Throughout several years, Germany has been part of the United Nations. During this time, Germany has assisted with UN operations worldwide, including joint training with the United States. It is not only the fourth largest contributor within the UN, but is prominent in several UN peace missions, along with other international peace missions within NATO, the EU, and OSCE (“Federal Foreign Office – Germany in the United Nations”). Germany is devoted to keeping the balance of international peace, this is demonstrated by the placement of German soldiers and police officers who are deployed in international missions and activities such as Resolute Support in Afghanistan, training support in Northern Iraq, and Operation Inherent Resolve to combat IS in Syria and Iraq (“Federal Foreign Office – UN peace missions and Germany’s engagement”). As per the German Federal Foreign Office, it is stated that the “German foreign policy is committed to peace and security around the world,” this peace is based on the framework of the United Nations, the EU, NATO, the G7 and G20, and the OSCE. It is believed that to secure international peace and security, global justice must be a formal factor (“Federal Foreign Office – Germany’s foreign and European policy principles”).
Within Germany, terrorism is not a new phenomenon, in the past, terrorism, more specifically domestic terrorism, has affected Germany. In the late 1960s, the Red Army Faction had advocated for communist revolution, which had stemmed from the climate of radical student protest, it had became terrorization through the bombing of cars and assaulting of different political figures (Red Army Faction, 353). Domestic terrorism had been part of Germany’s history. A new anti-terrorism legislation has been passed in June 2015, making it a crime to travel outside of the country to gain terrorist training (Gesley). This legislation had been past after the finding of TKP/ML members being found in several parts of Europe, this is including Germany as well.
This had been passed before the attacking of a female police woman by and Iraqi individual, the officer was severely wounded (“European Union Terrorism Situation and Trend Report (TE-SAT) 2016.”). Due to the history of terrorism within the nation of Germany, it is evident that taking a stance against terrorism is necessary, and that we would understand the meaning of terrorism. Not only does Germany understand the effects that terrorism brings to a nation, and is active in taking steps to prevent terrorism, Germany is also well versed in the definition of terrorism.
When dealing with terrorism, Germany uses the EU Council definition of terrorism. This definition defines what acts are considered to be terroristic offenses. Under the Framework Decision, three questions must be answered to determine if the act is terroristic: “a) Is the act at stake already incriminated under national law? b) By its nature or context, does the act “seriously damage a country or an international organisation”? c) Was the act committed for one of the aforementioned aims?” (Dumitriu, 592). Question A is asking if the terroristic attack is already a crime under the national law of Germany, asking this would give jail time to the criminal no matter the crime due to the fact that any offense against the state should be punishable. Question B, is inquiring the question if the act done is seriously damaging an international organization or a country, in this case, Germany. The last question, Question C, is considering the fact that perhaps the crime at hand was not aimed at the country, but giving the offenders the benefit of the doubt, it is a democracy after all. These questions were influenced, not only from the domestic terrorism in the past but also from the United States 9/11 attacks on the New York World Trade Centers. During these attacks, each one of these questions was answered, this showed that the questions must have some credibility, and must be accounted for as well.
More precisely, the German definition of terrorism, by way of the EU’s definition of terrorism, is an act that has “the aim of: “seriously intimidating a population,” “unduly compelling a Government or international organisation to perform or abstain from performing any act,” or “seriously destabilising or destroying the fundamental … structures of a country or an international organisation.”. ” (Dumitriu, 592). This definition mostly goes hand in hand with the American tragedy, 9/11, thus proving that this definition should be used worldwide, on a larger scale than just the EU. This also applies to Germany in the sense that the RAF, Red Army Faction, had been tearing Germany’s defense in two, by way of car bombings, and intention “to destroy the myth of the system's omnipresence and invulnerability” (Red Army Faction, 353). This speaks volumes on why this definition can be and should be the UN’s definition. It applies to variations of terrorism, international terrorism, and domestic terrorism as well.
In order to reach an agreement on the definition of terrorism, turning to our allies, the United States and Saudi Arabia, is our best hope. As a unit, we, Germany and the United States, are both equally aware of the international issues that have been occurring all over the world and are both ready to take advances into putting our international policy into action (“Germany and the United States: Reliable Allies”). There is a possibility in which we could also make amends with Russia, a nation in which we had begun to make amends within the past three years. This will aid us in being able to get protection from more nations scattered throughout Europe, especially considering that Russia is a nation who, since 2016, has been in the midst of modernization of its armed forces. The availability of protection at this point and time is crucial for Germany (Pifer). Due to the fact that Russia’s amount of nuclear weapons is growing, we must be aware that if not treated correctly, Germany’s protection can benefit greatly from this factor. Protection with someone who has been modernizing multiple factors of war, submarines,
One state in which trust will not be given is to Iran. They have been known for possibly being state sponsors of terrorism, as guided to us by our ally the United States (Ansari). It has been reported that Iran has supported Daesh, an Islamic terrorist group, back in 2015, if Iran is supporting them then being allies with Iran will not be beneficial. The backing of Daesh by Iran has caused discord within the state of our ally, Saudi Arabia. If we stay close to our allies during the meeting, being able to get our agenda passed will be much easier than trying to make a new ploy and agreements with other nations.