Mia Bloom, The Conversation

This week the world once again witnessed an Islamic State’s use
of at least one child bomber, perhaps two. A child between the ages of 12 and 14 was reportedly the culprit behind a suicide attack
– blowing up the wedding of Besna and Nurettin Akdogan in
Gaziantep, Turkey and killing 54 people on Aug. 20.

Although now the Turkish government is not certain whether it was
a child or an adult, it’s certainly not the only time children
have been used by terrorist networks to perpetrate attacks. The following day, a child was caught before he could detonate a suicide bomb
at a Shi’a school in Kirkuk, Iraq.

During the course of research for our book, “Small Arms: Children
and Terror,” John Horgan and I have learned how IS socializes
children into their terrorist network. We have also had the
opportunity to meet with children who have been rescued from
terrorist groups in Pakistan.

There are important differences in how groups engage children in
militant activities. Differences between children in terrorist
groups and child soldiers include how children are recruited and
what role the parents and community play in recruitment.

Understanding these differences helps us know how best to
approach treating the children’s trauma, and figure out which
children can be rehabilitated and which ones might be vulnerable
for recidivism as adults.

We have been researching IS Cubs of the Caliphate, so
called “Ashbal al Khilafah,” for two years, tracking how IS is
grooming the next generation of fighters. Since Syria fell apart,
IS has assumed de-facto control over schools and mosques. Though many
of the original Syrian schoolteachers remain, they must now teach
an IS-controlled curriculum to gender-segregated pupils. Parents
continue to send their children to school, although coercion is
always present. Failure to do so might place the entire family at
risk. IS will punish such families by taking their homes and
refusing to provide food and protection.

This is where children systematically learn IS ideology. The
school curriculum is little more than indoctrination, but it
brings children closer to each other to create a band-of-brothers
effect, and brings the children to the attention of IS personnel
who talent-scout for children exhibiting early potential for
“Cub” status in IS’ dedicated training camps. Through a
socialization and selection process, IS implies that entry into
the Cubs of the Caliphate is a rare commodity and something
desirable for each child. By limiting access, IS creates a
competition.

It is unlikely that the children share the radical views of the
adults. Rather, they have been manipulated, brainwashed or
coerced. It is a trend that IS started in January 2014 and has
only increased exponentially. Our experiences in Swat Valley,
Pakistan demonstrate that children barely understand the IS
ideology. At most, children parrot what they have heard from the
adults, but are not radicalized in any real sense.

Ease of access to children appears to be a key reason why there
were so many child soldiers in the 1990s. Whether militias
exploited orphans, street children or refugees living in camps
for internally displaced persons, a common theme was that
children who lacked adult protection and supervision were
especially at risk. Some militias transition street children, who were
previously organized into gangs, into military units. The ease
with which militia groups access camps in search of child
recruits exacerbates the problem.

Evidence from Sri Lanka suggests recruiters target schools. During the
course of my field research in 2002, mothers in the areas under
control of armed rebels, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam,
confided in me that they had started to homeschool their children for fear
that they would be recruited during the day.

The 15-year-old bomber who was caught with explosives in Iraq
this week had been in an IDP camp for a week
when he was sent to blow up a Shi’a school. When stopped for
questioning by the police, the child froze in fear and quickly
surrendered. Experience shows that children who are coerced will often
allow themselves to get caught, since they were coerced in the
first place.

Children are the ultimate weapon of the weak. They cannot back out, but they also
don’t want to carry out the mission.