ABSTRACT
Literature on counterterrorism in the United States generally begins in the 1980s. When discussed, American ‘terrorism’ primarily concerns the international terrorism of the early 1970s which, inspired by both the Palestine question and the American presence in the Middle East, targeted American institutions abroad. Up to that time the deadliest attack against an American mission took place in 1983, when the American embassy in Beirut was bombed (killing 63, including 17 Americans), followed by Hezbollah's bomb attack on the barracks of the US Marines in the same city (241 Americans killed). These were the first major terrorist actions triggering the American government's realization that they were dealing with a phenomenon that was to be taken seriously. The retribution acts against Tripoli in 1986 subsequently fixed the tone of the discourse on counter-terrorism mainly as a matter of military and foreign affairs. 1
