John Mueller is Professor of Political Science at Ohio State University and the author of "The Remnants of War." He is currently writing a book about reactions to terrorism and other perceived international threats that will be published early next year. This is his article that appears on Foreign Affairs.
THE MYTH OF THE OMNIPRESENT ENEMY For the past five years, Americans have been regularly regaled with dire predictions of another major al Qaeda attack in the United States. In 2003, a group of 200 senior government officials and business executives, many of them specialists in security and terrorism, pronounced it likely that a terrorist strike more devastating than 9/11 -- possibly involving weapons of mass destruction -- would occur before the end of 2004. In May 2004, Attorney General John Ashcroft warned that al Qaeda could "hit hard" in the next few months and said that 90 percent of the arrangements for an attack on U.S. soil were complete. That fall, Newsweek reported that it was "practically an article of faith among counter terrorism officials" that al Qaeda would strike in the run-up to the November 2004 election. When that "October surprise" failed to materialize, the focus shifted: a taped encyclical from Osama bin Laden, it was said, demonstrated that he was too weak to attack before the election but was marshalling his resources to do so months after it. On the first page of its founding manifesto, the massively funded Department of Homeland Security intones, "Today's terrorists can strike at any place, at any time, and with virtually any weapon." But if it is so easy to pull off an attack and if terrorists are so demonically competent, why have they not done it? Why have they not been sniping at people in shopping centers, collapsing tunnels, poisoning the food supply, cutting electrical lines, derailing trains, blowing up oil pipelines, causing massive traffic jams, or exploiting the countless other vulnerabilities that, according to security experts, could so easily be exploited? One reasonable explanation is that almost no terrorists exist in the United States and few have the means or the inclination to strike from abroad. But this explanation is rarely offered. (Full article.)
OMNIPRESENT ENEMY
This year what shall we commemorate? What ghosts shall accompany our odes? Are we forever to bow to a headless myth? Is it right? Is it hopeful? Will it pass on, Joining those without cause now gone?
Time is a fickle creature shaped like dreams; Last year can be no more than one year, The year before that and the next and the next. Ghosts wander in our minds not upon the ground And only in dreams might we call to them.
Rage flies swiftly dispersing its grave weight And we feel nothing behind our dead face. Have we ever felt anything, headless phantoms, we? Last year mocks not the year before. It is we, we who mock the solemn red dawn.
We’ll soon bow our headless heads In majestic awe and whispers of vengeance Soaring on high, burdening the ground With a wrathful screeching sound.
THE MYTH OF THE OMNIPRESENT ENEMY
For the past five years, Americans have been regularly regaled with dire predictions of another major al Qaeda attack in the United States. In 2003, a group of 200 senior government officials and business executives, many of them specialists in security and terrorism, pronounced it likely that a terrorist strike more devastating than 9/11 -- possibly involving weapons of mass destruction -- would occur before the end of 2004. In May 2004, Attorney General John Ashcroft warned that al Qaeda could "hit hard" in the next few months and said that 90 percent of the arrangements for an attack on U.S. soil were complete. That fall, Newsweek reported that it was "practically an article of faith among counter terrorism officials" that al Qaeda would strike in the run-up to the November 2004 election. When that "October surprise" failed to materialize, the focus shifted: a taped encyclical from Osama bin Laden, it was said, demonstrated that he was too weak to attack before the election but was marshalling his resources to do so months after it.
On the first page of its founding manifesto, the massively funded Department of Homeland Security intones, "Today's terrorists can strike at any place, at any time, and with virtually any weapon."
But if it is so easy to pull off an attack and if terrorists are so demonically competent, why have they not done it? Why have they not been sniping at people in shopping centers, collapsing tunnels, poisoning the food supply, cutting electrical lines, derailing trains, blowing up oil pipelines, causing massive traffic jams, or exploiting the countless other vulnerabilities that, according to security experts, could so easily be exploited?
One reasonable explanation is that almost no terrorists exist in the United States and few have the means or the inclination to strike from abroad. But this explanation is rarely offered. (Full article.)
OMNIPRESENT ENEMY
This year what shall we commemorate?
What ghosts shall accompany our odes?
Are we forever to bow to a headless myth?
Is it right? Is it hopeful? Will it pass on,
Joining those without cause now gone?
Time is a fickle creature shaped like dreams;
Last year can be no more than one year,
The year before that and the next and the next.
Ghosts wander in our minds not upon the ground
And only in dreams might we call to them.
Rage flies swiftly dispersing its grave weight
And we feel nothing behind our dead face.
Have we ever felt anything, headless phantoms, we?
Last year mocks not the year before.
It is we, we who mock the solemn red dawn.
We’ll soon bow our headless heads
In majestic awe and whispers of vengeance
Soaring on high, burdening the ground
With a wrathful screeching sound.
Next year how shall we mourn?
Copyright © 2006 mrp / thepoetryman