Syria's civil war remains a bloody stalemate between government forces and various opposition groups. The conflict continues to impact neighboring states with spillover fighting and increased economic burdens from refugees. In light both of Syria's importance to regional stability and in recent lessons learned from a lack of post-conflict planning, it is important for academics and policy makers to consider potential stabilization policies for a post-conflict Syria. This book explores a scenario where a post-Assad Syria faces a transition from civil war toward peace with its current borders...

The trafficking in persons for sexual exploitation is a worldwide problem. The international community is engaged in addressing this problem. One of the major issues associated with sex trafficking is that its severity is ultimately unknown. While the majority of government and NGO research indicates sex trafficking victims number in the hundreds of thousands or millions, some academic researchers argue these statistics are inaccurate. In the United States, there are federal and state laws empowering prosecutors and police officers. Law enforcement efforts involve operations conducted at the...

Countering terrorist ideologies is a task that relies exclusively on trust in an authority and the matching of incentives to individual needs for any success to be realized. Broad messaging campaigns undertaken by both physically and/or culturally removed authorities have little impact due to credibility problems and tendencies to over-generalize. This work, proposing that successful counter-ideology occurs at the level of the individual, constitutes a rational actor and game theoretic analysis of counter-ideology programs in Indonesia and Singapore, evaluating their unique, individually...

The impact of the September 11, 2001, attack by Al Qaeda was felt worldwide with increased security measures. However, maritime security measures are not as encompassing. This thesis investigated the possibility of maritime domain terrorism threats and what could be done to prevent such attacks as modeled on the basis of system of systems. Only certain terrorist groups have the capability to launch maritime terrorist attacks. The terrorist motives are to spread their political message, responding to what they have perceived as oppression. The system of systems model suggests (and is...

This book examines post-conflict justice in Iraq following the U.S. invasion, specifically, the legitimacy of the Iraq High Criminal Court and its first deliberation, the Al-Dujail trial of Saddam Hussein. It asks: How can the United States infuse transitional justice through Western forms of judicial procedures into the democratic transition of non- Western nations under U.S. military occupation? The analysis begins with International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg as a model of transformative post-conflict justice. Then it turns to the cloudier legacy of the Tokyo Trials, where the internal...

Kamal Salibi, a recognized Lebanese historian, described Lebanese society as "liberal and tolerant, traditional rather than zealous or fanatical in its attitude towards religion and political ideology." Unfortunately, the openness that defined Lebanon's success also led to its failures. Confessionalism, a fragile political environment resulting in a perpetually weak central government, and internal meddling by Lebanon's neighbors and imperial powers have framed its fractured history. The country of Lebanon is a sum of its parts (i.e., religion, politics, economy), parts that can be examined...

The use of public diplomacy is an essential component of counterterrorism efforts but, to date, the United States has not been as effective in its attempts to utilize strategic communication against the threat of violent Islamic extremism as it has been in its utilization of military, intelligence, and law enforcement resources. Based upon the idea that a retrospective analysis of previous presidential speeches could provide guidance for future strategic communications of U.S. government officials, this thesis identifies the nature of the message delivered by U.S. Presidents to foreign...

The purpose of this book is to identify how the Improvised Explosive Device (IED) is being used as a "weapon of strategic influence" by insurgent groups in Iraq. It is intended to explore how individual IED events, as well as an IED campaign, achieve strategic influence. This book examines how immediate and cumulative effects of IED attacks achieve strategic goals politically, economically, socially and militarily. Particular goals will vary depending on the motivations and objectives of the organization carrying out the attack, so distinctions will be made between Sunni nationalist, Shi'a...

The George W. Bush administration offered two rationales for the U.S. led invasion of Iraq in March 2003. First and foremost, the invasion would eliminate the threat that the Iraqi regime headed by Saddam Hussein might transfer weapons of mass destruction (WMD) to terrorist organizations. Second, the invasion would depose the brutal dictatorship in Baghdad and deliver the oppressed people of Iraq from tyranny. After the invasion, in the absence of any Iraqi WMD stockpiles, only one of these original justifications for war remained viable. As a result, the Bush administration realigned U.S....

After 9/11, anti-money laundering banking regulations were increased to counter terrorism finance. This study attempts to identify whether increasing banking regulations has countered terrorism finance by reviewing terrorism prosecutions. This study looked at federal terrorism prosecutions from January 2004 through April 2009. The study reviewed court documents and case backgrounds for indicators that anti-money laundering banking regulations were useful to the terrorism prosecution by either detecting terrorism financing or by supporting other charges, such as money laundering. The study did...