In an Unwinnable War, We Will Lose Most

by David Corn

That is not defeatism. Terrorism is a methodology, and a methodology cannot be vanquished. Specific terrorists can be targeted and perhaps destroyed. But it is a mistake to declare a set of means the enemy.

By doing so, President Bush and his comrades have given us a war with no natural finale, with no obvious terms of victory. In his better-than-ever speech to Congress, Bush did attempt to establish a potential conclusion by saying this war "will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated.'" But that is an objective difficult to accomplish and tough to certify.

Moreover, the threat of terrorism cannot be conquered. For as long as the war continues -- and beyond that -- the United States will be vulnerable to terrorism; no military action is going to alter that reality.

The Bush team does seem to recognize this sad point, without explicitly addressing it. During a press conference nine days after the September 11 attack, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was asked what would entail success in this new war. "Victory," he said, "is persuading the American people ... this is not a quick matter that will be over in weeks, a year, or even five years." What an odd remark. Rumsfeld was defining victory as the populace accepting the notions the threat will be present for years to come and America will have to remain on a neo-war-footing for a long while.

If this war does stretch on for years -- remember, the war on drugs has been under way for three decades -- the United States will remain at a disadvantage in many regards. Anyone who has been watching the military strategists and politicians on television in the last week must by now be familiar with the wonkspeak term "asymmetric warfare" -- which means a conflict between opposing parties of vastly different military strengths. This asymmetry applies to areas other than military force -- particularly vulnerabilities. Americans have more to lose in this war than its enemies -- sophisticated infrastructures, the benefits of higher standards of living, good plumbing. And the United States offers far more targets. Look at one of the early dilemmas of this war for U.S. military planners. They quickly considered bombing Afghanistan but encountered a problem: what's worth bombing there? A few terrorists can do far more damage within the United States than a company of Special Forces troops can do in Osama bin Laden's neighborhood. (How will Bush and his advisors even prove they are waging this war, if it evolves into a series of episodic covert operations? Will he occasionally release a statement saying, "Last week a five-person terrorist cell was neutralized, but we cannot tell you anything else about that, and, by the way, the Empire State Building is still standing?")

Yet these commissions -- which put out reports chockfull of proposals for reorganizing the federal bureaucracy and creating new offices to manage counterterrorism -- said nothing about airport and airliner security. The most prominent counterterrorist experts in the nation toiled on these reports, and they didn't get close to guessing what was coming. At a press conference on September 17, Gilmore noted his panel "didn't have a specific discussion about airport [security], I believe, because there's no point in discussing one particular attack, when any million of them might occur."

Any million? How do you defend against a million possibilities? Indeed, the second report of the Gilmore commission refers to various nightmare scenarios beyond Hollywood's favorite -- terrorists with a nuclear device. It highlights "agricultural terrorism" as one form of dirty warfare deserving more attention, noting it would be a breeze for terrorists to use "pathogenic agents" to destroy livestock and crops. The study also reports there are 1500 germ banks throughout the world, where terrorists could purchase dangerous biological agents. It describes how terrorists could easily steal a piece of medical equipment, remove radioactive material from the machine, and use a conventional bomb to spread that radiological matter in a populated area.

Think of all the targets awaiting terrorists. Water supplies. Many major cities receive their water through pipes that traverse hundreds of miles. Every inch cannot be protected. Chemical factories, nuclear plants. How difficult would it be to crash a Cessna into one and unleash a Bhopal or Chernobyl? Or set off a McVeigh-like bomb near a facility that handles hazardous substances. One terrorism expert raises the prospect of celebrity assassinations on live television. A Pentagon consultant notes that a war game he participated in came to a sudden finish when the "terrorists" (of which he was one) found a way of planting dangerous bacteria in the oil supply of western nations; the West caved. A dozen or so car bombs probably could cut off all access to Manhattan. A suicidal extremist could drive a car packed with explosives on to the Golden Gate bridge. The Hoover Dam. Attacks on food supplies. Are their any limits to their diabolism? Explosions at churches, synagogues, hospitals or universities. Car bombs at elementary schools. A suicide bomber in decent shape could easily bolt past the guards at the Capitol. A free nation the size of the United States cannot control immigration to prevent the entry of the small number of people needed to engineer dastardly (and low-tech) operations.

In this war on terrorism, the violence is not likely to flow in only one direction. That is not to say bold and severe steps should not be taken against the mass-murderers who orchestrated and executed the September 11 attack. The United States should move against them. But the profound vulnerabilities of the United States ought to be weighed heavily when options are considered, and responses ought to be designed to minimize the prospects these vulnerabilities will be further exploited.

So, many readers ask, what is to be done? It is fine to understand the historical, cultural, and geopolitical contexts of the event, they note. But what about action? I refer them to a proposal of Michael Klare, a professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College. In an article for Salon.com, he suggested that the United States indict Osama bin Laden and his associates as mass murderers and organize a multilateral campaign that pursues their capture as a criminal manner -- not a war. Additionally, Klare would have the United States mount an effort to encourage influential Muslim clerics to condemn bin Laden as an enemy of true Islam.

"To win over peace-minded Muslims to our side in this struggle," Klare writes, "we will, of course have to show greater sympathy for their concerns." That is, recognize context and revisit U.S. policy in the Middle East -- not to appease bin Laden (who cannot be appeased) but to construct a coalition that can help us achieve justice without a war that could create new set of problems, such as civilian casualties, destability in important nations, and greater antipathy toward the United States. Klare's strategy might even be less likely to stir further terrorism than a heavy-handed military-oriented approach.

Would a touchy-feely endeavor succeed? We will never know. The war on terrorism has already been declared. To those who seek alternatives to (rather than critiques of) the current plan, it is too late. For the time being, we are stuck with Bush's metaphor of war, and perhaps a war itself.

It is no surprise that Bush in his speech to Congress -- in which he finally managed to display stature -- dodged contexts and urged us to look forward. But as we step into this war, we should continue to contemplate what brought us to this dangerous point.

Let's start by asking this loaded question: was inconveniencing the Soviet Union in the 1980s by having the CIA support the anti-Soviet Afghan resistance worth the lives of 5000 or so American civilians in 2001? It was in the breeding ground of the mujahadeen -- where the United States trained and supplied a resistance force that included anti-democratic, fundametalist, misogynist extremists and drug traffickers -- that bin Laden and his lieutenants received their starts in the take-on-a-superpower line of work. Bin Laden was one of the prime recruiters for the CIA-backed mujahadeen. In his work for that band, he developed an international network.

With this in mind, a friend who works in the Pentagon -- on the other side of the building from where the airliner hit -- sent me the following note.

"The night of the attacks I saw Bud McFarland [who was a national security adviser to President Reagan] being interviewed. I wanted to reach through the TV and choke the living shit out of that bastard, after his Afghan mujahadeen buddies tried to blow up my ass that day. Whatever weenie was interviewing him asked for his expert views on international terrorism, but never had the balls to ask what his evaluation was now of the 1980s policy of supporting those psychos in order to stick it to the Soviets. I knew that idiocy would produce a blowback, but I never dreamed it would be this monstrous."

He is right to view the policy decision to assist the mujahadeen so personally. Perhaps without the CIA intervention in Afghanistan, bin Laden would still have developed into a dangerous threat? But did McFarland and his colleagues consider the consequences that could arise from arming and emboldening anti-democratic, fundamentalist thugs in a far-away land? There is no indication they did.

Their failure to do so should serve as a caution to the policymakers of today: bombs can continue to reverbate long after they have exploded; special operations set off ripples that emanate for years. Such reflection, though, is unlikely when Americans are dead and war is at hand.

In his speech before Congress, Bush noted that "it is my hope that in the months and years ahead life will return almost to normal," and he insisted we have not entered an "age of terror." He was trying to be reassuring. But this was not straight talk. It is hard to envision a years-long war on terrorism that will not produce times of tremendous terror.