Reviewed by Daniel Byman

Philip Bobbitt thinks big. His latest book, Terror and Consent, even gently criticizes Samuel Huntington's Clash of Civilizations and Francis Fukuyama's End of History as "not big enough." Bobbitt contends that the world is in transition from nation states to "market states" whose strategic reason for being "is the protection of civilians, not simply territory or national wealth or any particular dynasty, class, religion or ideology." This shift, he argues, has huge implications for counterterrorism, because future terrorists -- particularly if they possess nuclear or biological weapons -- may threaten the legitimacy of the market state. "Almost every widely held idea we currently entertain about twenty-first century terrorism and its relationship to the Wars against Terror," he says, "is wrong."

Bobbitt, a professor at Columbia University who previously wrote The Shield of Achilles, a monumental history of warfare, has held senior positions in several Democratic administrations. Despite his establishment pedigree, he is a thoroughgoing contrarian. Defying the nearly universal criticism among academics of the term "war on terror," Bobbitt embraces it, making a strong case -- better than the Bush administration has -- that the challenge can best be thought of as a series of wars.

His list of erroneous assumptions about terror goes on for two pages, beginning with the idea "that terrorism has always been with us, and though its weapons may change, it will remain fundamentally the same." In reality, he argues, al-Qaeda represents a new form of terrorism that seeks mass casualties, is highly decentralized and, like its market-state enemy, even uses outsourcing. Should Osama bin Laden be defeated tomorrow, Bobbitt says, the kind of terrorism he pioneered is here to stay.

In using the term "war" to describe its counterterrorist activities, the Bush administration has seemed at times to disdain legal constraints on the use of torture and electronic surveillance. But Bobbitt doesn't plead for a return to the status quo of the 1990s. Rather, he calls for public recognition of the need for new tools to fight terrorism and, at the same time, for ensuring their conformity to law. While readers may at first see this as another Democratic critique of Bush, in many ways it is just the opposite: an intelligent embrace of the Bush administration's strategic worldview but not its methods.

Yet some of Bobbitt's arguments fall flat. The very scope of the book detracts from its content, a stark contrast to Fukuyama and Huntington, who each presented one big thesis, tightly constructed and defended. In Terror and Consent, so many arguments are moving at any one time that it is easy to lose the logical thread through 600-plus pages. To liven things up, Bobbitt draws in examples from the Bible, ancient Greek city states, the French Resistance, the Habsburg-Valois wars and (perhaps it goes without saying) homosexual pirates. These historical parallels sometimes amuse and inform; too often they simply distract.

In his effort to show a world transformed, Bobbitt seems at times to contend that everything is new under the sun. He declares Israel's 2006 war in Lebanon to be "unique," despite many historical parallels, including past Israeli operations there. He claims that terrorism in the era of the market state is more theatrical than in the past. Yet one of the pioneering scholars of terrorism, Brian Jenkins, noted in 1975 that "terrorism is theatre." Who can forget the Black September organization's dramatic kidnapping of Israeli athletes during the Munich Olympics? History may not always repeat itself, but, as Mark Twain observed, it often rhymes.

Most interesting, and most arguable, is Bobbitt's assertion that "it hardly matters whether the forces of destruction arise from militant Islam, North Korean communism, or Caribbean hurricanes." He is correct, of course, that natural disasters, like catastrophic terrorist attacks, can kill thousands of people and undermine confidence in governments unless they respond effectively. But lumping together such disparate incidents risks making counterterrorism so broad a term as to be meaningless. Hurricanes are invariable natural disasters; terrorism varies in reaction to the response, and U.S. policy affects the incidence of attacks as well as their severity.

To his credit, Bobbitt offers many policy recommendations. One is for the United States to build an alliance of democracies ready to undertake humanitarian and strategic interventions -- essentially, NATO on steroids. He contends that this intervention doesn't always have to be military. But his book leans heavily on the "hard" side of power, and it isn't clear why his rationale for intervention in Rwanda and Darfur wouldn't apply equally to Afghanistan (pre-Taliban), Algeria, Angola, Congo, Nepal, Somalia, Tajikistan and Yemen, among other places. His doctrine does not tell us when not to intervene or when military action, rather than economic and diplomatic pressure, is necessary. These are the hardest questions.

Readers might also ask whether the Iraq misadventure should make us cautious about interventions elsewhere. Bobbitt dismisses the question, saying it is "too soon to conclude that the removal of Saddam Hussein . . . will prove to be a mistake." But that is not a satisfying argument, given that even if the United States succeeds in Iraq in years to come, the human and financial cost already has been staggering. His dismissal is disappointing in a book that is otherwise quite fair to counterarguments.

My advice is that readers should approach Terror and Consent with a mixture of caution and open-mindedness. Not all of Bobbitt's pronouncements may be convincing. But his book constantly prods us to reexamine our preconceptions about terrorism, which is by itself some preparation for what may lie ahead.

Copyright 2008, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

Review
"Brilliant . . . This is quite simply the most profound book to have been written on the subject of American foreign policy since the attacks of 9/11--indeed, since the end of the cold war . . . It should be read, marked and inwardly digested by all three of the remaining candidates to succeed George W. Bush as president of the United States."
--Niall Ferguson, The New York Times Book Review

"Philip Bobbitt is perhaps the outstanding political philosopher of our time. Terror and Consent is simply indispensable for our understanding, yet it is as readable as it is profound."
--Henry Kissinger

“Philip Bobbitt has long been one of the most thoughtful and wise commentators on the state of the modern world and the challenge that it faces. But in this book, he sets out with clarity and courage the first really comprehensive analysis of the struggle against terror and what we can do to win it. Above all, he understands that this war is new in every aspect of its nature — how it has come about, the profound threat that it poses, how it has to be fought and the revolution in traditional thinking necessary to achieve victory. It may be written by an academic but it is actually required reading for political leaders.”
--Tony Blair

"In this thrilling book, Philip Bobbitt bravely confronts the myths that confound our understanding of terrorism and provides a new way of understanding this phenomenon. He does us the favor of not only describing the traps we've fallen into, but also the ways of escape."
--Lawrence Wright, author of The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11
 
"In this original, provocative, and deeply researched book, a superb scholar addresses some of the most basic and vital issues of our time.  Philip Bobbitt's Terror and Consent deserves to be widely read, debated and absorbed." 
-- Michael Beschloss, author of Presidential Courage

“Philip Bobbitt has taken our understanding of terrorism -- and of how to defeat it -- to a deeper level.  This brave book confronts us with the knowledge that the worst is yet to come, and it points the way for America and its allies to counter the new breed of shadowy, ultra-violent adversaries.  More importantly, Terror and Consent wisely shows how governments can do this without sacrificing their legitimacy as guarantors of human rights. This is truly the book for our times.”
--Steven Simon, Senior Fellow, Council on Foreign Relations and co-author of Age of Sacred Terror 
 
“Terror and Consent is the most profound analysis of the wars against terror.  Bobbitt puts the threat in its proper historical and theoretical context, explains its relationship to globalization, international law and the domestic constitutional structure and offers tough-minded but humane prescriptions.  No one understands the challenge of the terror threat in all its dimensions as well as Philip Bobbitt.”
--Jack Goldsmith, Shattuck Professor of Law, Harvard Law School and author of The Terror Presidency 
 
"Magisterial . . . 'important' barely begins to characterize this book."
--Craig Seligman, Bloomberg News

"Bobbitt may well be a prophet . . . Terror and Consent is the product not only of immense erudition but also of broad practical experience."
--Ben Martin, The Advocate (Baton Rouge)

"[A] complex and provocative analysis of the West's ongoing struggle against terrorism. Terror and Consent merits wide circulation and serious consideration."
--Publishers Weekly

"A distinguished scholar proposes an entirely new way of understanding and combating modern terrorism. Bobbitt keeps his feet on the ground, boldly offering detailed real-world proposals to combat the problems he outlines."
--Kirkus

"Bobbitt aims for the big picture and succeeds . . . Not just another book about terrorism, this is a complete theory of constitutional evolution and a sophisticated set of far-reaching policy prescriptions."--Booklist


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