#LONE WOLF OKLAHOMA MANUALS#

The lack of interceptable communication has made it nearly impossible to stop attacks in the planning stages.

#LONE WOLF OKLAHOMA MANUALS#

According to Ophir and Morgenstern (2009), these individuals utilize online propaganda and manuals to plan and carry out attacks independently. The internet has made it easier for terrorist organizations to reach supporters, distribute recruiting propaganda, and disseminate training manuals (al-Qaeda, 2017 see also ISIS, n.d.). Lone wolf attacks have become increasingly more prevalent in the United States however, this was not always the case. Between the 1960s and 1980s, terrorist organizations held a more hierarchical structure. It was common for an organization to have a clandestine military branch with a very public political front. This changed in the 1990s with the creation of flatter organizational models. Small cells of organization members began operating independently of one another. It was believed that if one cell were caught, members would not be capable of revealing information about subsequent cells. Cells have become increasingly smaller to include just one person. This concept has come to be known as ‘lone wolf’ terrorism (Martin, 2011).

But is this assessment correct? Could it be possible to prevent an attack perpetrated by an individual, acting alone but on behalf of extremist ideologies and through the indirect guidance of a terrorist organization? This paper seeks to answer this question through a review of both empirical data and literature. Meanwhile, politicians and the media use the term ‘lone wolf’ as nothing short of an excuse, as if the term alone explains why the attack was not thwarted.

As training for law enforcement has become hyper-focused in response to such incidents, prevention has taken a proverbial back seat. Lone wolf terrorism has become an increased threat to national security in the United States over the past several decades.

Lone wolf oklahoma