Home Grown Terrorism in the United States (US): Causes, Affiliations and Policy Implications

The April, 2013 tragic Boston Marathon bombings by two United States Citizens of Russian origin was a demonstration of the weakness of counter terrorism measures and lapses in the operational mechanisms of the US-Russia counter terrorism task force. The paper uses theoretical and practical inferences to provide a comparative analysis of terrorist operations in the United States and the Russian Federation. Whilst the theoretical aspect outlines a background of terror groups in the US and Russia and their operational strategies, the practical approach provides a comparative analysis of counter-terrorism measures in the US and Russia, terrorist techniques and implications on the joint US-Russia counter terrorism policy. The effectiveness of the US-Russia counter terrorism task force largely depends on the willingness to adopt define common counter-terrorism mechanisms through defensive and preemptive lenses.