THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERRORISM: HOSTAGE-TAKING, HIJACKING, AND SEIZING
R. A. Schultz
The historical differences between hostage-taking and kidnapping have become significantly blurred in recent times. Kidnapping was once considered to be a covert action wherein the perpetrators may not be known for some time. News media attention would initially be intense but would decrease significantly over time. Hostage-taking would be an overt seizure of one or more individuals with the intent of gaining publicity or other concessions in return for release of the hostage(s). While dramatic, hostage and hostage barricade situations are risky for the perpetrator.
Hostage-taking and kidnapping became almost commonplace during the heyday of now-defunct terrorist groups such as Black September, the Italian Red Brigades, and the Bader-Meinhoff Gang. Their activities usually met with limited success, and a lot of dead people on both sides.
Terrorist groups intent on disrupting the pacification of Iraq have taken hostages from among the nationals of U.S. allies, threatening and performing beheadings if their usually impossible demands were not met. Those instances in which the terrorists have been successful in having their demands met have served only to encourage further outrageous acts, presenting painful “lessons learned” for those who would negotiate with them. Unfortunately, oftentimes the lessons learned are either quickly forgotten or are not put into ongoing practice.
As a general policy concerning dealing with Islamofascist thugs, Israel has adopted the attitude that once a hostage is taken, that person is considered already dead. This policy eliminates a good deal of the hand-wringing panicky indecision involved in hostage negotiations and the Israeli attitude has been a significant deterrent to continued kidnapping and hostage-taking by the jihadists by eliminating the effectiveness of their actions, but only so long as the hard line is adhered to.
Also worthy of note is Israel's record of hostage rescue by force, frequently with spectacularly successful results, witness the Entebbe Airport rescue of July 4, 1976 in which Israeli commandos rescued all but one of 248 hostages who had been held by members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine since their hijacking of an Air France passenger jet a week earlier.
Sometimes employed as a means of escape, hijacking has been used to produce spectacular hostage situations. Although trains, buses, and ships have been hijacked, aircraft are the preferred target because of their greater mobility and vulnerability. Hijacking of aircraft came to be known as “skyjacking,” thanks to the cleverness of an early Make-Believe Media “news” disseminator.
Prior to the attacks of September 11, 2001, the conventional wisdom was for passengers finding themselves the victims of hijacking/skyjacking to follow the instructions of their captors and to offer no resistance, in the hope of obtaining eventual release after the terrorist's demands had been met. The 9/11 attacks introduced on a grand scale the dynamic of the “martyr” or suicide terrorist, making it mandatory for the victims to offer meaningful resistance as the only means of their potential survival.
Similar to hostage-taking, seizure usually involves a building, vessel, or other object that has value in the eyes of the audience. It could, for example, involve the taking of the Eiffel Tower or the Statue of Liberty, coupled with the threat of destruction of the seized object unless demands are met. There is considerable risk to the terrorist because security forces have time to react and may opt to use force to resolve the incident especially if few or no innocent lives are involved. Property can always be replaced; lives cannot.
