Terrorism in BritainTechnologically crude attacks rely on communications to generate a wider resonance

Published 7 June 2017

The terrorist attacks of 22 March, 22 May, and 3 June 2017 across the United Kingdom have showed very considerable variation in terms of their modality and choice of targets. They range from an attack on the iconic home of British democracy (22 March) toward an attempt to kindle a war on public relaxation, with massacres at a pop concert in Manchester (22 May) and on pubs and bars around London Bridge (3 June). Such atrocities are low-tech in execution, but they rely upon state-of-the-art communications to generate a wider resonance. There is an inverse relationship between means and effects here. Thus, a tactically crude attack can be launched in the full knowledge that a crowded street will be full of camera footage – dramatic images are guaranteed.

The terrorist attacks of 22 March, 22 May, and 3 June 2017 across the United Kingdom have showed very considerable variation in terms of their modality and choice of targets. They range from an attack on the iconic home of British democracy (22 March) toward an attempt to kindle a war on public relaxation, with massacres at a pop concert in Manchester (22 May) and on pubs and bars around London Bridge (3 June).

Only the Manchester bomb attack showed any technical prowess here: the other attacks look rather opportunistic and improvised using an emergent template of a vehicle assault followed by a knife rampage. Tim Wilson of the Handa Center for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at the University of St. Andrews offers helpful reflections on the recent wave of terrorist attacks. He notes that such atrocities are low-tech in execution, but they rely upon state-of-the-art communications to generate a wider resonance. There is an inverse relationship between means and effects here. Thus, a tactically crude attack can be launched in the full knowledge that a crowded street will be full of camera footage – dramatic images are guaranteed.

Yet, Wilson says, for all their variation, all three of these attacks fully shared one common feature: that all five of the attackers went out, apparently, with a firm death wish and absolutely no intention of coming back. Even though only the Manchester attacker, Salman Abedi, actually blew his own physical frame into fragments, it is hard to believe the other four attackers did not expect to be gunned down — as they all promptly were. Here Prime Minister Theresa May’s proposal of longer custodial sentences for those who flirt with joining such missions seem unlikely to have much deterrence effect. If anything, it may risk enhancing “rebel chic”: the perceived Islamist “glamour” that pulls in discontented youth and gives them a cause and their lives – or, indeed, carefully staged deaths – meaning.