Schneier has a piece discussing some of the recent over-reactions to the plane plots. He takes the stance that the terrorists are winning, which is completely correct.
Imagine for a moment what would have happened if they had blown up 10 planes. There would be canceled flights, chaos at airports, bans on carry-on luggage, world leaders talking tough new security measures, political posturing and all sorts of false alarms as jittery people panicked. To a lesser degree, that's basically what's happening right now.
Our politicians help the terrorists every time they use fear as a campaign tactic. The press helps every time it writes scare stories about the plot and the threat. And if we're terrified, and we share that fear, we help. All of these actions intensify and repeat the terrorists' actions, and increase the effects of their terror.
(I am not saying that the politicians and press are terrorists, or that they share any of the blame for terrorist attacks. I'm not that stupid. But the subject of terrorism is more complex than it appears, and understanding its various causes and effects are vital for understanding how to best deal with it.)
The implausible plots and false alarms actually hurt us in two ways. Not only do they increase the level of fear, but they also waste time and resources that could be better spent fighting the real threats and increasing actual security. I'll bet the terrorists are laughing at us.
Another thought experiment: Imagine for a moment that the British government arrested the 23 suspects without fanfare. Imagine that the TSA and its European counterparts didn't engage in pointless airline-security measures like banning liquids. And imagine that the press didn't write about it endlessly, and that the politicians didn't use the event to remind us all how scared we should be. If we'd reacted that way, then the terrorists would have truly failed.
What I don't like about his arguments is that he is ignoring that a secure public tends to be a complacent public. He should know this from his work with computer security. "Nothing bad has happened, so why should I take any precautions." That is the attitude that the US public falls into continuously. I'd even postulate that some fear is a good thing. The problem is that fear is something that is difficult to control the volume on.
Here's a thought experiment for you. Imagine that al-Qaeda successfully executed a dirty bomb attack in Washington D.C. What would the level of support for the Iraq war be? Not very attached in perspective, but the conflict in Iraq is related to the war on terror. Remember that the insurgency in Iraq has al-Qaeda support, and to a large extent is al-Qaeda personnel, and the terrorists there are fighting those who are best equipped to fight them, the military. The Iraq theater also is a PR front for the US. It does show the Muslim world that the US is not just after their oil, but believes in democratic states where the people run things and not despotic regimes. I know this is a minor message, especially since the MSM has ensured that it is just that, but it is a message that some Muslims are bound to understand. Fear in this instance would steel the public resolve to finish the job right. That resolve has gotten very soft in recent time, and fear of military deaths and failure is slowly creeping into the resolve of people to see success there.
Sadly, I doubt that the public in general, and politicians and the press in specific, will follow that advice.
Here's a thought experiment for you. Imagine that al-Qaeda successfully executed a dirty bomb attack in Washington D.C. What would the level of support for the Iraq war be? Not very attached in perspective, but the conflict in Iraq is related to the war on terror. Remember that the insurgency in Iraq has al-Qaeda support, and to a large extent is al-Qaeda personnel, and the terrorists there are fighting those who are best equipped to fight them, the military. The Iraq theater also is a PR front for the US. It does show the Muslim world that the US is not just after their oil, but believes in democratic states where the people run things and not despotic regimes. I know this is a minor message, especially since the MSM has ensured that it is just that, but it is a message that some Muslims are bound to understand. Fear in this instance would steel the public resolve to finish the job right. That resolve has gotten very soft in recent time, and fear of military deaths and failure is slowly creeping into the resolve of people to see success there.
It's time we calm down and fight terror with antiterror. This does not mean that we simply roll over and accept terrorism. There are things our government can and should do to fight terrorism, most of them involving intelligence and investigation -- and not focusing on specific plots.Well said.But our job is to remain steadfast in the face of terror, to refuse to be terrorized. Our job is to not panic every time two Muslims stand together checking their watches. There are approximately 1 billion Muslims in the world, a large percentage of them not Arab, and about 320 million Arabs in the Middle East, the overwhelming majority of them not terrorists. Our job is to think critically and rationally, and to ignore the cacophony of other interests trying to use terrorism to advance political careers or increase a television show's viewership.
The surest defense against terrorism is to refuse to be terrorized. Our job is to recognize that terrorism is just one of the risks we face, and not a particularly common one at that. And our job is to fight those politicians who use fear as an excuse to take away our liberties and promote security theater that wastes money and doesn't make us any safer.
Sadly, I doubt that the public in general, and politicians and the press in specific, will follow that advice.
1 comment:
It seems like every time there is a terror alert, all of the people who are the target of the terrorists are the ones who have to pay the price in loss of freedom. We need to get more active against the terrorists themselves. Remember when it seemed that people were getting kidnapped all the time, and the demands were always that some other terrorist be set free? One of the suggestions that I heard was that every time someone was kidnapped with those demands, we should immediately execute the terrorist they were trying to free. It would seem that we need some sort of reprisal system against terrorists, rather than the current system that only hassles the terrorists' targets.
Just my opinion.
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