CHICAGO, Ill. - It should be remembered that most of the weapons being used by Hezbollah in the current conflict were previously only available to a “nation-state,” and were designed to be used in full-blown land conflict. Weapons that were originally designed to attack mass formations of (mounted and unmounted) troops are now being used to target innocent civilian populations.
It would be our considered opinion that this is another step of the evolution of terrorism, asymmetric and/or 4th Generation warfare (4GW). What we are seeing is a transformation of “terrorist organizations” into something far more powerful and capable of inflicting massive damage and major loss of life. We believe that the ultimate effect of these latest events will eventually shown to be “profound.”
Furthermore, those who have been monitoring and reporting on weapons development in Iran/China/Russia and N. Korea are not surprised by the fact that the weapons mentioned above actually exist. In fact, ERRI and other experts are well aware of the capabilities of these weapons. The only matter of conjecture was whether or not these missiles/rockets had been transferred to Hezbollah. Recent events in the Middle-East would seem to remove any doubt about that, and confirm that more of these “stand-off” type weapons are in the hands of terror organizations than ever before.
ERRI analysts first warned of this trend in January of 2004, when we said: “Increasingly, militants (except suicide/ homicide bombers) are reluctant to directly engage U.S. and Coalition military forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. Instead, they are using indirect fire weapons such as unguided rockets, mortars, and IEDs. They believe that this allows them a better opportunity to escape the wrath of return fire by coalition forces.” — Source: “World-Wide Terrorism; Predictive Analysis: January, 2004,” By C. L. Staten, CEO and Sr. Analyst, Emergency Response & Research Institute.
