The threat of terrorism cannot effectively be countered unless the United
States changes its arrogant, me-first global ways and faces up to the fact that
many people in other lands are -- rightly or wrongly -- damn angry about it.
This proposition has become something of a mantra among progressives who
counsel restraint in response to the horrific attacks of September 11. But it
is also a sentiment popular within a subset of the national-security
establishment: counterterrorism experts.
I am not suggesting that all the I-know-terrorism talking heads you watch on
television are sensitive souls who place priority on understanding "root
causes." But since September 11, I have attended several
what-to-do-about-terrorism meetings in Washington, and I have been surprised to
see that many prominent terrorism wonks believe the United States cannot rely
solely on a military response. They argue that in order to diminish the threat
of terrorism at home, the US must also re-examine its foreign policy and
actions abroad.
At one conference, Jerrold Post, who was a psychological profiler at the CIA
for 21 years and who pioneered the government's effort to fathom the psychology
of terrorism, noted that the "real dilemma" is the existence of "roiling hatred
within the Arab world directed at the United States . . . America
doesn't have the vaguest idea how much hatred." Terrorists, Post maintained,
exploit people's "feelings of despair over economic conditions . . .
and [over] totalitarian regimes." As a result, he said, the effort against
terrorism is "not a military struggle in many ways," adding, "I do worry about
the militarization of the conflict, particularly when civilian populations
become casualties. . . . There is a hazard in the [war]
metaphor, if taken too literally. . . . It could widen that
polarization" between the United States and large segments of the Arab world.
Shibley Telhami, an academic and mainstream think-tanker who specializes in the
Middle East and who also spoke at the conference, agrees. Of the Osama bin
Laden outfit, he said, "This group captures a popular mood in the region." He
also argued that the United States must mount a "reduction of anger" initiative
and that "the shortest answer is moving on the Israeli-Arab peace process."
These are just some of the people who know terrorism best and who are warning
the public not to expect too much from military force in the quest to reduce
the threat. At the same meeting, Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism expert at the Rand
Corporation, said that military action, while appropriate, "should not be seen
as the answer." H. Allen Holmes, a former assistant secretary at both the
Defense Department and the Department of State, asserted that any use of force
must be accompanied by a US diplomatic effort that seeks to improve the image
of America overseas. "We must provide assistance and listen to other states,
including states heretofore regarded as rogue states," he said, adding: "There
is a strong belief [in the Middle East] that great powers manipulate the
governments of the region, and the United States is seen by many as the big
manipulator and has become identified with governments unpopular in the
region."
A rough consensus might be the following: the attacks of September 11 -- the
work of evil extremists -- should not be viewed outside their geopolitical
context. The experts who say this are not rationalizing the attacks. Rather,
they are realistically assessing larger factors that must figure into a
coherent counterterrorism strategy. After the conference, Holmes, who also
served as ambassador to Japan, South Korea, and other nations, elaborated: "In
a war on terrorism, there will be no victory. We can contain it, slow it down,
diminish it. But only if we put together a grand coalition for the long haul to
do something about the sources of terrorism. Pakistan has 40 percent
illiteracy, a low GNP, so the mosques are turning out
terrorists. . . . We will never abandon Israel, but we need a
different idea of how to be a broker. We are so identified with one side of
that conflict."
Holmes needed no translator: to curtail terrorism, the United States must
change its foreign policies. Doing so will not sway the most fanatical and
murderous thugs, such as Osama bin Laden and his crew. They appear to crave a
bloody religious war, not better wages for Yemeni workers. But the goal --
long-term, to be sure -- is to make it harder for mass murderers of this sort
to recruit followers and win support from portions of the public (such as those
Pakistanis who have demonstrated in favor of bin Laden), while making it easier
for the United States and other nations to work together to root out and punish
terrorists.
A just conclusion to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would probably not
persuade bin Laden to renounce his war against Americans and Jews. But a
resolution there could remove one large complication in the effort to align
nations (and their people) against bin Laden. A counterterrorism strategy that
takes US foreign policy into account in this manner is not on the minds of many
in Congress or the Bush administration. President Bush keeps calling his war on
terrorism a battle for freedom and tolerance that pits "legitimate" governments
against rogues. But try telling that to dissidents in Saudi Arabia or Egypt. Or
Pakistan, now ruled by a general who gained power through a coup. The only
foreign-policy changes Bush seems to be contemplating are those that lend
support to ruthless heads of state who sign up for Bush's war. See Vladimir
Putin and Chechnya.
SEVERAL DAYS after the above-mentioned conference, the House Intelligence
Committee's subcommittee on terrorism held a rare public hearing. Appearing as
a witness, Lee Hamilton, a former Democratic congressman who recently served on
a national commission on terrorism, noted that in visiting 28 countries,
members of the commission encountered "a deep resentment about what the United
States stood for" and were told "that managing that resentment will be one of
the major foreign-policy challenges" for the United States.
No one on the committee asked Hamilton to expand upon this. Instead, the
lawmakers mostly wondered about which agencies were best prepared to respond to
terrorist attacks and how much authority would be granted to Tom Ridge, whom
Bush has appointed to a new Cabinet-level counterterrorism position. After the
hearing, I asked Hamilton what could be done to manage the resentment he
mentioned. He first pointed out the "sharp distinction between resentment and
hostility." The latter motivated the September 11 attackers, he said, and that
antipathy cannot be countered. "The broader foreign-policy problem," he
explained, "is resentment. Hostility swims in the resentment."
So what can be done about this resentment? Hamilton had only the mildest of
suggestions: "What you do is listen. Style makes a difference in the conduct of
American foreign policy. We have a reputation for not listening, for being very
arrogant, for insisting it is done our way."
My next questions were obvious: beyond listening better, what concrete policy
measures should the United States adopt? And has the Bush administration
bolstered America's reputation for being arrogant? Before I could finish
asking, Hamilton was gone. Even though he had raised the resentment issue, he,
too, appeared more comfortable discussing bureaucratic reorganization.
The need to think beyond military solutions was also raised at a bizarre talk
given by Jeff "Skunk" Baxter before a group of military policymeisters, defense
contractors, and Defense Department employees a few days after the attacks.
Weeks before September 11, the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies, a
Pentagon-friendly think tank, had asked Baxter -- who was a lead guitarist for
the Doobie Brothers and Steely Dan and a music-technology whiz before he
fashioned himself into a military-technology expert -- to present the case for
a national missile defense. After the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks,
Baxter -- with his droopy moustache and old-guy ponytail -- was still happy to
do so. He argued that in the post-9/11 world, missile defense remains
"imperative" because China could still intimidate the United States by
threatening to launch one or more of its two dozen or so nuclear missiles.
Beijing, he claimed, would not be deterred by the prospect of a US
counterstrike: "If we launch a nuclear attack against China, all we do is solve
their housing crisis." He maintained that Chinese leaders do not think about
"protecting the public." So imagine, he commanded his audience, that in the
midst of another September 11-like event, China moved against Taiwan and told
Washington, Back off or we'll take out Los Angeles. How could the
president appear on television and say, I am going to prosecute a war in
Taiwan, and America must prepare for further casualties?
Here was an undiluted Star Wars fanatic. What was interesting, however, was
that even a hawk like Baxter, who is a consultant to the Pentagon, saw the
limits of a counterterrorism policy that depends on military action. The
problem, as he put it, is that the United States faces an adversary driven by
powerful forces: "You live in a dirt-poor place, but if you blow yourself up in
the name of Allah, you'll get 73 virgins, all the dope you can smoke, backstage
passes to Bruce Springsteen. . . . How do we nullify and negate
that threat?" Simple, he said: "The way to keep a kamikaze pilot out of
aircraft . . . is to deal with it at the source" -- that is, the
motivation.
The goal of US policy, he said, should be to "re-engineer the perceptions of
our enemies." Suicide bombers have to be convinced that "they get nothing for
dying for Allah," and the people who support terrorists -- whether those people
are leaders or commoners -- have to be convinced that such violence is an
insult to Islam and counterproductive. So Baxter proposed a Manhattan Project
of "perception engineering," which would explore and develop a variety of
means: psychological warfare; propaganda campaigns designed by advertising
executives ("these guys were selling Chevrolets when they were crap with the
`heartbeat of America' "); nanomachines that can invade the circulatory
system and affect the brain and thought patterns of the target; cultural
products that engender warm feelings toward the United States. "This World
War III is a different war," Baxter commented. "It's an information war
. . . a war fought with ideas. . . . I can give you a
valium and make you feel good. I can give you a musical score and engineer your
perceptions. . . . All this is doable."
The audience's positive response was intriguing. Most listeners appeared to
accept his premise that motivation and causation had to be addressed. Baxter,
of course, skipped past the possibility that persons who harbor ill will toward
the United States might possess legitimate grievances about, say, economic
conditions, the repressive conduct of governments backed by Washington, or the
pervasive influence of American culture. His answer was not to solve problems,
but to manipulate the responses to problems. Nevertheless, his kooky proposal
focused on ideas, not missiles.
Actually, the key to an effective counterterrorism strategy is ideals, not
missiles. If the evidence is strong that bin Laden and his gang executed the
September 11 attacks -- and as of this writing, the Bush administration has yet
to present the case -- then these evildoers ought to be targeted. It would be
better to capture bin Laden and his lieutenants than to blast them --
especially if the latter entails civilian deaths, causes a larger refugee
crisis, and thus fuels further resentment. But even if bin Laden is, as the war
pundits like to say, "taken out," a difficult set of tasks will remain: to
reconfigure US policy, to change American conduct abroad, and to transform not
just the perceptions of people in the Third World, but the ugly
realities that many of them face. The job, no less, is to make the United
States a force for social justice overseas. Yes, that's a lefty cliché.
But don't take the word of do-gooding Kumbaya progressives. Just ask some of
the national-security experts.
David Corn is the Washington editor for the Nation. This piece was
first published on alternet.org.
Issue Date: October 5 - 11, 2001
