With due respect, Robert, if terrorism were a no-win strategy, it would not be practised so widely. The Israeli Stern gang achieved most of their aims in forcing the British out of Palestine after WW2, the Algerian campaign for independence used many of the tactics you describe here as 'terrorist', you would call Hizbollah terrorists at your peril if you were in Beirut, and even the IRA achieved a degree of power that they would never have had if they had not conducted their armed campaign. As for the imperative of not talking to terrorists, obviously somebody temporarily suspended that rule when they invited Hamas to the Kremlin. One thing that links most, but admittedly not all, 'terrorist' movements is that they usually spring up in countries where the usual legitimate avenues of politicial discourse and redress are either consciously blocked by the ruling power or deemed to be so by the disaffected ruled.