John Kerry has taken a lot of heat over his comments about reducing terrorism to a “nuisance level.” People are asking what exactly that means.
Well, remember when a bomb going off in a bar or on a bus was a sad thing that happened somewhere far away? Remember when PanAm flight 103 went down over Lockerbie and no countries were invaded as a result?
What, you didn’t think September 11 was the first instance of terrorism ever, did you?
We can’t prevent all terrorism everywhere in the world any more than we can prevent all murders. There, it’s been said, it’s unpopular, it’s true. The President says “Our goal is to defeat terror by staying on the offensive.” How do you defeat terror? How will terror surrender? Who will sign the armistice? And against whom shall we be offensive? If it was alright to go into Iraq to stop terrorism, why not Chechnya or Palestine? How do we minimize the fact that the War On Terror will leave civilian casualties which will result in Anti-American sentiment, breeding the next wave of terrorists?
So we come quickly to the realization that the United States can at best prevent terrorism in the United States and against United States interests such as embassies and military bases/ships.
Anti-terrorism efforts should be primarily a law enforcement action. And that’s not a bad thing. A cop who knows his beat will notice when something is wrong, and we must trust that he will deal with the problem appropriately, as he has been trained to do. But just as the police can’t stop crooks by random searches of passers-by, we will need to use judgment about what methods to use. We will have to ask questions like what are we trying to prevent? Is that a reasonable threat? Will our methods work? What will it cost? Will it cause more problems than it solves? Is the action justifiable in the eyes of the people and the law?
We need to stop saying “That’s fine, as long as it keeps me safe” and start asking “How does this make me safe?”