This is an excellent book and provides numerous examples about looking at the root causes of terrorism. The author uses a somewhat scientific approach to looking at the root causes of terrorism, for example, he looked at the ages of terrorists, their education and background to debunk current thinking that terrorists have been disenfrancised. Instead he looks at radical islamists/terrorist as having been influenced by radical peers, the Iraqi invasion and the internet chat rooms. There is much to be said about "leaderless jihad" because terrorists evolve not as recruits of a central body but as separate groups that take the jihad on their own.He further defines future efforts and approaches to combat this "leaderless jihad".

This seems to me an overrated, padded book, with little insight but much fodder for the author's future grant applications. There is some useful culling of statistical reports. The psychological profiles teach less than nothing about the individual jihadis. Sageman's main point, that terrorism is now decentralized and needs to be prevented by adequate psychological massaging of potential recruits, is undercut by his prefatory scene-setting admissions: the jihad has been reduced to low-level cells that lack adequate technical and planning skills precisely because the high end leadership has been run to ground and killed. Of course they could rise and reorganize (if they have not to some extent done so) if we give them territory sufficient to shelter their activities and let down our guard after reading Sageman's book.

Marc Sageman knows jihadis first-hand. He trained Taliban for the CIA, and as a forensic psychiatrists he interviewed captured jihadis.
His comparison of the threat of local moslims in the USA and Europe is very interesting. So is his analysis of the person and his context behind the jihadi.
Sageman sees jihadis as a lunatic fringe, which should be reassuring, but is not. He proposes a US pullout from Iraq, and Israeli-Palestinian peace (keep dreaming!) as a way to de-escalate the tension between the jihadis and the US.

As an officer in the Air Force and analyst for DOD, I can not say strongly enough that this book is a must read for all Americans. Sageman diligently puts together a solid argument that considers context, scientific appreciation, individual and group psychology, and Middle East conditions. This book is extremely helpful in understanding the threat of Islamic terrorism and is vital for Americans to read if we are to appreciate, as a country united, the complexities of the terrorist threat. Bottom line: the threat of terrorism is real, but the greatest threat to America is how we choose to respond to it. Although we are succeeding in killing and disrupting the bad guys, as we must, we are possibly loosing the battle in regards to Muslim perspective towards the U.S.(hearts and minds). Policy implications in the book are spot in. Great book...must read!

Marc Sageman gets it. He explains in detail how the third wave of terrorists are more apt to adopt their extremist views through social discourse and the need to fit in. Many people believe that this war is ideologically based i.e. people are driven out of religious doctrine. This may hold true for the al-Qaeda leadership, who wish to return to the 6 and 700s , but for the vast majority of new internet "terrorists", they just want to be cool; they essentially want to be fearless ninjas.
That being said, I would disagree slightly with Mr. Sageman about US policy. It is true that this war can't be continually fought with guns and tanks, but given the time-frame context of 9/11 something had to be done to wipe out training camps, safe havens, and the upper echelon leadership. Now that this has essentially (with the obvious and unfortunate exclusion of the two top tier guys) been done, it's time to engage the Middle East with evolving tactics. Opinion polls show that folks in the Muslim Ummah admired the West for its technology and freedoms, including the right to choose leaders, but they fear western domination. It is incumbent upon our leaders to show that while extremely difficult, in the end the US as a whole are friends with Iraq and Afghanistan and we are there now to help them and to rid them of terrorist strongholds for everybody's mutual benefit. Despite all the turmoil and destruction, roughly 50% of Iraqis feel that the US did the right thing. That is saying something considering the numbers are lower in the US and much lower in Europe; places where people have never had to really endure such hardship in the past 50 years, but are free nevertheless.

Since the appalling events of 9/11, Forensic psychiatrist Marc Sageman has applied his social scientist skills to develop a largely accurate understanding of the terrorist phenomena associated with Osama bin Laden. This book is a logical follow-on to his earlier book, "Understanding Terror Networks" (2004, Amazon.com). Sageman provides his readers with what can and should be called target knowledge of a very particular type of Islamic terrorism. In doing so he also ventures into the more ambiguous realm of terrorist motivations.

In "Leaderless Jihad", Sageman argues that the bin Laden terrorist movement has operationally evolved from networked type of organization centered on the ideology of bin Laden and controlled by what he calls "al Qaeda Central". According to Sageman, bin Laden's leadership role been marginalized and al Qaeda has been transformed into a social movement. Essentially he maintains that what was always a very loosely wrapped organization has now become even more dispersed into virtually independent cells or nodes of socially connected individuals with only a vague adherence to bin Laden's ideology of Jihad against the "Far Enemy" in common. If this description is accurate, and it certainly appears to be, fighting the bin Laden phenomenon is much more of an ideological war than a shooting war.

Now Sageman argues that to win this kind of war it is vital to understand what the social and psychological factors are that are driving the participants in the terrorist movement. As his study makes clear they are not driven by poverty (except vicarious poverty) or by a longing for democracy as understood in the West. Sageman suggests that, as is usually the case, they are motivated by a variety of factors with the desire for justice for real or imagined transgression by the West against Islam being the most common.

Sageman in this book and in his earlier book, has done a good job of trying to build an accurate set of target knowledge about the real target of the largely bogus Global War on Terrorism (GWOT). As an additional book that will help explain the points Sageman is trying to make, this reviewer would recommend, "The Starfish and the Spider", sub-titled. "The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations" (Amazon.com). The three books together make sobering reading.

The author once again provides an easily read and understood book about the current terrorist threat. He first provides us with a history of global terrorism and then explains how the current terrorist threat differs from terrorist threats that the world has seen in the past.

He then discusses the radicalization process that creates terrorists - this was incredibly interesting as was his explanation as to why there currently is a greater terrorist threat in Europe than the U.S. based on this radicalization process.

Further, he discusses how terrorists have been forced to use the internet as one of the primary ways to get around increased surveillance and border protection around the world. He then explains how this evolution in terrorist communication and interaction has created a "leaderless jihad" that we now face.

Finally, he concludes with well thought out recommendations concerning ways that the U.S. should consider moving forward to combat this evolving terrorist threat.

Overall - an outstanding book - a must read for anyone interested in the terrorist threat that the U.S and the world now faces.

The author once again provides an easily read and understood book about the current terrorist threat. He first provides us with a history of global terrorism and then explains how the current terrorist threat differs from terrorist threats that the world has seen in the past.

His discussion of the radicalization process that creates terrorists was incredibly interesting as was his explanation as to why there currently is a greater terrorist threat in Europe than the U.S. based on this radicalization process.

He discusses how terrorists have been forced to use the internet as one of the primary ways to get around increased surveillance and border protection around the world. He further explains how this evolution in terrorist communication and interaction has created a "leaderless jihad" that we now face.

Finally, he concludes with well thought out recommendations concerning ways that the U.S. should consider moving forward to combat this evolving terrorist threat.

Overall - an outstanding book - a must read for anyone interested in the terrorist threat that the U.S and the world now faces.