Some people, especially Americans, became familiar with the term “terrorism” on September 11, 2001, and believe this is the date the United States first encountered it. In fact, the United States had been battling terrorists for decades, responding in a variety of ways to such incidents as the kidnappings of U.S. diplomats in Latin America in the late 1960s and 1970s; the murder of two U.S. diplomats in Sudan in 1973; the takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Iran in 1979; the suicide bombings of the U.S. Embassy and U.S. Marine barracks in Lebanon in 1983; the bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993; and the suicide bombing of the USS Cole in 2000. While the U.S. government met some of these acts with CIA operations and secret meetings with leaders of the nations involved, others were met with military strikes...