Terror war veering out of control
The Cincinnati Post
cincypost.com
The anti-terrorist crusade is getting out of control. Terrorism is a threat, to
be sure. But our unfocused effort to attack our enemies everywhere
threatens to do more harm than good.
Worst of all is our campaign to unseat Saddam Hussein. We had a
chance to remove him from power during the Gulf War, but the elder
George Bush failed to push the campaign to a conclusion. Despite
sky-high approval ratings, like those of his son today, he wanted to
disengage the United States from the war as quickly as he could. And so
we have been tangling with Saddam Hussein ever since.
But that is hardly a reason to go after him now, in the wake of the
September 11 terrorist attacks on the
World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon.
There is no question that
Saddam Hussein has done some unspeakable things, both to his enemies
and to his own people. Yet there is no hard evidence, or for that matter,
soft evidence, that either he or his fellow Iraqis were involved in the terrorist
attacks.
The stakes are painfully high. As violence in the Middle East spirals out of
control, an unprovoked attack on Iraq could lead to retaliation on Israel,
which in turn could involve the entire Arab world. It would be a terrible price
for the United States pay to avenge itself this way in the name of family
pride.
Meanwhile, the United States is engaged in an even more puzzling
anti-terrorist campaign in the Philippines. The brutal Abu Sayyaf
kidnapping group numbers about 60 on the island of Basilan. The group
has thus far managed to elude about 7,000 Filipino soldiers. Now the
United States in wading into the fray with $100 million in military aid that
includes 30,000 machine guns.
As Pulitzer Prize winning columnist Nicholas D. Kristof has pointed out
recently, our entire effort seems ill-advised. The main public hospital on
Basilan serves about 300,000, but like such facilities in developing
countries around the world, has next to nothing to provide adequate
medical care. But anti-terrorism is popular these days, and so we plunge
ahead.
It's like that in Afghanistan, as well. Operation Anaconda is aimed at
rooting out the last Al-Qaida and Taliban fighters, holed up in caves far out
of the way. Yet even after a ferocious bombing campaign and ground
onslaught, we have little to show for our efforts. Reports of the fighting
simply provide body counts that are a painful reminder of the nightly news
from Vietnam, and the results appear to be about the same. Osama bin
Laden is still at large, and it now appears that we don't have a clue about
where he might be.
And yet we remain committed to an open-ended anti-terrorist campaign
that is costing a great deal of money, has a set of shifting targets, and has
no end in sight. Indeed, it's hard to know when it might ever end, or what
victory will entail.
But it is politically popular. The American people have traditionally been
willing to rally around their leader in times of crisis. They did so in World
War I and World War II. They believed in the anti-Communist campaign in
the Korean War, though the troubling stalemate helped bring down Harry
Truman in the end. And initially they supported the war in Vietnam.
Riding approval ratings seldom seen in the White House, George Bush
has every reason to push ahead. While the recession may be ending, the
economy is still not healthy. There is serious disagreement between
Democrats and Republicans in Congress over what kind of stimulus
package is appropriate and what to do about Social Security. The
president's hand-picked candidate for the Republican nomination for the
governorship of California recently went down to defeat.
Our American electoral system means that campaigns begin months, and
sometimes years, before an election takes place. Everyone in
Washington, and around the country, is maneuvering for position with this
coming November in mind. And November is eight months away.
I remain troubled by the travesties that took place on September 11. But
I'm equally worried about a politically-motivated anti-terrorist campaign that
may never end.
Allan Winkler is a history professor at Miami University.
Publication date: 03-15-02
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