Pape’s 2005 publication Dying to Win analyzes all known instances of suicide terrorism between 1980 and 2003: a total of 315 attacks. He found that the attacks were not explained by individual motives and beliefs, and discovered little correlation between religion and suicide terrorism. He proposed instead a “causal logic of suicide terrorism,” which suggests that such actions are a strategic response to foreign occupation by a democratic power. Pape’s research found that every terrorist campaign, and more than 95 percent of all suicide bombings, had the objective of national liberation at their heart.

  The corollary of this argument is that the use of military force by foreign powers to subjugate or reform societies will serve only to promote a larger number of suicide terrorists than would otherwise be the case. As Pape argues, suicide terrorism is not the result of an existing supply of fanatics, but is a “demand-driven phenomenon.”