berman does not ascribe suicidal terrorist acts to fanaticism or desperation, but instead he argues that these tactics are used "when the terrorist group begins to encounter hard targets, like american military bases, that are impervious to everything else." to support this thesis, berman gives the taliban as an example of a group that switched from traditional guerrilla-warfare techniques they used against the northern alliance to suicide bombings used against the americans and other westerners, as the only means, berman argues, to make a significant impact against their new and more technologically advanced adversaries.