Modern Jihad: Tracing the Dollars Behind the Terror Networks [Hardcover]

Loretta Napoleoni (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 295 pages
• Publisher: Pluto; First Printing edition (2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0745321178
• ISBN-13: 978-0745321172
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.4 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,290,063 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Loretta Napoleoni's first book, the bestselling Terror Inc: Tracing the Money Behind Global Terrorism, has been translated into twelve languages; her second, Insurgent Iraq was an early look at the growing insurgency led by al-Zarqawi (and came out just as American media and government were recognizing his power). Napoleoni holds an MA in international relations and economics from Johns Hopkins University, and a PhD in terrorism from the London School of Economics. For her work as a consultant for the commodities markets, she met often with officials of many Middle Eastern nations. Her latest book is Rogue Economics: Capitalism's New Reality (Seven Stories Press).

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Quite a different take on global terrorism, October 18, 2003

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Modern Jihad: Tracing the Dollars Behind the Terror Networks (Hardcover)

Loretta Napoleoni's Modern Jihad isn't just another discussion of Islam or 9/11: it is an informed and informative financial probe of the roots of terror networks, tracing the dollars behind them and how terrorism is funded. From the creation of illegal organizations and subverted international economic systems; to trafficing money to terrorist groups; to smuggling, Modern Jihad is quite a different take on global terrorism and is strongly recommended as a mainstay addition to any serious collection on contemporary terrorism.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Reviewed Before Finished, September 30, 2003

By 

James Igoe (NY, NY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Modern Jihad: Tracing the Dollars Behind the Terror Networks (Hardcover)

I heard the author lecture at a bookstore in lower Manhattan, and although I initially hesitated buying her book - the beginning of her lecture began too "soft" - I later broached harder economic questions, which she deftly answered. Impressed, or at least positively engaged, I bought the book. I'm finding it well written and well researched, and I'm surprised that it weaves together much common, but fragmented, knowledge into a cohesive review of terrorist financing, without the partiality common to politically/ideologically oriented analyses.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Hasty journalism but overwhelming evidence, February 4, 2004

By 

J. Hess "disentropic" (Irvine, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Modern Jihad: Tracing the Dollars Behind the Terror Networks (Hardcover)

I'm given Loretta Napoleoni's book on the finance of terror, "Modern Jihad", the once-over. It is sloppy in execution. She cites 100s of newspaper articles, with no effort to assess their accuracy or reliability. She also uses some academic papers and books, again uncritically. Her account has a breathless tonality - the activities of terrorists are reported with insufficient attention to balancing forces. In one example, she tells us that in one year, commercial ventures tied to efforts to expand Islamic influence expanded trade in Indonesia from $600k to $1.24M - surely small potatos. But the extent of the reports is sufficient to overcome uncertainty on the details as to her key point, the extent of terrorism and how closely it is tied to the international economy. Appropo to the point of the Times story, terrorists use the instruments and opportunities of international finance that where pioneered by states and corporations. The broad story she tells is that terrorism was often initiated by states as part of counter-insurgency plans; she begins with French and US activities in Vietnam, skims through Central America, Columbia, and Afgahnistan. The techniques developed and disseminated by these were appropriated and "privatized", and eventually developed and linked in a "new economy of terror." This includes investments in normal business enterprises as well as money-laundering and trafficking in drugs and arms. In some regions, the terrorist groups have established "state shells" which imitate some aspects of states in their monopoly on violence and control of the economy, often including the provision of social services to the population. Like fuedal lords, those controlling state shells can appropriate resources from the local economy (where they don't kill it) and collect taxes or impose duties on trade. There is sometimes collusion between these state shells and legitimate states.

Napoleoni leaves me with the impression that there are three possible courses of action:

1) Coordinated international action to force much stricter controls on flows of money, people, arms, and drugs, including anti-smuggling efforts in Central Asia and many other regions, and success in bringing state-shells back under the control of legitimate governments;

2) A surge of international justice, openess, and transparency, including redistribution of profits, alleviation of poverty, increased education, and reform of repressive governments, thus removing the conditions that foster terrorism;

3) Terrorism is going to be with us for the long hall as patchwork efforts in controlling it occasionally succeed and often fail.

The Bush administration believes strongly in policing, option 1, and gives limited recognition but little support to option 2. We're not powerful enough to police the world by ourselves, and the more we try the more the incentives for other nations to obstruct us in more or less covert ways. The outcome can only be 3.