Posted on 12/31/2002 3:09:11 AM PST by kattracks
Capitol Hill (CNSNews.com) - One homeland security advisor to the Bush administration charged Monday that the U.S. could not rely on defensive measures to gain victory in the war against terrorism. Other experts warned that terrorists will attempt another mass casualty attack against the U.S. in 2003.
Dr. David Kay is a counter-terrorism expert with the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies (PIPS), which sponsored a seminar Monday on the success of U.S. efforts to respond to terrorism and to deal with future threats. The chief U.N. nuclear weapons inspector in Iraq following the Gulf War, Kay believes the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks provoked an important change in the attitudes of government officials.
"I think 2002 ... was the tipping point when the metaphor for dealing with terrorism changed from 'terrorism is a crime' and the appropriate institutions for dealing with it are the police, law enforcement, and the judiciary," Kay said, "to 'terrorism is war,' and the appropriate tools for dealing with terrorism as war are completely different."
Such a shift in mindset is absolutely essential, Kay warned, for dealing with a threat he believes is eminent.
"Although we have often talked in the past ... about weapons of mass destruction or mass disruption, chemical, biological," Kay recalled, "I think 2003 will see terrorists finally making offensive use of technology to do us great harm."
Because of the potential for that threat to become a reality, Paul Bremer, chairman and CEO of Marsh Crisis Consulting, said the U.S. must fundamentally change its primary response to terrorist threats.
"This war cannot be won on the defensive," Bremer said. "No matter how good we make our homeland security, there is virtually no way we can defend all of the targets that terrorists can come after."
A member of the Bush administration's Homeland Security Advisory Council, Bremer served as ambassador-at-large for counter terrorism under President Reagan after spending 23 years with the U.S. Diplomatic Service. In 1999, House Speaker Dennis Hastert appointed him chairman of the National Commission on Terrorism.
Bremer believes terrorists' motivations have changed over the past 20 years from attracting attention for their causes to exacting retribution and revenge for perceived wrongs. That, combined with the potential for access to weapons of mass destruction, means the U.S. must abandon any ideas of responding to terrorism as a law enforcement problem.
"Wait and respond is no longer acceptable," Bremer explained. "We have to move from 'wait and respond' to 'detect and destroy.'"
Because potential targets are unlimited, terrorists would only need to seek out a "weak link" in U.S. security to launch a successful attack. That, Bremer said, leaves the administration with only one option.
"We have to go on the offensive," he said. "To be blunt, we have to kill the terrorists before they come here and kill us."
Michael Swetnam, CEO and chairman of the board of PIPS, offered his assessments of U.S. efforts to accomplish that and other counter-terrorism goals in 2002.
"I think that we can give ourselves a full bevy of mixed grades in our war against terrorism," he said.
Swetnam - co-author of Usama bin Laden's al-Qaida: Profile of a Terrorist Network , and a member of the technical advisory group to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence - gave the U.S. the following "grades" for its counter-terrorism efforts:
- A to A-minus: Assembling world coalitions in the fight against terror. Swetnam noted aid provided by Syria, Yemen and Pakistan, nations that have traditionally harbored terrorists;
- B to B-minus: Efforts to fight al Qaeda. While the U.S. has disrupted the organization, seized some of its money, and captured or killed many of its leaders, more then three-fourths of the group's leadership is alive and attempting to regroup;
- C-minus: Reconstructing domestic civil defense. While the federal government has created a Department of Homeland Security, state and local governments have, Swetnam believes, been given little direction and no money;
- D: Addressing the root causes of terrorism. Swetnam believes the U.S. is losing the propaganda war to bin Laden and other Muslim extremists who promote hatred of Americans;
- F: Addressing shortcomings of the intelligence community: Swetnam believes the problems in U.S. intelligence agencies, which allowed the 9/11 attacks to be planned and executed without detection, still exist;
"We have a mixed grade this first year of our war on terrorism," Swetnam concluded. "Unfortunately, we will probably have many years yet to improve upon these grades before this war on terror is fought to the point where we can feel comfortable again."
E-mail a news tip to Jeff Johnson.
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A couple of things.
Without us to hate they would need to find new targets for their bloodlust, anger and angst of humiliation.
We are the "new" targets. Traditionally, the envy you speak about, with its inevitable bloodlust, anger and angst of humiliation, has been a pillar of Islamic culture. In the past, these motivations were exercised on their neighbor; muslim against muslim, clan against clan. They consumed one another. It is the same as it ever was; only now, the caliphs (and therefore, the mullahs) have had 50 years of petro dollars, enabling them to propagandize the masses and to redirect that sin outward also.
I agree that as long as they remain Islamic, it cannot be helped or changed. Islam is a corrupt, false and hopeless religion. It is not our fault, and we will do what it takes to eliminate the threat.
There is much in our culture that is shameful and selfish. We cannot be quick to defend the immoral aspects of our own culture.
Bump for Truth.
It should have happend in 1993. The intent of the masterminds of the first attack on WTC: knock one tower into the other so that they both collapsed onto the street. If successful the death toll would have been tens of thousands.
The difference? The Clinton Administration was absolutely dominated by LAWYERS. Two in the White House, and many in the Cabinet.
Only a LAWYER could possibly confuse war with crime.
Keep LAWYERS out of the White House.
At last someone has said it!
There is no reasoning with terrorists. But the perpetrators understand and fear violence directed against them and what they love. The US must field teams of assassins and terrorists to repay the violence IN KIND.
We must unleash our own counter-terrorism that is so vicious and blood-thirsty that no terrorist or nation will dare hurt an American or damage an American property. They will fear and respect us more when their own dead children and wives lie dismembered on their doorsteps. Then (and only then, in my opinion) will the terrorism problem cease.
As a point of historical fact, the KGB followed such a policy in the Middle East and terrorism directed against Soviet embassies ceased altogether.
Ah yes, the awe-inspiring combination of nuclear weapons and toothless camel humpers with outdoor plumbing.
Wrong on all counts.
There is nothing wrong with Islam that cannot be fixed by a rapid detonation of a few nukes.
Spelled correctly or not, what is this "imminent" BS?
What is CNSNEWS?
What was Sept 11, 2001? We are up to our eyeballs in war whether we were dragged kicking and screaming into it or not
Mecca-Medina-Qom.
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