Terrorism, technology and asymmetric warfare.

Terrorismo, tecnología y guerra asimétrica.

In the Gulf War, several US generals came to think that, for the first time, infantry might not be necessary, not even defining, for the Allied forces to defeat the Iraqi army. Technological advances in aviation, guided missiles, electronic pulses, and all the paraphernalia belonging to war from afar, made much more credible that a new era of inter-state or international wars was in the works, in which for one, there would be no direct confrontation between contenders, which would help avoid casualties, and for another, civilian victims would be lowered near to zero, as guaranteed by the pinpoint accuracy of tactical ballistic missiles developed up to that time. However, in spite of the weight of aviation, and air weaponry played a decisive role in this war, it is a fact that there were much more civilian victims as expected, and also much more US soldier casualties than expected. In this paper, I will analyse the existing relation between terrorism and the strategies to widen or diminish asymmetries in war.