THE OBSERVER: Tsarnaev brothers fit the key indicators of potential threat: young, male, first-generation migrants with 'identity issues'
Security services have learned much about Islamic extremist violence in recent years. "Profiling" has been rejected as too blunt to be of much use, but it's clear that it almost exclusively involves men, aged 18 to 30, and often first generation immigrants with what are broadly and inadequately dubbed "identity issues". A key indicator of potential threat is also a close family member already involved in extremism. Those apparently responsible for the Boston bombings fit all these parameters: two brothers, aged 19 and 26, who spent much of their lives in the US but were clearly deeply attracted to the culture of their Chechen parents.
Beyond the "who?" is the "how?", and the counter-terrorist community have also learned to watch for signs such as a sudden increase in religious practice and unexplained trips overseas to south or central Asia. Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the older of the two, travelled last year to Russia and, it is thought, Dagestan, where he and his family once lived. He had also become more obviously devout, a family friend told the Boston Globe. A neighbour said he had abandoned sharp western clothes.
Terrorists are not loners either. Tamerlan was married and had a small child. Mohammad Sidique Khan, the leader of the 7/7 bombers, left a young daughter. Militancy is, after all, a social activity. Terrorists are not unhinged, studies have shown, nor necessarily badly integrated, though in this case Tamerlan appears to have had trouble making friends in the US. Most believe, however misguidedly, that their deeds will be hailed after their deaths. » | Jason Burke | Saturday, April 20, 2013
