Pick Your Poison: Explaining Terrorist Selection of Chemical and Biological Agents

Terrorist interest in chemical and biological weapons (CBW) continues to pose a significant international threat, but understanding of how these groups select the specific CBW to pursue is lacking. The current literature provides little explanation of how these decisions are made inside the group. Key questions on who proposes, authorizes, and selects the CBW—and their reasons for doing so—remain unexamined. This dissertation seeks to answer these questions through comparative analysis of the CBW efforts in four major terrorist groups: the Rajneeshees, Aum Shinrikyo, al-Qa’ida, and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. Additional cases of CBW efforts in smaller terrorist groups including R.I.S.E. and the al-Abud Network and small nation-states including Rhodesia, South Africa, and Iraq are also examined. This research demonstrates that leaders may authorize CBW efforts, but the scientific and technical personnel make all of the important decisions including which CBW agents to pursue and how to pursue them. Insights gained from this analysis will increase opportunities to disrupt future terrorist CBW efforts by focusing on the key individuals and the most important decisions points related to the pursuit of CBW.

Author

• Quillen, Chris

• al-Qa'ida
• Aum Shinrikyo
• biological weapons
• chemical weapons
• Islamic State
• terrorism

Identifier

hdl:1920/15248

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:MARS:1920/15248