Stuff You Should Know - How Suicide Bombers Work

Episode Date: June 21, 2011

It 1981 the first modern suicide bomber blew himself up. But this was by no means the first suicide bombing. Israeli psychologists evaluated the motivations of suicide bombers and found a number of commonalities. Join Josh and Chuck to learn more. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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They just have way better names for what they call, like what we would call a jackmove or being robbed. They call civil acid. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart Radio App, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from HowStuffWorks.com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me as always is Charles W. Chuck Bryant, looking as spry as ever. Have you ever seen Bad Santa? Yeah. Remember the kid? He's like your

granny. Is she spry? And he's putting on a ski mask and they come in the door and he goes, Granny, are you spry? Really? Yeah. She's like, oh, I'm making some sandwiches. Now you're looking very spry today, Chuck. You've done something that you've never done to me before. What, man? What's going on? You literally put a video on your laptop and just turned it around and then started the podcast. And I'm waiting to see what happens because I think it might have something to do with the podcast. Did you see it? Did it happen? It happened. It's pretty awesome. And it has nothing to do with what we're podcasting. None. I wanted you to see it, buddy. General interest. I will be putting that on the Facebook page, okay? Because

ain't no party like our Facebook pages party. Yeah, you're into people getting flung off of things apparently. I'm in a little bit of that mood right now. Yeah. How are you doing? I'm great. Well, good. We should probably tone it down a little bit because this is a grim, grim subject we're about to talk about. Yeah, that was the first minute was about all the fun we're going to have here. Yeah. So, Chuck, I got an intro for you. Okay. I was jogging. You and I were jogging on treadmills as is our want usually. And I prefer treadmills because I can watch TV while I do it and just totally forget that I'm running, right? That kills me. But it works so well. Like I'm up to like five miles each time. Right. You know what's sobering

though? Go try to run a single mile on pavement. I don't need to. There's no TVs on pavement. It's much different. During one of these ventures, I was watching CNN and this weird, it was Wolf Blitzer and this weird segment came on where one of Wolf Blitzer's journalists was in Libya meeting with the family of a man who had blown himself up in a car full of explosives to gain entry for Libyan rebel fighters into this city. It's a very disputed city. I can't remember which one. And the guy was sitting down with the family, the two daughters and the wife who were grieving, but holding a picture of the man, talked to his best friend who picked up the pieces of the guy. And I realized it took me a minute, but it was dawning on me that

this is exactly what say Afghani or Talibani state television would do with one of their suicide bombers. It was just like the embargo on disgust over suicide bombing as a general rule was lifted because someone CNN was rooting for blew himself up. And suddenly it was okay. But I mean like step for step, it was like a celebration of this man's heroism for blowing himself up. And I just thought it was really nuts. And I guess it's probably as unobjective as I should be throughout this podcast, but it struck me as really, really strange. I wrote a blog post on it called CNN oddly celebrates suicide bombers hero or something like that. Yeah, but it was just so weird. And there's in the blog post, there's video, somebody found it

and posted it. So there's video of this weird segment that just sticks out like a sore thumb. And I guess that what I learned is that my personal opinion is suicide bombing is wrong, no matter what side is doing it. I think I would agree with that. All right. So this is a relatively new thing, right? Suicide bombing. It's new because their bombs are fairly new, right? Yeah. But it's far, far more ancient than that. It is the concept of killing yourself or dying in the name of religion is pretty ancient. Oh, yeah. You want to go all the way back to martyrdom in general might as well. Okay, start at the beginning. martyrdom is what we're talking about. Obviously, when you talk about suicide bombing, it's forsaking your own life for a higher cause,

for a principle for your faith, anything that is not for your direct, like earthly benefit, but maybe benefit later on to elevate your cause, but benefits for you in the afterlife. And so generally, that's what we suspect make suicide bombers tick. That's what is martyrdom. And it's because although it is like a very deep, there's a deep religious affiliation between martyrdom and suicide like this. Yeah, this case, it doesn't necessarily have to be religious. It can be sure your side, your cause like the 49 year old oil worker who is Libyan was for the rebel faction had nothing to do with religion. He was just willing to die for his cause as all suicide bombers are. Yeah, religion kicks it up a little notch though. So well, the reason why is because

it's so ingrained, the two are so entangled from such an ancient place, right? Like our lamb who did this article, who did this. He wrote it. He traces martyrdom back to the second or third century BC, right? What with King Nebuchadnezzar? Yeah. Yeah, the famous story in Bible history, the book of Daniel, we all know King Nebuchadnezzar gave, as the BC boys call them, Shadrach, Meshach, Nebedniko. Yeah, I can't see those three names together without thinking about that too. Well, BC boys were three Jewish guys. That's probably why they called themselves that in the song. In the Bible story, Nebuchadnezzar gave them the choice. You can renounce your Jewish faith or you can burn alive. And they said, you know what? We're the beastie boys and we don't give

in to anybody. And so we're going to not renounce our faith. They were thrown into the fiery furnace and they lived, which the lesson there was, an early lesson in martyrdom, which was, hey, you know what? God's going to protect those who die in his name. Doesn't it make you wonder, like, don't you tend to think that in stories like that, somewhere eons ago, something happened, possibly with these three people. What happened that eventually got translated into, they were thrown into this furnace and they walked out unscathed. Did somebody lose their grip on them and they skirted across like a campfire and their robes didn't catch and everybody was like, oh my God, you know? And then just to make it more easily digestible for the masses, it was transformed

into this larger thing. My feeling when it comes to parables like this, where to me it's obvious that someone wasn't unscathed in a burning fire, was that maybe someone was burned, like they were being tortured and saying renounce your religion, being burned with like fiery torches or something and they refused and refused and they couldn't be broken and so they were set free and that becomes a parable in the way of something miraculous like this. That makes sense. It's good analysis. I'll probably get killed for that. The war on drugs impacts everyone, whether or not you take drugs. America's public enemy number one is drug abuse. This podcast is going to show you the truth behind the war on drugs. They told me that I would be charged for

conspiracy to distribute 2,200 pounds of marijuana. Yeah, and they can do that without any drugs on the table. Without any drugs, of course, yes, they can do that and I'm the prime example of that. The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The property is guilty. Exactly. And it starts as guilty. It starts as guilty. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid for it. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Where were you in 92? Were you bouncing your butt to Sir

Mix-A-Lot wondering if you, like Billy Ray Cyrus, could pull off a mullet? Yes. 1992 was a crazier for music and a crazy time to be alive. And now iHeart has a podcast all about it. I'm Jason Launfier, and on my new show, Where Were You in 92, we take a ride through the major hits, One Hit Wonders, and irresistible scandals that shape what might be the wildest, most controversial 12 months in music and pop culture history. They were angry at me. They thought I was uncontrollable and wild. I wanted to burst open. Well, the president came after me. Everybody's I'm Warner with madness. Imagine trying to put a record like that out right now. We'd be canceled before it made it to the post office. Featuring interviews and special

guests like Sir Mix-A-Lot, Ice Tea, Tori Amos, and Vanessa Williams, this podcast poses the question, what was it about 1992 that made it so groundbreaking and so absolutely fabulous? So buckle up and tune in to Where Were You in 92. New episodes drop every Wednesday. Listen and follow on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. But the point is, the idea was that God's got your back if you're willing to die for him, right? Yes. But that eventually transformed into what people still believe today, that toil on this planet leads to bounty in the next life. The big three, I'll believe that. And you can trace that back to the early church, early Jewish faith, early Christian faith,

and the early Muslim faith. And martyrdom goes back just as far and comes from the same tree. The idea that if you sacrifice yourself, you're going to gain reward after this. So what's a few minutes of pain for a lifetime of happiness and pleasure, right? Well, in the non-suicide version where you're actually killing other people, in the name of your God, goes back to maybe not the first time. But one good example Robert used was in 64 AD, rather than surrendering to the Roman authorities, a rebel group basically killed their own themselves and every last man and woman. This one, I think, was probably literal. Yeah, probably so. Think about how that would be treated today, though. Yeah, like the authorities are coming and you kill every man, woman, and child

inside. Sounds like a standoff at Waco or something. Yeah. But your point is, and I think the larger point is, is that people were willing to kill themselves, kill those close to them, and kill others eventually in the name of God and expected some sort of reward for it. Right. So you were talking about the rise of Islam. Right. So it was AD 610 when the Prophet Muhammad received his first vision, right? Yeah. And basically was set about going forth to found Islam. And within 14 years, he had amassed something of an army and was taking on other people in the area, right? Right. It was pretty successful at it, right? Yeah. So what I gained from this, and I'm certainly not a scholar on Islam at all. I'm not a scholar on any religion, but the Islam came out of a place

of strife and battle. And so thusly, this concept of jihad came about fairly early on. Yeah, there's two parts to jihad. If you've never, you've heard that word a lot used probably for the second part, which was a righteous battle in the physical world. But the first part of jihad means it's an inward struggle of the soul in Arabic. So it's a two pronged thing there. And the Quran basically vindicated defense and combat in the name of protecting the faithful, right, as well as retaliation. So it's traced back to the Quran as far as probably the birth of the notion of something like a suicide bombing, even though it certainly doesn't say that anything about that anywhere in the Quran. Right. So jihad played a big role in the Crusades, which was the Christian version

of the Holy War, right? Yes. And that was taking it to the Muslims doorstep, basically invading the Middle East, right? Europeans invading the Middle East. That was the Crusades. And so from these conflicts, during the Dark Ages, the medieval ages, the Crusades, and after the birth of Islam, this idea of taking a single person and going and doing as much damage as you possibly could came about. So do you remember in the Sniper podcast, we talked about snipers being considered militarily force multipliers? Yes. So are suicide assassins? Absolutely. And the term assassin actually comes out of this era and from the Middle East, from the word Hashishan. Yes, Persian word. The name of a radical Shiite sect didn't know that. Yeah. So Hashish and

assassin are one in the same. Hashishan. Hashishan. Assassin. Right. Yeah, it sounds more like it that way. You may recognize the word Hashish as a type of pot residue. So if you find it odd that the word Hashish pops up, be advised that the sect of the Hashishan smoked hash as part of their religious ritual. Oh, really? Yeah. They were also the ones, though, who would go out and they were tasked with killing public officials in very public places to basically terrorize the population. If you kill somebody like that, you cut someone's head off in a crowded square, you're going to die, but the leader's head just got cut off in front of me and now I'm really freaked out. Yeah. It was the first early versions, ancient versions of what would later become suicide bombings. Right.

But that sect was wiped out by Mongols in 1257 and there was kind of a break on this activity for a while as far as world history goes and then you get to World War II and the Japanese kamikaze pilots who are most essentially suicide bombers. Right. Except by way of a plane. Yeah. Through the Bushido code. Yeah, but usually think suicide bombing is someone on foot, but it can really, you know, you can do it. There's been boats, there's been cars and trucks, humans walking, and then obviously planes flying into aircraft carriers. Really a male cart filled with explosives. You're going to get the same. Yeah. You're a suicide bomber. Well, Robert Lamb puts the first modern suicide attack in Lebanon in 1981 during a war between civil war between Christian and

Muslim militants. And there was a lone suicide bomber, a Shiite, hit an Iraqi embassy in Beirut and the U.S. entered the conflict the next year. And 1983, a suicide bomber drove into the U.S. embassy. I remember that actually killing 63 people. Yeah, that was in April. And most folks say this is like the beginning of the modern suicide mission. Right. And then in October, two truck bombs drove into the Marine barracks in Beirut and killed 299 people. Yeah. French and American, I think 241 Marines. So like you said, that's the birth of the modern suicide bomber. And unfortunately, it's just basically been gaining momentum ever since this whole concept of, I'm going to strap a bunch of explosives to myself and walk into a crowd and blow myself up

and kill as many other people as I possibly can. Yeah, let's poke around inside the mind because people have been curious what kind of person does this. Because obviously, if you look at just from a straight physical standpoint, they did find between the ages of 18 and 24 is your average age of a suicide bomber. Yeah, apparently Israel conducted studies in the late 90s to figure out what they, you know, who suicide bombers were. Right. So the sense of despondency in teens is playing a part here. The whole world is against them. Teens, how many teens feel that way? I know I did. Yeah. And it's no different in other countries. Combine these feelings with tyranny, you're oppressed, you're angry. And then the final censure here is usually, and I think they even

have a study that there's some sort of personal loss attached to the person that ends up being picked to carry out the mission. Right. Their parents were killed. Or wounded or put in prison. Yeah. Yeah, it'll do it. Yeah, it wasn't a study, but it said Israeli psychiatrist sifted through the lives is how Robert put it. And they did discover, in almost all cases, connections to like slain or wounded family members or friends. And for the most part, they were males. But as times worn on, women, children, older people have all joined the echelons of suicide bombers, right? Yep, they're usually very poor. Yeah. There was, did you hear about the woman from, I guess she was a Chechnya extremist in Moscow on New Year's Eve? She had a suicide belt and was

getting ready to walk out into Red Square to blow herself up and take just tons of people with her. And she decided it didn't match her purse. She didn't make it out of the apartment because she got a spam text from her cell phone provider saying, Happy New Year. And it blew her up. Really? Yeah. In her room? Yeah, in her apartment. Wow. She didn't have her cell phone off, which apparently is standard procedure. Like she, they went out and bought a cell phone just for that purpose. Right. The provider sent out a spam text to everybody because, you know, cell phone providers have been thinking like, well, we're providing service to somebody who's going to blow up a bunch of people as a terrorist. They're saying we want to tell everyone Happy

New Year. Exactly. Wow. I didn't hear about that. It's true. The war on drugs impacts everyone, whether or not you take drugs. America's public enemy number one is drug abuse. This podcast is going to show you the truth behind the war on drugs. They told me that I would be charged for conspiracy to distribute 2200 pounds of marijuana. Yeah, and they can do that without any drugs on the table. Without any drugs. Of course, yes, they can do that. And on the prime example, the war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The property is guilty. Exactly. And it starts as guilty. It starts as guilty. Cops. Are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way

better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil answer. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the I heart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Where were you in 92? Were you bouncing your butt to Sir mix a lot wondering if you like Billy Ray Cyrus could pull off a mullet. Yes, 1992 was a crazier for music and a crazy time to be alive. And now I heart has a podcast all about it. I'm Jason Launfier. And on my new show, where are you in 92? We take a ride through the major hits, one hit wonders and irresistible scandals that shape what might be the wildest, most controversial 12 months and music and pop

culture history. They were angry at me. They thought I was uncontrollable and wild. I wanted to burst open. The president came after me. Everybody I'm Warner was madness. Imagine trying to put a record like that out right now. We canceled before it made it to the post office. Featuring interviews and special guests like Sir mix a lot, ice tea, Tori Amos and Vanessa Williams. This podcast poses the question. What was it about 1992 that made it so groundbreaking and so absolutely fabulous? So buckle up and tune into where you 92 new episodes drop every Wednesday. Listen and follow on the I heart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. So one other common trait is that they obviously are willing to die for their cause,

but they are also willing to kill for their cause. Um, most terrorists don't have a, you know, they have no empathy for the suffering of other people. And it helps that, uh, in the case of us versus them, that the VEM is very, very different from themselves, right? Which is certainly the case with the Middle East and the United States. Couldn't be any more different as far as countries go, right? And people go. Yeah. Yeah. There's definitely a whole sentiment that, um, occupation and invasion, uh, fans, the flames of, um, suicide bombing. Well, yeah. Cause that you see your, you see Americans as an invader and an occupier and a savage and a nonbeliever, which is a big part that, that part about Jihad in, uh, the Quran right says basically like, this is what happens

to nonbelievers is what you do to nonbelievers, right? To an extent, uh, Robert points out that if suicide bombers were left just completely alone, they might want to back out or think twice. So that's why they surround them toward go time with a social network of supporters, uh, to say, you know, you're doing the right thing. They isolate you from your family and friends and, um, show you videos, martyrdom videos to reinforce that what you're doing is well, no, you make a martyrdom video. Oh, you make your own saying like, I'm about to blow a bunch of people up and I can't wait to get to the afterlife and I'm like a true, um, believer. You're right. I read that wrong. And, and so that that is, it's not only inspiring. It's also like you can't back out now. You've

made your video, right? Like you, you, this is your point of no return. Well, cause yeah, that'd be probably even more shameful, but I think people, you know, that survival instinct is very strong. So this, these people that are handling them, usually one of them will go with the suicide bomber to, uh, the target area and will basically keep them encouraged and, um, on, on track. And, um, I imagine we'll blow them up if they decide that they want to back out. Yeah. Well, and beyond that, sometimes it's planned that way. Sometimes the, um, the assistant is, has the detonator to, to prevent any kind of back out. I think that there's probably a backup detonator. Yeah. You think? Yeah. Okay. That's my suspicion. So we're talking about the nuts and bolts of it

all of a sudden. Then let's go ahead with that. Uh, you mean the shrapnel? Yeah. Suicide bomber. It's not a very elaborate, expensive operation that costs about 150 bucks, probably worth of explosives and one human life willing to do so. Yeah. And you've got yourself a suicide bomber, whether it's a duffel bag full of stuff or something you strap on your chest. Uh, like you said, they've used trucks and boats. Well, duffel bags are, um, apparently out of vogue because you'll get shot in the head if you look like you are even remotely Middle Eastern and you have a duffel bag, right? At least if you're in London in 2005 and you're Brazilian, right? Yeah. Um, but you were saying this, it's just one person with a duffel bag or a vest or a belt. Yeah. And

the attack of, um, a suicide bomber is threefold, right? One, it kills a bunch of people. So it's terroristic. Two, it draws a lot of attention to this cause that at least one person is willing to die for. And then three, it's, uh, it's a force multiplier because it has like a huge effect on morale in the psyche of the population. Yeah. But it can also go the other way. As pointed out with World War two, um, it can either like, it's happened both ways in America because when, uh, 241 Marines were killed in the truck bombing in 1984, uh, President Reagan said in his, in his memoir that that had a big deal with his pulling out of that region. And like, he was like, no, you know what? Forget that. These people are willing to do this. I'm

getting my guys out of there. Or in the case of World War two with the Japanese, let's drop two bombs on their country that they won't be able to recover from because they're willing to fly their planes into our, uh, aircraft carriers. You know, that's not how the Japanese tell it. How do they tell it? They tell it like they were starting to make moves that they were willing to surrender and the Americans had so much money invested in this research that they basically needed and wanted to see what happened. It certainly doesn't surprise me. There are two versions of that story. Yeah. That's the way history works. So Chuck. Yes. Um, what, I guess, what are these things made of? You said you can fill a truck, a belt,

all this stuff. What is it? Well, it varies, of course, between, uh, what your resources are. I think in the early days, they would just read jigger landmines and use those. But now it's everything from TNT to, uh, something called TATP, uh, triacetone, triper oxide, and then other plastic explosives, stuff that can do a lot of damage. Right. And they found too that, uh, the more people around the suicide bomber, the better, obviously not for those people close in proximity. But if you hear that there's a suicide bomber suspect and all of a sudden the crowd disperses, it's going to have a blast zone that's much greater and cover much more area. Because the, the thick mass of people around that person create basically a human shield. Yeah.

Which is pretty serious stuff. And, uh, in London, 2005, you want, I talked about that guy, remember? Oh, is that when you meant by shot in the head? Yeah, he got shot in the head seven times. Yeah. And he was not a suicide bomber. No, he's just some guy from Brazil. Mistaken identity. Yeah, that was a pretty jumpy time, if I remember correctly. Yes, it was. Uh, you got anything else? No. Oh, I thought the very end had a very interesting, thing that Israeli settlers were trying was they proposed burying suicide bombers in pig skin body bags. Yeah, I saw that. As a way of discouraging suicide bombers from, uh, because I guess if they think if I'm going to be buried in pig skin,

that's not the afterlife that I'm, that I'm looking for. Right. But the problem is, and Robert does a good job pointing this out, I think when you, the suicide bombing is capable of dehumanizing on both levels, right? Yeah. That would have not only, um, I guess to dehumanize the suicide bomber, but it dehumanized the Israelis, right? So part of the, the whole, um, feedback mechanism for suicide bombings is that one side doesn't see the other as human any longer, right? Right. You're willing to die for your cause. So you're crazy or, um, you are worth dying to kill because I don't see you as a person any longer. Yeah. And so that, that would have been counterproductive. I'm sure. Good job.

This is a tough one. Yeah, it was. I'm glad we got through it, man. Okay. Yeah. It's a tough topic. I hope he explained like how it works in the history and, uh, was it good? Yeah, it was okay. If you want to learn more about suicide bombers, you can type in suicide bombers, um, terrorism. There's another article on how terrorism works. Um, just type whatever you want in the search bar at howstuffworks.com and, uh, you will be pleasantly surprised. We virtually guarantee it. Um, I said handy search bar. So, uh, what do you want to do? No listener mail today. All right. In lieu of listener mail, cause I was just reading listener mail. It just, not enough. I saw that you made it a face and kind of like waited away. Not today. And I don't have

another one ready. So let's just say, uh, how about just a thank you for, for listening? Is that good? That's what we're doing. Yeah. All right. Thank you for listening, everybody. Yeah. Something simple. That was it. Keep it pure. Okay. All right. Uh, if you want to say thank you back, we always appreciate that. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast at howstuffworks.com. Be sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join How Stuff Works staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Thank you. The War on Drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane

stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. Cops. Are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call, like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid. Be sure to listen to the War on Drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. Check out the podcast, Good Assassins, the unbelievable but true story of the greatest spy of World War II. A mysterious agent is strategically dismantling the Nazis' violent grasp on France. They don't know her name, but they want this woman dead. They send a devious double agent to hunt down the limping lady, but Virginia Hall was tougher than they expected. Listen to Good Assassins on the iHeart radio app

Apple Podcast and wherever you get your podcasts.