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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: MSI who wrote (2259)	10/2/2001 4:26:16 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Improved civil defense (esp. a strengthened public health sector!) and aggressive war on terrorism are not mutually exclusive; they are both necessary.

To: MSI who wrote (2259)	10/2/2001 5:29:15 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 281500

MSI... We'll always be vulnerable, no matter how tight our security. No amount of security will prevent a determined attacker from penetrating our safeguards and checkpoints and carrying out an attack. Right now, I can name any number of methods in which prospective terrorists can cause tremendous loss of life, as well as economic damage. And no one would really be able to remain so alert that they could prevent them. For a comparison, one only as to look at the "war on drugs". No matter how much money we spend, drugs still get through, people still get high, and drug dealers still pervade our streets. And this is because it is "profitable" and the "cost/benefit" analysis still favors engaging in such activity. To stop terrorism, the cost/benefit analysis for those nations that permit and facilitate such activities must become too expensive a price to pay. Terrorism doesn't just "happen".. It is supported financially.. It's practictioners are harbored (as OBL is being harbored in Afghanistan), and its soldiers are drawn from the ranks of the people within these nations. So to TRULY stop it, we have to be willing to take whatever military action is necessary to obtain the result we desire, namely the identification, arrest, and punishment of those individuals engaged in these terrorists acts. I truly hope we don't have to commit US ground forces to a campaign in Afghanistan. HOWEVER, if our threats to do so are seen as hollow and without substance, then it will become imperative, if only to prevent others from perceiving the US is a paper tiger, unwilling to avenge the deaths of 6,000 of its people and the destruction of some $40 Billion worth of property. We learned a painful less from Neville Chamberlain at Munich. When you start negotiating with "evil", that evil will eventually seek to dominate you because it perceives you as too weak to oppose it until it has become too late. I agree with you that basic civil defense measures have been lacking for many years. And I'm certainly not against improving it. But if you have the will to destroy the evil that threatens you before it has a chance to implement its plans, you'll make such civil defense measures extraneous. As far as I'm concerned... if any individual declares war against the US, and take physical steps toward carrying out plans or operations against us, that provides us carte blanche to "remove" them as a "player" from the global political game. Fight our wars overseas, or better yet, provide those who oppose this evil in their own countries the means to overthrow these governments and institute more moderate regimes. But for god's sake, let's not run in fear and turn our country into an armed camp, or a police state. Hawk