A rchive Date
[ 14-10-2001 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ U.S ]
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[http://www.canoe.ca/Columnists/byfield.html
Learning to think like the terrorists
By TED BYFIELD -- Edmonton Sun
October 14, 2001
The FBI warned Thursday to expect another major terrorist hit on the United States this weekend, and for all I know the same paper that carries this column may also carry the horror stories of what the FBI was talking about.
One thing you can count on. They wouldn't say this without good reason. The cost of that warning will run into billions. Who would want to fly this weekend?
Another thing to note is this: Though the announcement was made anonymously, it was no leak. President George W. Bush expected it and commented on it. And since he had been urging Americans to return to normal life, well, again, this means the FBI must have wind of something.
Or have they been duped? Are the terrorists familiar enough with their detection methods to feed them false information to continue to disrupt the economy without doing anything? This too will have been considered and they made the announcement anyway.
It's fascinating, if chilling, to consider what the American and British counter-intelligence agencies have to do. They must learn to think like terrorists and look at the terrorist task from the terrorist perspective.
What will he do for an encore? Topping the murder of some 5,000 people, the total destruction of two of the biggest buildings in the world, and a direct hit on the headquarters of the biggest military machine in the world - that's a hard to act to follow.
Various extravaganzas have no doubt been considered - spraying lethal bacterial or viral infections by crop dusting aircraft on downtown areas. Or sinking a cruise ship with 2,000 or 3,000 people aboard. Or parking a truck loaded with explosives in the middle of Los Angeles. Or blowing up the stadium at a major football game, so you kill more people in the stampede to get out of the place than you kill by the explosion. If it did nothing else, that would pretty well wreck the football season.
All worth considering, no doubt, but each poses certain problems. Germ warfare, say scientists, is extremely difficult to wage without the highest and most sophisticated control equipment, which is hard to come by and even harder to operate.
And you can depend on it, the police will be watching very carefully all huge and highly publicized assemblies of people, making the lugging of bombs into stadiums difficult. The fans generally do not bring suitcases to football games. Unless, of course, the stuff came in with the food and beer supply, so that will be watched too.
One anti-terrorist expert last week said that the most probable threat is nuclear weapons. They have proliferated dangerously, the Russians have laid off thousands of atomic scientists and underpay the ones they still employ. So the expertise may be available. One nuclear explosion in the Chicago Loop would do the job, and you wouldn't need that big a truck to haul it in. Ten-, twenty-thousand lives in one wallop, that would meet the order.
All of these eventualities are likely high on the FBI's list of possibilities and maybe something like this is what they're talking about.
Other more fundamental things will also engage them. For instance, what precisely are the terrorists trying to achieve? If everything went just the way they wanted, what would happen?
The destruction of Israel certainly, but far more than that. What they say they want is the destruction of the United States, in fact of all "western" civilization. They regard it as evil incarnate. (And, judging from some of the recent offerings out of Hollywood and the rock music world, they could make a pretty good case for this.) That is their stated goal and, however preposterous, they are unquestionably pursuing it.
They have discovered also three elementary facts which, they think, make this possible. One is the vulnerability of the technological economy. It ultimately depends upon universal goodwill. It can be disabled by terrorism. The second is the extreme vulnerability of the modern mega-city. It too can be crippled.
The third is our national defence establishments. They're wholly geared for war between great nations, not for war against small, determined, highly trained, absolutely dedicated groups.
In short, the whole nature of warfare has changed. That's what confronts us.
Letters to the editor should be sent to letters@edm.sunpub.com
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
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