inside the United States, the consequences would be devastating. Preventing plutonium, highly enriched uranium (HEU), tritium gas or other materials that can be used to construct a nuclear weapon from illegally entering the United States is an area of vital concern. There are enormous economic consequences when our nation's port security system is compromised. Interdicting …

Social Structure And Culture: Applying Cross-National Indicators Of Criminal Violence To Domestic Terrorism, Travis Shane Irwin

Theses

Despite the increase in terrorism research post September 11, 2001, little is known about domestic terrorism though it occurs at overwhelmingly higher rates as compared to transnational terrorism. Although the use of criminological theory and methods to study terrorism has increased recently, there are relatively few terrorism studies within the criminological literature. Drawing upon extant criminological theories of violence among countries, this study uses the recently created Global Terrorism Database to examine the distribution and correlates of domestic terrorism among 72 developed nations between 1970 and 1997. This study examined the following questions. First, do prior established predictors of criminal …

East Meets West: Middle Eastern Muslims In The Southeastern United States, Jessica Lee Winslow

Masters Theses

Muslims of Middle Eastern and Turkish origin, whether longtime immigrants, recent refugees, or students living in America temporarily, are an important part of the changing ethnic and religious landscape in the Southeast U.S. In the aftermath of 9/11, much attention has been shifted upon Islam and the Middle East. Discrimination and a lack of mutual understanding and tolerance between the selected populations and native-born, non-Muslim Americans are persistent problems. The Knoxville Turkish Cultural Center and the Istanbul Center of Atlanta recognize and reflect the contemporary need for intercultural and interfaith awareness, education, and dialogue to promote tolerance. I argue that …

Computational Feasibility Of Increasing The Visibility Of Vertices In Covert Networks, Yaniv J. Ovadia

HMC Senior Theses

Disrupting terrorist and other covert networks requires identifying and capturing key leaders. Previous research by Martonosi et al. (2009) defines a load metric on vertices of a covert network representing the amount of communication in which a vertex is expected to participate. They suggest that the visibility of a target vertex can be increased by removing other, more accessible members of the network. This report evaluates the feasibility of efficiently calculating the optimal subset of vertices to remove. We begin by proving that the general problem of identifying the optimally load maximizing vertex set removal is NP-complete. We then consider …

The Nexus Between The Ballot And Bullet: Popular Support For The Pkk And Post-Election Violence In Turkey, Nadir Gergin

Theses and Dissertations

This study examines the relationship between popular support for the Kurdish Worker’s Party (PKK), which is an ethnic insurgent and terrorist organization mainly operating in Turkey, and its terrorist activities during the pre-and post-election periods in Turkey . Popular support has been measured through popular votes for the political party affiliated with the PKK in 1999 general, 2004 local and 2007 general elections. Two leading theories of social movements, Resource Mobilization Theory (RMT) and Relative Deprivation Theory (RD), were used as theoretical approach. The study uses secondary data and constructs a longitudinal design. An advanced statistical analysis technique, a generalized …

Method Of Measuring The Economic Impact Of A Radiological Dispersal Event Within An Urban Environment, Antoine N. Munfakh

Theses and Dissertations

A radiological dispersal event (RDE) is the result of a Radiological Dispersal Device (RDD) or a dirty bomb. An RDD is a low‐yield conventional bomb surrounded by radiological material (RM) such as Cesium‐137 or Cobalt‐60. Upon detonation, the blast of the conventional explosive is designed to spread the RM over a wide area. The RM will then be inhaled or ingested by people, or otherwise absorbed into the environment. An RDD is an affordable, feasible, and economically devastating option for terrorist groups. Possible RM could be stolen or acquired cheaply from the millions of radioactive sources used worldwide in industry, …

Understanding Terrorism: Religious & Political Dimensions, Christopher Cusano

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Terrorism in the twenty-first century has had one of greatest effects on the status quo of international relations, peace and war. It has become the 'specter' of our era and in many instances, it has been referred to as the predominant threat of modern civilization. Furthermore, it has the potential to drastically change the world we live in. For these reasons it has rightfully earned our attention and focus. Many efforts to understand terrorism have fallen short of recognizing the underlying causes. In many cases, acts of terror have either been of purely political motivation or have had socioeconomic conditions …

Terrorism Conflict: How The United States Responds To Al Qaeda Violence And Expressed Grievances, Richard Craig Rosthauser

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study analyzes how the United States responds to Al Qaeda's messages and expressions of grievances and how America's responses escalate the conflict between the United States and Al Qaeda.

After its first two attacks against America, Al Qaeda devised a strategy to draw America into a guerrilla war in Afghanistan, stating its intentions in its "Declaration of War" in 1996. Before this declaration, Al Qaeda worked from the shadows and denied reports it was either funding terrorism or participating in terrorism. Bin Laden continued his denials but took responsibility for some terrorist acts in his messages. President Clinton did …

Fostering Global Security: Nonviolent Resistance And Us Foreign Policy, Amentahru Wahlrab

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation comprehensively evaluates, for the first time, nonviolence and its relationship to International Relations (IR) theory and US foreign policy along the categories of principled, strategic, and regulative nonviolence. The current debate within nonviolence studies is between principled and strategic nonviolence as relevant categories for theorizing nonviolent resistance. Principled nonviolence, while retaining the primacy of ethics, is often not practical. Indeed, most nonviolent movements have not been principled, or solely principled. Strategic nonviolence is attractive because it does not require any individual or group to believe in a particular faith or ethical tradition. However, strategic nonviolence is problematic as …

A Content Analysis Of Elite U.S. Newspapers' Coverage Of Iran, 1979 And 2005, Melissa Kamal

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study is a quantitative content analysis of the New York Times and Washington Post coverage of Iran during the period surrounding the Ayatollah Khomeini's ascension to power in 1979 as well as the period surrounding Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's election in 2005. The results showed that coverage of Iran in the elite American print media as it related to terror was higher in the period after Khomeini came to power and also in the period after Ahmadinejad's election than it was in the period immediately preceding their respective ascensions. The results also showed that there was more coverage of Iran as …

A Disappearing Boundary?: The Changing Distinction Between Combatants And Civilians From The First World War To The Present Day, Aimee Kidder

Honors Theses

The issue of terrorism has stimulated intellectual debate regarding the rights and protections that should be afforded to civilians. However, the practice of targeting noncombatants in warfare extends far beyond terrorism and has roots deep in the historical past. This study looks at violence against civilians over a series of case studies from the First and Second World Wars as well as the French-Algerian War of the 1950s and 1960s. By looking at the changing legal distinctions between combatants and noncombatants, the study first establishes a trend in international law toward increasing protection of civilians. Yet, these legal advances are …

Postmodern Anarchism In Post-Millennial Hollywood: Cyber Revolutionaries And (In)Corporeal (Hyper)Realities, Jason Swiderski

Digitized Theses

An analysis of recent Hollywood blockbuster films reveals the frequent use of anarchism as a trope for negotiating the atmosphere of cultural, political and economic uncertainty that has come to characterise life in the twenty-first century. By applying a technologically-informed strand of anarchism Lewis Call characterizes as postmodern anarchism to these films, socio-cultural tensions and anxieties over the proliferation of digital technologies, fluctuating notions of masculinity and femininity and the threat of terrorism can be allegorically mapped and traced within their narratives. A close analysis of two films that bracket this period, Fight Club (Fincher, 1999) and The Dark Knight …