With open USA borders, no shortage of suicidal homicidal terrorists and a world flooded with weapons you have to ask yourself why we have not had any attacks in the USA? I dont believe it is because we have been good and lucky.
I think the reasons we have not had a serious attack in the US since 9/11 relates to the reasons you have cited but also to the fact that an attack brings with it increased pressure on the terrorists, pressure which is serious and damaging to their efforts. As a result of 9/11, Saudi money has been curtailed, some very important high-ups such as KSM have been captured, networks have been rolled up, Afghanistan as a base has been lost, OBL is in hiding, Iraq has been invaded, and there have been increased security measures taken in the US. Thus, I suspect that the calculation has been made that small-scale attacks are not worth the trouble they cause, but major catastrophic ones are definitely worthwhile.
The factors you cite, while true, do not necessarily compel a series of small attacks because they are not worth suffering through our response. Ironically, they increase the incentives for large scale attacks, which is what I expect will be attempted at some point.
I think this was the lesson of the 1993 WTC bombing--a small attack followed by a response that did a lot of harm to domestic terror networks. After 1993, we suffered through a number of international incidents. None domestically, however, until 9/11. |
