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Thoughts on Terrorist Targets
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Thoughts on Terrorist Targets
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As a longtime writer, who observed four revolutions and lived with terrorism in several Latin American nations, herewith a few observations. Despite all the warnings for us to fear indiscriminate killing from Al-Qaeda, thinking about their past targets is the way to understand them. All have been against U.S. military or government, e.g. the embassies, U.S. war ships, or major economic targets, e.g. the World Trade Center. Know your enemy and its strengths and objectives is the first rule for fighting effectively. We need to separate out our propaganda (that they are senseless killers) in order properly to analyze their objectives. Al-Qaeda's great strength is its dedication and the number of volunteers willing to do suicide missions, its growing numbers worldwide (not just among Arabs), and its decentralization. Al-Qaeda is not the wicked witch which just wants to kill Americans because we are good, as our president tells us. Rather, it is an extremely intelligent, ruthless and fanatic organization with a sole objective, to get America and Americans out of the Muslim world and, secondly, out of Europe and Asia. Simply killing Americans is not their objective. What they want is to inflict real cost and pain upon us first economically and then, if possible, with nukes or bio/chem weaponry to make us pay a cost for our foreign interventions. Secondly they want to make America the enemy of the whole Muslim world (a program in which they are abetted by many American fanatics also) or better of the whole 3rd world. This analysis brings the following conclusions – 1) Al-Qaeda won't repeat past actions. Planes now have fortified cabins and security search, but mainly pilots no longer have orders to do anything hijackers tell them, which was the old policy. Now they will fight back and passengers too will fight figuring they'll be killed anyway if their plane is hijacked. Suicide terrorism has changed government orders and policies from old days. 2) The greatest threat to airliners is from shoulder fired anti-aircraft missiles. There were reportedly thousands, and certainly there are hundreds in Iraq. These were under tight control when Saddam ruled. After the war they were robbed and sold on the black market and are now widely distributed.
3) Another great threat is stolen Russian (and other nations') nuke materials, (even our own are not fully accounted for), e.g. enriched uranium for a dirty bomb or even a real nuke. Here, too, the program of U.S. aid to collect such material has fallen behind because of concentration on the Iraq war. Also, since the neo-conservative takeover of American foreign policy, many foreigners really hate America, or rather, American policies, so we have many more enemies who might look the other way or accept bribes from terrorists, thus allowing them to get nukes or nuclear material. 4) Easier to hit are American targets and American civilians overseas. Already the U.S. Navy fears to allow shore leave in nations with substantial Muslim populations. American business interests and American citizens overseas are now warned by our own State Department that they have become potential targets. 5) Logic is for Al-Qaeda to play it cool and attack in a new way to frighten us and throw us off guard and to try to disrupt and even bankrupt America with unending threats. Think about an earlier threat from a captured prisoner to blow up the Brooklyn Bridge, taken seriously in media and by police. We were as dumb as the proverbial country hick who was offered to buy the bridge, from which story the threat was taken. How can a few explosives blow up the bridge? The real target of any suicide bomber would surely be the New York tunnels, not bridges. What
Washington Should Do New York City is still woefully under-funded for civil defense, e.g. reports indicate that firemen and police can still not communicate easily in the field. Instead civil defense money is squandered on small town America, giving them exotic technology and money instead of focusing money on vital economic targets. 2) Work all out to get control or help Russians control stealable nuke materials and bombs. This effort was recently let slide because of concentration on attacking and occupying Iraq. 3) Work with other nations to control 3rd world rogue powers and threats. The Administration is now returning to this policy. America cannot do this by going it alone and antagonizing the rest of the world with our arrogance and self-righteousness. We must work with the major world powers to control this great threat. We do not gain in this by antagonizing them. 4) Work seriously for peace between Palestine and Israel. This is the thorn in the whole world's back. Peace means compromise and fairness for both sides. The issue is increasing being recognized as such. A recent International Herald Tribune article analyzes the forces which are creating the chaos which is the real enemy of most of the world and the greatest threat to American interests. 5) Stop terrifying all Americans with general alerts. Ivan Eland explains how Israel and England do it. Widespread Washington alerts are just helping terrorists spread fear and respond to increased radio chatter. When they hit it will be when we are unprepared anyway. For an excellent overview of the general terrorist situation see this Christian Science Monitor analysis – so much for the War Party's claim that capturing Saddam has made us safer from terrorism. Go here for links to reports about how Al-Qaeda is achieving its objectives.
Jon Basil Utley is the Robert A. Taft Fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute. A former correspondent for Knight/Ridder in South America, Utley has written for the Harvard Business Review on foreign nationalism and Insight Magazine on preparation for terrorist threats. He is director of Americans Against World Empire.
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Previous articles by Jon Basil Utley on Antiwar.com Thoughts
on Terrorist Targets European
Anti-Semitism and the Religious Right Eight
Washington Lies About Iraq Bush
Foreign Policy and the Failing Stock Market 'Anti-Terror'
Bill Splits Conservatives Alternative
to Unending War Answering
the 'Wolfowitz Doctrine' on American Empire |