Three Features of Jihadi Foreign Fighting None of this, however, detracts from the fact that Road Warriors is a highly accurate synthesis of a complex literature and is a major academic achievement. In books with such breadth of scope, there will always be minor quibbles to be had about details of specific cases (I had a few for 1980s Afghanistan) and about editorial decisions (I would have liked, for example, to see a nod to pre-1980s cases, such as the 1948 Palestine war or the late 1960s Islamist Fedayin). Of particular value is the chapter on countermeasures, in which Byman presents an innovative framework for thinking about the constituent parts of the foreign fighter challenge and offers policy suggestions that are as specific as they are original. At the same time, the book is packed with details and insights that even jihadism specialists will learn from. Byman’s clear prose and his organization of the book into chronological chapters centered on key individuals constitute a breath of fresh air in a sometimes dense academic literature. It is also highly accessible, making it very well suited as an introduction to the topic for newcomers. It is the first long history of jihadi foreign fighting and, as such, it allows us to see patterns and nuances that are less apparent. Road Warriors is an extremely valuable addition to the literature. He then looks at the repercussions of jihadi foreign fighting in Europe and the United States before ending with an in-depth reflection on what can be done to counter the phenomenon. Byman’s account starts in 1980s Afghanistan and passes through early-1990s Bosnia, mid-1990s Chechnya, late-1990s Afghanistan, mid-2000s Iraq, and late-2000s Somalia before reaching the Syrian civil war.
What system made road fighter series#
The book shows with great clarity that foreign fighters who went to Syria in the 2010s are but the latest in a long series of jihadi foreign fighter mobilizations and that the phenomenon needs to be understood - and dealt with - as the decades-old and wide-ranging phenomenon that it is.
Still, the Syrian jihadi case looms larger, to the point where, in the public consciousness, the term foreign fighter has become closely associated with ISIL volunteers.Įnter Daniel Byman’s new book Road Warriors, which takes a long historical view on the phenomenon of Islamist foreign fighters. In fact, a byproduct of the increased general interest in foreign fighting has been studies into little-known variants of the phenomenon, such as far-right, Shiite, or anti-ISIL foreign fighting. To be sure, the literature has not been exclusively focused on ISIL volunteers. Yet another has been the prospect of so-called blowback or spillover from travelers to Syria in the form of international terrorist attacks. Another has been the in-theater activities of the fighters and their impact on their host organization and the Syrian conflict. An important line of inquiry has been the individual-level characteristics and recruitment pathways of the fighters. A large proportion of them ended up joining the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), the world’s most formidable terrorist organization at the time, prompting fears that they would not only fuel the ranks of jihadism in the Middle East, but also pose a global terrorist threat.įor the same reason, the academic literature on foreign fighters is heavily centered on the case of Syria in the 2010s, which has been studied in depth from several angles. In this period, tens of thousands of Muslims from all over the world, including over 5,000 from Europe, joined the Syrian rebellion.
The reason for the surge in attention was, of course, the departure of unprecedented numbers of Islamist volunteers to fight in Syria’s civil war between 20. Interest among policymakers has been similarly high: Since around 2013, many countries around the world have implemented measures to combat foreign fighting, and in 2014 the phenomenon even got its own U.N. A Google search for the term now yields over a million hits, while Google Scholar suggests it features in some 20,000 publications, three-quarters of which are from the 2010s.
What system made road fighter full#
Be sure to check out the full roundtable.ĭaniel Byman, Road Warriors: Foreign Fighters in the Armies of Jihad (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019).įew topics in international security have captured as much attention in recent years as that of foreign fighters. Editor’s Note: This is an excerpt from “ Book Review Roundtable: Foreign Fighters in the Armies of Jihad” from our sister publication, the Texas National Security Review.
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