In its imperial power Britain was not amused by IRA and noted their explosions:

"McLaughlin, was arrested near the scene; he was charged with unlawfully killing McDade and causing an explosion ."

In fact terrorism has respectable pedigrees :

terrorism (n.)
1795, in specific sense of "government intimidation during the Reign of Terror in France" (March 1793-July 1794), .
" If the basis of a popular government in peacetime is virtue, its basis in a time of revolution is virtue and terror -- virtue, without which terror would be barbaric; and terror, without which virtue would be impotent." [Robespierre, 1794]
General sense of "systematic use of terror as a policy" is first recorded in English 1798 ( in reference to the Irish Rebellion of that year) . At one time, a word for a certain kind of mass-destruction and terrorism was dynamitism (1883) "The work of dynamiters especially one who uses it unlawfully ".

During World War I frightfulness (translating German Schrecklichkeit) was used in Britain for "deliberate policy of terrorizing enemy non-combatants " . It was the basis of German actions during their march through Belgium in 1914. The Belgian city of Leuven was largely destroyed. One German officer later wrote about the town, "We shall wipe it out... We will teach them to respect Germany. ".

" After the war, the British adopted the tactics in Ireland with its armed militia given free legal power as Black and Tans . "

Winston Churchill organised them.
" In November 1920, the Tans "besieged" Tralee in revenge for IRA killing local RIC men. They closed all the businesses in the town, let no food in for a week and shot dead three local civilians. . On the night of 11 December 1920, they sacked Cork, destroying a large part of the city centre."

So it may be British style not to have war on terrorism but be appalled at dynamiting, exploding , discharging fire-arms or driving trucks in improper manner causing bodily impairment . Or the customary "disturbing the peace" . In Iraq the charge may be blocking traffic .

Terrorism is an excellent means of attacking a superior force or army.

Don't stand and fight the lion head on, just attack and run.
If you inflict enough wounds over time you may indeed bring the lion down.

It is also known as gorilla warfare, and it worked in Vietnam.

It may not have worked if the Viet cong, hadn't been able to blend with
citizens in villages. Isis uses the same tactics.
Protecting citizens from bombing may be the difference between America and the
United Nations helpers winning a war or losing it.

Or being bogged down in a war for decades. The early successful conquerors, didn't
have any qualms about killing citizens, that's why they won. They didn't leave men alive
who would take up ams at the first chance and they would have to fight them all over again.

America had taken thousands of Iraq combatants prisoner in the Iraq war.
But because the people back home said if they hadn't had a trial, they should be let go,they set those men free and ended up having to fight them all over again, as Isis.
People in Western countries, need a good dose of reality.

The Yanks deal with gorillas in a different way from British laws.

" David Hicks sells his AK-47 to pay for a taxi in a bid to flee to Pakistan, but is captured by Northern Alliance fighters in Baghlan, Afghanistan." "David Hicks was captured by the Northern Alliance unarmed in the back of a truck or a van. So he wasn't on the battlefield at all." The Yanks landed at the airport, grabbed Hicks and locked him up in Guantanamo in communist Cuba. ( The US pays rent to Castro brothers for the political prison ).
2007
"February 2: Mr Hicks is charged for a second time, this time with providing material support for terrorism and attempted murder."
UK declared him a British citizen and would probably have charged him with not wearing a seatbelt in the van . Australia froze his income from his book in the interests of wearing seatbelts .

Nicknamenick

In the very beginning when David Hicks's father and Mother and the Australian
Media found out about his capture and imprisonment by the American government
his mother handed some letters over to the Australian authorities.

In the letters David Hicks boasted about his involvement in the taking of the village of
Kashmir and the imposing of the Muslim faith on that village. A lot of those villagers
were killed in that incident.

David Hicks joined the Muslims in left winged ideological hatred of his own country, and then when the fighting got too rough for him or rather he found the Taliban and Alqueada groups were not the romantic revolutionary heroes he had delusional ideas about, but cold blooded killers, he scurried like the frightened pampered little western
boy he was,desperate to get back to the country he had turned his back on.

When you fly with the crows you get shot down with the crows. David Hicks was over there flying with the crows, by the words in his hand written letters to his mother, who later said she wouldn't have given those letters to the Australian investigators when she
fully understood the implications of all that was to come.

I believe him to be a traitor the same as I believe Julian Aasange is a traitor..
Where does Assange want to go, why back home to the West. A pampered little Western boy like him doesn't want and couldn't live in those countries he champions
as being better than his Western countrymen
Let him remain without a country in the embassy or he can go and live with Muslims
Seeing as how he thinks the west is so much more evil than them.
The Muslims have a long history of conquering and bloodshed, as does the Western
Empire, dating back to the time of the Romans. He just has to decide what side he is loyal too. He won't stop the wars, nobody in history has been able to do that.
Choose your side Julian.