ABSTRACT
In the 1980s it was an article of faith of US administrations and the US public, as reflected in repeated public opinion polls, that state-sponsored terrorism was the biggest security threat facing the USA. This polling data reflected the orientation of the Reagan administration, which brought the issue of state-sponsored terrorism to the top of the political agenda. In the 1980s, however, the image of state-sponsored terrorism was of the Communist terrorist trained and controlled by the Soviet Union who set out to undermine the West. Claire Sterling’s book (1981), with its depiction of a global Communist conspiracy against the West, became the bible of the Reagan administration and especially Secretary of State Alexander Haig.1
