The years after 9/11 clearly show terrorism isn’t the threat it seemed

The Columbus Dispatch ^ | Sunday, February 29, 2004 | GWYNNE DYER

[Loyal Buckeye]

History has been derailed. It was chugging along quite satisfactorily until the end of 2000: the Cold War long over, no threat of a major war anywhere, democracy spreading even to the most unexpected places by nonviolent means and a growing commitment to multilateralism in all the major powers.

Now there is a great and greatly exaggerated fear of terrorism, American troops rule over 50 million deeply unhappy Muslims in Afghanistan and Iraq, the 55-year-old NATO alliance is starting to come apart under the strain and even the United Nations is at risk.

Was the world bound to end up in this mess, or have we been the victims of a huge historical accident?

The two main forces that have driven us off the familiar track and down this worrisome detour are the Islamist terrorists of al-Qaida and the neoconservatives who populate the upper reaches of the Bush administration. Was it really inevitable that al-Qaida would invent a novel way to carry out a massive terrorist attack that would cause thousands of casualties? And was it equally inevitable that American neoconservatives would use that terrible event as a launching pad for their own project?

Al-Qaida and the other radical Islamist organizations associated with it are very small, very weak and very isolated, even within their own societies. In almost 30 years of trying, the Islamists have not succeeded in toppling even a single pro-Western government in the Arab world. Before 9/11, most observers of the Arab world would have said that the Islamists had already peaked in terms of popular support — without ever becoming truly popular — and were starting down a long, slow decline toward irrelevance.

Then, Osama bin Laden’s people hit upon a new means of attack that could cause mass casualties: suicide teams of aircraft hijackers that included trained pilots. Nobody had ever considered that within the realm of probability, so nobody was watching out for it, and the attack was a spectacular success for al-Qaida. But it was unlikely ever to be repeated, because the security forces know now what to look for, and nor are there dozens of other novel ways for terrorists to wreak huge damage just waiting to be discovered.

All of al-Qaida’s subsequent attacks have been conventional carbombs, and the casualties they have caused over the past 30 months do not exceed 1,000 people. Even with the short-term boost that their spectacular attack on 9/11 gave to the Islamist cause, they have still failed to overthrow a single Arab government. They just got lucky once. It was a fluke.

As for the neocons in the Bush administration, it was an electoral fluke of the first order that they were even in office at the right time to exploit the Islamist attack for their own purposes. Their project was the unilateral exercise of American power to create a U.S.-friendly global environment — pax Americana, they used to call it — and they had even chosen an attack on Iraq as the way to launch it, which is why an attack on Iraq was on the agenda in the very first Bush cabinet meeting in January 2001. But they had not even mentioned this project during the 2000 election campaign and, in normal circumstances, they would have had a hard time persuading the American public to back it.

It was the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington that convinced a majority of Americans that the world was full of dangerous people who had to be dealt with and gave the neocons the chance to hitch their pax Americana project to the "war on terror" that President Bush proclaimed after 9/11.

The invasion of Afghanistan probably would have happened, even if Al Gore had been president. Popular pressure to punish the regime that had given the terrorists bases was enormous, and the attack on Afghanistan was seen both in the United States and elsewhere as a legitimate and entirely legal response to the terrorist attack. But Iraq was a very different case.

From the start, Iraq was the vehicle the neocons preferred for the launch of their project: the point was to create a horrible example of what happens to countries that consistently defy the United States, in the hope that everybody else would be scared into line lest it happen to them, too.

Could the Bush administration ever have persuaded the public to go along with such a project if not for the terrorist attacks on 9/11? Probably not. It was the marginal project of the Islamists that gave wings to the equally marginal project of the neocons.

In other words, we are in the midst of a train wreck. None of this was bound to happen. In fact, it was quite unlikely to happen. Nevertheless, it has happened, and now we are living with the consequences of that. We may be living with them for some time.

[Loyal Buckeye]

Comments?

[Ole Okie]

Bush did it?

Barf!

[07055]

So, because Bush has succeeded in stopping more terrorist attacks against the US, that means those attacks would never have occurred anyway...

That seems to be the Kerry line for the upcoming election.

[EllaMinnow]

...American troops rule over 50 million deeply unhappy Muslims in Afghanistan and Iraq...

I'm at a loss for words. Too bad Gwynne Dyer wasn't.

[Semper Paratus]

History has been derailed. It was chugging along quite satisfactorily until the end of 2000

That's as far as I got, didn't have to read the rest, all Bush's fault.

[hershey]

Iran is next on the list.

[conservativecorner]

ROFLMAO at the stupidity of the writer. Can individuals really be so blind to all the dangers we face as a country?

[foreverfree]

bump

[cynicom]

I wonder what the age of the author.

[fsorbello]

This is the same Kerry line of "Things have been over-stated."

It's kind of sad, really, because if had asked anyone, especially the "experts" they would have told you we were going to get hit again and soon. In fact, they're still saying that...we just went through some "terrorism games" down here for readiness' sake.

I guess the point is, because we've prevented these bastards from hitting us again, the threat wasn't as severe as we were told. That's BS.

[smith288]

His contact page

[Puddleglum]

Good grief! Bush has done great things to combat terrorism. In chess terms, he put a rook in the terrorists' back row and now they're ineffectually scrambling to protect their home turf. The PLO is weakening, Iraq is free, Iran and Syria are edgy, Libya is surrendering its ambitions - would any of this have happened without Bush's leadership? I don't think so. With Gore, Israel would probably have already had to concede territories at some phony "summit" to a smiling Arafat.

[sgtbono2002]

You just know where this girl has her head and its dark and smelly up there.

[WV Mountain Mama]

So in her world, as long as they are using small bombs and not killing many people at a time, it is ok. Sept 11th was inevitable and therefore ok. There are so many flaws in her thinking it is hard to know where to begin. I suggest she spend a year in Israel and have to ride the buses everywhere she goes, and she only eat in popular cafes. She may change her tune or at the very best, shut up.

[thoughtomator]

If, theoretically, I were missing a brain, I too might think there was no connection between our muscular military response to 9/11 and the lack of attacks on US soil since.

[Vigilantcitizen]

"ROFLMAO at the stupidity of the writer. Can individuals really be so blind to all the dangers we face as a country?

Yes. And it's sad.

[livius]

Stunning. Bush's very success is going to be used against him.

Bush's swift, firm policies successfully prevented further attacks against us (so far), but how do you prove that?

I suppose one could just listen to the ravings and threats coming out of al Qaeda and the mad mullah of the moment - but of course the press doesn't even refer to these people as terrorists.

Another thing that Bush did was to give us all tremendous confidence at at a very devastating moment in our history. Our economy really did shudder with uncertainty, but now that he has restored it, he gets no credit. I have actually heard people say, oh, things weren't that bad after 9/11. How soon they forget.

[KC Burke]

All of al-Qaida’s subsequent attacks have been conventional carbombs...

I'm sure the plane load of people that almost died from a terrorist with a bomb in his shoe would beg to differ.

The arguement of this writer is an insult to those thousands that died in 9/11 and to those who risk their lives to keep us safe.

[gore_sux]

After reading Ann Coulter's "Treason", I see these anti-American writers, celebrities, politicians etc... in a whole new light.

They care nothing for the values they pretend to espouse, they are only interested in the destruction of America. Since the commies couldn't accomplish it, they are now tying their wagon to Islamo-fascists.

[JohnEBoy]

Imagine a Gallup poll taken on 9/12/2001 of Americans. The question is: How soon do you think there will be another terrorist attack in the USA? The choices are Within 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, 1 year, 2 years or none at all. On the day after 9/11, how many would have said "none" or nothing after 2 and 1/2 years. The percent responding that way would have been very, very small.