Like all of you, I’m shocked by the increasing frequency of terrorist attacks, the most recent one being in Nice. We humans are problem solvers and, naturally, once you get over the shock of the news, you cannot help but ask yourself: what can be done?

I know this is a domaining blog but first and foremost, it’s my blog and on my blog, I can decide to cover non-domaining topics when I feel it’s appropriate.

Which is what I’m doing today.

To figure out what can be done, let’s try to see what the authorities have done so far.

Furthermore, I will ask you to think outside the box for a while.

After a terrorist attack, the following ends up usually happening:

1) Press conferences are held, announcing that the war against terror will continue to be fought

By doing this however, terrorist organisations are receiving exposure/attention.

2) Average citizens like you and me express their anger and revolt. On Facebook, Twitter and various platforms

The result: once again, terrorist organizations are receiving exposure/attention.

3) The authorities adopt measures which reduce freedom (like more surveillance, a reduction in personal freedoms and so on) and try to convince the general public to accept them by instilling fear (of terrorism)

The result: again, people become afraid, all of this ends up being debated in the media and terrorist organizations are receiving exposure/attention.

As can be seen, two preliminary conclusions can be drawn:

1) Terrorist organizations receive exposure/attention

2) The reaction of authorities as well as citizens is linear (as in quite predictable) or in other words, we as a society tend to do similar things after each terrorist attack

Enough about this.

Now let’s try to see things from the perspective of a terrorist organization.

It’s important to understand, first and foremost, that the “traditional” military capabilities of terrorists are very, very weak.

In an open and “fair” fight against even the army of one medium-sized country, the army of the Islamic State would most likely lose. In other words, there’s no way these people can win by playing fair. They don’t have a strong enough military to do this, not by a long shot.

What does this tell us?

It tells us that terrorists will do the only thing they can do: use unconventional or non-linear war strategies.

This brings us to terrorist attacks such as the one in Nice.

We might be tempted to quickly blame the French authorities for not preventing the attack but let’s step back for a moment and ask ourselves: is it possible to consistently prevent such attacks?

More likely than not, this attack did NOT come after a complex terrorist operation or something along those lines.

It was probably only a result of the actions of one brainwashed sociopath, how can the authorities possibly prevent something like this from happening?

These are, again, non-linear threats. This much is certain.

And for the most part, the authorities react in a linear manner to these threats.

Maybe it’s time to ask ourselves: is this the right strategy?

Can you win against an opponent who constantly employs non-linear tactics by using linear strategies?

Perhaps it’s time to adopt a non-linear way of thinking.

In other words, just like in game theory, it might be more effective to see things from the perspective of the opponent we are trying to defeat.

What do we know about terrorists? Why do they do what they do? Why do they use terrorist attacks?

The answer might be simpler than meets the eye.

Perhaps they’re doing this because it’s the only thing they can do.

They can’t win a conventional war, terrorist attacks are the only weapon they have for the most part.

Their tactics revolve around instilling fear or to put it more broadly, one of their main goals if not the main one is being in the news, making people talk about them, ultimately making people be afraid of them.

So we know that terrorists want attention. Let’s use this information and go back to the beginning of this post.

What does our behavior after terrorist attacks usually result in?

The press conferences, the social media reactions of average citizens, the instilling of fear by the authorities?

They result in attention for terrorist organizations.

In other words, through these reactions, perhaps we are giving them exactly what they want.

In my opinion, this is something worth thinking about.

I wish I had a solution, I don’t.

You might be tempted to say that the solution this post suggests is ignoring terrorists, removing them from the media, not giving them the attention they desire.

I have no idea if such a solution would work, perhaps it would.

I’m just thinking out loud.

But maybe, just maybe, it’s time to think outside the box when it comes to non-linear threats.