Legitimacy and Capacity

NINE-ELEVEN
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The BEST STRATEGY: Attack the Terrorists' Capacity & Legitimacy
(September 21, 2001) The use of military force to respond to the terrorists attacks on September 11^th appears irresistible as well as necessary. But while military force can remove immediate threats, it is not the longer term answer for several reasons:

First, as the last 30 years in the Mideast demonstrates, force leads to force, and escalation to escalation.
Second, this is not a "war" - wars take place between nations and there are "rules of war' (including the Geneva Convention.) Instead these are terrorists acts which because they break all rules, can be even more devastating and pose more danger than war.
And third, money spent on war can't be used to mitigate the poverty and misery that often leads to such desperate acts -- in part because they have nothing to lose.

As WWII General and former President Dwight Eisenhower so eloquently said:

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children."

    Thus more effective long-term responses would be to:
    Impair the terrorists capacity, i.e. cutting off their money proved highly effective in Germany, and indeed in some respects may be easier to do because money leaves a paper and computer trail. (And terrorists should be less effective if they have to spend time raising and laundering money rather than just using that money to plan and carry-out terrorist acts - just as our own politicians are less effective since they spend so much of their time and attention raising money for their campaigns.) Note: "impairing capacity" also obviously includes the non-proliferation of nuclear, biological, and other weapons of mass destruction.
    Remove the terrorists' legitimacy. It's one thing for the president of the United States to say these terrorists' acts are not condoned, much less ordered by Muslim religion -- it would be far more effective if that message came from Muslim clerics, especially in Afghanistan. Reportedly the Taliban didn't outright reject US demands to turnover bin Laden but rather said they wanted proof of his complicity. The KEY is this response implies they would denounce him if there was proof he was responsible for the terrorist acts. While this is very likely just a smokescreen, a demand for proof is not itself unreasonable and proof will be needed to justify the retaliation in any event.
    But more importantly, this response offers the opportunity for the Afghanistan clerics to state the terrorists acts were not ordained or sanctioned by Muslim religion. That is, who did it and the necessary standard of proof are different and subordinate questions -- and gaining any admission that the acts were wrong could save innumerable lives over the next generations. In short we should call their bluff. (And indeed since in the past they claim they have isolated bin Laden so he cannot engage in such acts, ask them for proof he could not have planned or aided the terrorists acts.)
    The bottom line is without legitimacy the terrorists are isolated by world opinion, and limiting the terrorists capacity not only mitigates the risk of further terrorist acts, it mitigates their effectiveness to effectively scare and blackmail countries.

In an interview in 1998 bin Laden said he believed terrorists attacks against the United States would result in it breaking apart into separate, smaller, and weaker states... just as the USSR disintegrate after the war with Afghanistan. That is, he believes these acts of terror will make the United States implode and fall just as the World Trade Centers.
This is a gross miscalculation for several reasons: (1) the United States is far more cohesive in language, background and beliefs, and has a longer shared history than the former USSR; (2) Americans truly believe in their country (Europeans in the US have been amazed at our display of patriotism); and finally (3) we have far greater economic power than the former USSR (and seem to be doing the worst economic damage to ourselves.)

Indeed, instead of dividing us, these acts of terrorism have united us, rather than weaken us, they have strengthened us, and above all made us more aware -- and more grateful for -- and more willing to defend -- our country's strengths and freedoms.

In that interview bin Laden also stated he believed the US military is weak and unorganized, and its soldiers undisciplined and unmotivated. Certainly our defense policy has far too often and for far too long been based on profit rather than effectiveness. But the sheer magnitude of the expenditures (the US military budget was $310 billion in 2000, more than the world's next 12 largest militaries combined) leaves an awesome force.

And finally a newspaper in Northern Michigan carried a picture of a homemade sign that said "Kill Them All and Let God Sort Them Out." George W. Bush's reputation for strenuously defending and routinely using the death penalty in Texas perhaps gives his administration more time and leeway to pursue diplomatic and other initiatives than a Gore presidency would have.

Page prepared 9/21/01

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