Sunday Discussion Group

July 1, 2007

The dramatic events in Britain over the last couple of days are a stark reminder of a terrorist threat that is likely getting worse for the West, not better.

Fortunately, no innocent people suffered any serious injuries as a result of these attacks in Britain. What’s more, the attackers do not appear to have been well trained:

Several experts and officials said the technology behind the London car bombs seemed amateurish. While the attackers apparently tried to detonate the bombs using cellphones, “they didn’t go off because there were not top-grade people putting them together,” one Western official said.

In this sense, people were very fortunate, but the fact remains that the British terror alert level is now at “critical,” the highest level possible, and an aggressive investigation is underway. The events lead to several questions worth considering for those of us in the United States:

* Americans have experienced some horrific instances of terrorism (9/11, Oklahoma City), but the kind of incidents we’ve seen in Britain have not reached our shores. Why?

* Oliver Willis suggests we’re “living on borrowed time.” Are these kinds of attacks in the U.S. inevitable? (Andrew Sullivan writes, “The truth is: it’s amazing we haven’t had more of this kind of thing, especially in the US. When it comes, we need stamina, stoicism and calm. And it’s coming.”)

* How ready is the United States for these kinds of threats?

While considering these questions, I’d also offer an insightful perspective from Newsweek’s Fareed Zakaria, whose recent cover-story sheds some light on the subject.

The crucial advantage that the United States has in this regard is that we do not have a radicalized domestic population. American Muslims are generally middle class, moderate and well assimilated. They believe in America and the American Dream. The first comprehensive poll of U.S. Muslims, conducted last month by the Pew Research Center, found that more than 70 percent believed that if you worked hard in America, you would get ahead. That compares with 64 percent for the general U.S. population. Their responses to almost all questions were in the mainstream and strikingly different from Muslim populations elsewhere. Some 13 percent of U.S. Muslims believe that suicide bombings can be justified. Too high, for sure, but it compares with 35 percent for French Muslims, 57 percent for Jordanians and 69 percent for Nigerians.

This distinct American advantage — which testifies to our ability to assimilate new immigrants — is increasingly in jeopardy. If leaders begin insinuating that the entire Muslim population be viewed with suspicion, that will change the community’s relationship to the United States. Wiretapping America’s mosques and threatening to bomb Mecca [as Tom Tancredo has suggested] are certainly a big step down this ugly road.

What do you think?

Too bad we can’t track those 13 per cent who think suicide bombing is justified, because that is probably one of the two most despicable attitudes that I can think of. The other despicable attitude is that it is okay to drop bombs on civilian areas.

The indications that these were not well-trained terrorist bombers goes against the thesis that they’re coming out of Iraq. Unfortunately terrorist bombing is an idea whose time has come.

  • As been mentioned by my friend Tom Cleaver, the bigger problem isn’t the US muslim population, the problem is domestic terrorism.

    Oklahoma City and various anti-abortion bombs/assassinations were all caused by “good” Americans of the Christian Fundamentalist stripe and virtually ignored by the Bush Admin (can’t imagine why…)

    One of the most disturbing books I have read in the past year is Blackwater. Chuck Colson, the ex Nixon crook and born again, is mentioned as a pal of Blackwater founder Erik Price. Chuck wrote an “essay” in 1999 that basically states that Americans CAN NOT BE TRUSTED to make the “RIGHT” choices and thus it can ONLY BE SAVED by the Christian Fundamentalist Right by ANY MEANS NECESSARY. And as we have seen throughout history, the more reality ruins fanatics fantasies then the more fanatical/dangerous they have become.

    Added to this is the fact that lowered recruiting standards have allowed various criminal elements, mentally unstable and probably racist groups into the US military and access to military training and combat experience.

  • What do you think?

    I think it’s bullshit that trillions are pumped into Iraqi national security when those resources could help avoid the next mass-terror frame-up on American soil (and just think, it could be done without setting the U.S. Constitution afire like has already been done by the Loyal Bushie Brownshirt Cabal).

    I guess in the worst-case scenario, we’ll have to fight them here (police state, degraded Constitution & Bill of Rights) and there (Cheney Protectorates of Iraq & Iran). And if that doomsday does happen, I’d like someone to explain to me from our FEMA concentration camp that the terrorists haven’t won.

  • On my daily search for all things Giuliani (it always, always cheers me up, because his candidacy is so ridiculous), I saw a clip of him on “Hannity & Colmes” discussing the terrorist activity in London. He mentioned the use of CCTV in the city and how this sort of surveillance helped catch people a day or so after 7/7 and how it, or something like it, was used in New York City. I’m wondering if this is really that different than anything the U.S. has to offer, since Hannity likened it to the very necessary, very successful Patriot Act and wireless surveillance in this country. Considering the right’s disturbing habit of lumping very different things together (like Romney, with al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood) or (Giuliani, with Iran and al Qaeda), I think it’s a fair question.

  • I think Fakaria has the essence right. A society’s disenfranchised will always be susceptible to radicalism and extreme actions. We’ve had this in our country, but our rabble rousers have tended to be right wingers, often cloaked in Christianity. Oklahoma City, the anthrax mailings, abortion clinic bombings, and the long reign of terror from the KKK come to mind as examples of ‘typical’ domestic terrorism.

    If there’s an upside, it’s that the people who act out their radical solutions tend to be less than brilliant. They lash out without really thinking their plots all the way through. The danger is when clever people go this route.

    Disenfranchising entire groups is the surest route to increased terrorism. All groups have their clever persons. When those persons become radicalized, you’ve got a problem.

  • We’ve had this in our country, but our rabble rousers have tended to be right wingers, often cloaked in Christianity. Oklahoma City, the anthrax mailings…

    Oh, well, it should be no problem then for the FBI to solve the crime and prove how right wingers allegedly got a hold of military-grade anthrax and sent it to the Democratic leadership in the Senate not long after the 9/11 terrorism attacks.

  • “Oh, well, it should be no problem then for the FBI to solve the crime and prove how right wingers allegedly got a hold of military-grade anthrax and sent it to the Democratic leadership in the Senate not long after the 9/11 terrorism attacks.”

    Huh?

  • P.S. I guess the anthrax terrorist attacks didn’t fall under the auspices of the “Global War On Terrorism.”

  • Completely agree with JKap (#3). If Bush had lost either of the last two elections, we’d be so much more secure, and we wouldn’t have needed to radically undermine our Constitutional rights in the process. Of course the two are related–when we undermine the Constitution by locking people up indefinitely, with no charges and no rights to representation, we breed resentment and hostility.

    Same goes with torture. Has there been a dumber debate over the last decade? Can anyone point to a single *real* expert on security/ military matters who thinks torture is a good idea? It’s these draft-dodging armchair macho men like Cheney (and now Scalia) who can’t get enough of it.

  • Americans have experienced some horrific instances of terrorism (9/11, Oklahoma City), but the kind of incidents we’ve seen in Britain have not reached our shores. Why?

    I think it’s because everyone in the US is on the lookout. But the point about American Muslims being well-assimilated and content is a good point. I always feel there will never be a revolution in the US because the people are contented, as long as things stay the same- and that’s good, as long as people have the ability to correct the problems we still have through the political process. As many assholes as a Muslim may meet here, they’re going to keep bumping into people like me, who are nice and aren’t prejudiced, over and over again. And they can earn money by working, get an education, and get the things I want. So a Muslim can think I’m an unbeliever or an Infidel or whichever it is, but it’s going to be really hard for them to hate my guts, because we’re not bulldozing their houses in America down, and I didn’t do any required military service that involved kicking anybody’s door down and pushing his mother and his sister to the floor. I think of places like Jersey City, and there are tons of Muslims there. At least the ones I meet seem very American and they have American friends.

  • A major problem with Fareed Zakaria’s Newsweek figures (and similar approaches) is that outside of terrorist hotbeds such as Iraq, we’re dealing with what are essentially outliers — rare events conducted by small groups of extremely radical individuals that could be exist within any demographic. We’re much more likely to get hit by lightening, often used as an example of a rare and largely random event, than by a terrorist.

    The amateurish nature of the London bombings brings up another common myth all too often pushed by the Bush administration — that terrorists are “sophisticated.” Aside from some intricate financial networks al Q had going, most of their tactics are quite primitive right now. (I recall someone once citing Bin Laden’s use of runners rather than satellite phones as an example of “sophistication.” Gimme a break!) That could change should terrorists acquire the ability to deliver biochemical or nuclear devices, but my sense is that such advance capabilities would make them easier to spot. Buying a box cutter generally doesn’t raise much suspicion, even if you look middle eastern.The IEDs now being used in Iraq have become more sophisticated, but building them over there and building them here are two entirely different matters. In any event, I don’t really see what sophistication has to do with anything right now, again, because these are rare events.

    Predicting that attacks are coming to the US as Wills and Sullivan do is a lot like saying one day a volcano will erupt or a tornado will strike. Duh. I happen to live in an area where the likelihood of an event is higher than in most places (of terrorism, not volcanoes) but the chances of my being present where and when an attack occurs is remote. To get my shorts in a knot about it would be irrational. This is not to diminish the tragedy suffered by those who would be involved, but the notion of complete safety is a fallacy. Obviously, we should take reasonable precautions — after becoming separated on 9/11, my wife and I now inform one another where we’re going to be during the workday if not in the office — but when an event occurs, we should not be surprised. Nor should we panic. Sullivan is right on in that regard and the Brits have set an example we’d be wise to follow.

    How ready is the US to meet another attack? Good question. So far, much of what BushCo has done (and frightened Republicans have backed) has been useless. We let Bin Laden escape, we created a training ground in Iraq and pissed off nations who might otherwise have cooperated with us and shared intelligence. Flooding law enforcement and intelligence agencies with bogus leads makes it less likely we’ll identify real threats. And frisking my 80 year-old mother-in-law at the airport is idiotic. Katrina exposed all sorts of response vulnerability. So the answer to how prepared we are probably depends upon where, when and what kind of attack occurs — and how lucky we happen to be that day.

    America needs to understand that the goal of terrorists is to terrorize, which oddly enough puts the victim in control of whether or not terrorism succeeds. When we allow ourselves to overreact and let fear take over, we allow them to win.

  • I was just taking a stroll down the New World Order memory lane and was reminded that the anthrax sent to Senators Daschle and Leahy was delivered in waves on the ides of the demise of many of our Constitutional rights, The U.S.A. Patriot Act.

    And I just wanted to mention what an abhorrent framing of the The Enabling Act that the “Patriot” Act is. To suggest that a set of policies or laws equates to patriotism is anti-patriotic. True patriotism is love for country. I also submit that it is highly patriotic to exercise our freedom of speech in promotion of a vibrant and robust democracy.

  • Americans have experienced some horrific instances of terrorism (9/11, Oklahoma City), but the kind of incidents we’ve seen in Britain have not reached our shores. Why?
    The very first thing I thought of when I read this was about how the USA’s muslims are more integrated than Europe’s muslims, and then you went on to mention that.

    Not that this latest incident has been linked to Arabs much less muslims (at least not yet), so it may be dangerous to so quickly make such an assumption.

    Geography is probably an issue too: Europe is simply closer, they might be firmly establishing themselves there first in order to make a launching place to attack us next.

    Too bad we can’t track those 13 per cent who think suicide bombing is justified, because that is probably one of the two most despicable attitudes that I can think of. — Dale
    When I read this you seem to be implying that only muslims hold such attitudes, and that may or may not be true.

  • The United States has had eleven school shootings since 9/11. How these are not viewed as acts of terrorism is beyond me. Terrorism is the use of anonymous innocents to send a horrific message to the public by a terrorist that no one they dislike is safe at their hands. School shootings send the message that none of us or our kids are safe from a random nut(s) with multiple guns and propane bombs.

    The fact that we only look at acts by muslims or middle eastern peoples as act of terrorism shows that we fully accept our own society’s insanity, just not that of other cultures. I do not fear Islamic extremists nearly as much as I do one of our own societal outcasts or radicals out to make a point.

    It’s inevitable that someone, somewhere will do something terrible on our shores. However in this game of whack-a-mole, we only have our eyes on the hole marked al Quaeda, while others bent on terror will pop up and do their deeds. Terror is and always will be a part of humanity. We just need to recognize that the things we do, such as marginalizing members of our own society or waging horrific wars in other countries serves as an incubator for further acts of violence.

  • I think that any discussion of global terrorism must involve taking a hard look at the influence of religion. Arabs living in the Middle East have many secular reasons to be upset with the West, however, it is hard to argue that their actions are not influenced by religion. Similarly, the American government is filled with people who read their bibles literally and who hunger for the “end times.” Can we really expect religious extremism to be good for global stability, be it Islamic extremism or Christian extremism?

  • The one positive thing about the bombing in England is that I heard the news media here commenting on how calmly the Brits were taking it. And unlike previous bombings/attacks, those “on the street interviews” with US locals all said the same thing: they were more likely to die crossing the street than from terrorists, if we stop living our lives and live in terror, the terrorists have won.

    Maybe the result of years and years of Republican fearmongering is a sense of perspective.

  • Added to this is the fact that lowered recruiting standards have allowed various criminal elements, mentally unstable and probably racist groups into the US military and access to military training and combat experience.

    I think there is a very high chance that with rise of the religious-right netroots we will see some very dangerous elements along the lines of this become more powerful in America. The CIA and the FBI will not counter it because their definition of patriotism runs more towards those fringe groups and they will see intimidation of liberals as tending toward the overall security and good of the country. Then people who prefer not to attract attention to themselves will have difficuly choices to make. Only the strong will be able to counter this grave threat.

  • I posted my friend Larry Johnson’s commentary on these “terrorists” yesterday. Asa former CIA counter-terrorism expert, I think he knows what he’s talking about. The comment is in yesterday’s thread on this topic and if you didn’t read it I suggest you do so, if only to get some “food for thought.”

    As to the Bush Administration and these “terror threats,” here’s my comment (lifted from Wikipedia):

    The Reichstag fire was a pivotal event in the establishment of Nazi Germany. At 21:15 on the night of February 27, 1933, a Berlin fire station received an alarm call that the Reichstag building, the assembly location of the German Parliament, was ablaze. The fire seemed to have been started in several places, and by the time the police and firemen arrived the main Chamber of Deputies was in flames. Looking for clues, the police quickly found Marinus van der Lubbe, shirtless, inside the building.

    Van der Lubbe was a Dutch insurrectionist council communist and unemployed bricklayer who had recently arrived in Germany. Hitler used this as evidence that the communists were plotting against his government. That night Van der Lubbe and 4000 Communist leaders were arrested. Hitler forced President Hindenburg to pass an ’emergency decree’ suspending all articles that guaranteed freedom and liberty. Hitler’s police were then allowed to seize property and take people without any sort of trial. The death penalty was introduced again for many crimes and concentration camps were set up. The Nazis’ twelve year terror over their opponents had started.

  • While we wait for more good information about the failed car bombings yesterday in Great Britain. Today’s NYTimes article on the the bombings carries some speculation on the motivations for the attack which I find rather credible.

    But a posting on an online forum monitored by the SITE Institute, which tracks jihadist Web sites, asked whether London had been “craving explosions from Al Qaeda” after authorities in June bestowed a knighthood on the author Salman Rushdie, reviled by some radical Muslims for his book “The Satanic Verses.”

    No “established link” exists between the knighthood and the car bombs, a British security official said.

    I think the Rushdie explanation is somewhat more plausible than the Iraq explanation, but I think we should hold off on any rush to judgment.

  • Terror has a funny way of being heightened just before elections.
    Just because shock and awe didn’t work in Iraq doesn’t mean that page got taken out of the neo-con playbook for domestic consumption.
    There is a collusion of common interest that those who terrorise and those who run the war on terror share. (Fear=Power)

  • I do my small part for assimilation. I’m friendly to a Muslim family that I regularly see at the supermarket.

    I glad that Larry Johnson and Tom Cleaver–among others here–can see through the media BS.

  • Further on about this topic, I really don’t think we need to worry so much about the Muslim population in America. What we need to worry about is the American right. Specifically, that part of the white supremacist right that Tim McVeigh came out of. Remember them? Perpetrators of the worst case of terrorism in America prior to 9/11???

    These people think that if they could provoke a “race war”, they would win. What better way than to commit an act of terrorism that can be blamed on Muslims, the way the Reichstag fire was blamed on the German communists (after the Nazis set the fire, by Goering’s own admission in 1946).

    There is a significant portion of the American population that is radically “anti-Muslim.” They’re the domestic haters who sit around steamed about all the furriners coming here, they’re the stormtroops of the anti-immigrant movement, high on hate from talk radio. These people would go out and commit pogroms against Muslims (and probably anyone else not white who doesn’t speak with their mouth full of roadkill and chawin’ terbacky). They’re far more common that one might imagine, as I learned this past week while doing fundraising for the AmeriCares Darfur Initiative. There was about 3-4% of those I called who wanted to put a restriction on their donations so “it won’t get in the hands of Muslims” as one of them put it. And these are people who had donated beforeto AmeriCares for such things as the Rsunami Relief – not the kind of folks you’d expect to be saying things like this. So if people who donate to humanitarian organizations can be found with this attitude (and I wasn’t the only one to hear such stuff), what about the real haters???

    It wouldn’t suprise me if the Bush administration would attempt to use this sort of thing, put agent provocateurs out to commit the act, so Bush could declare martial law and set himself up as president-for-life.

    I wish I was wrong and that events wouldn’t make me think this way. But they do.

  • Totally agree with #15, petorado’s comment that school shootings are acts of terrorism. I use the definition of terrorism loosely, because I believe that violence against others and economic oppression by the powerful are terrorist acts.

  • Here is an example of how not to react to the failed car bombings in Great Britain.

    Appearing on ABC’s This Week, Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-CT) used the foiled terror attempts in London to call for greater domestic spying here in the United States. Lieberman said, “I hope these terrorist attacks in London wake us up here in America to stop the petty partisan fighting going on about…electronic surveillance,” in apparent reference to the Senate Judiciary Committee’s subpoenas for documents related to Bush’s NSA warrantless wiretapping program
    […]
    Liebermen went further in his calls for greater domestic spying. “The Brits have got something smart going. … They have have cameras all over London. … I think it’s just common sense to do that here much more widely.”

    Let me remind you of what Juan Cole wrote yesterday.

    Just remember what screw-ups these guys are when Alberto Gonzales comes to you with a plea to repeal the Bill of Rights in order to deal with them.

  • maybe the real al qaeda hasn’t attacked us again because bush gave in to their principal demand (us troops out of saudi)

  • Re: rege @ #28
    Appearing on ABC’s This Week, Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-CT) used the foiled terror attempts in London to call for greater domestic spying here in the United States. Lieberman said, “I hope these terrorist attacks in London wake us up here in America to stop the petty partisan fighting going on about…electronic surveillance,”

    This is what I lovingly refer as a terrorist campaign by the NeoCon 9/11 Hit Squad, which it looks like G.I. Joe Lieberman just genuflected his way into.

    It is nothing less than a psychological attack upon the American public to manipulate and exploit fear for a sitting United States Senator to stoop so low and suggest that the U.S. Constitution is “petty.”

    How can the Democratic leadership in the Senate continue to let this “man” hold a committee chairmanship. What an unholy disgrace.

  • Too bad we can’t track those 13 per cent who think suicide bombing is justified, because that is probably one of the two most despicable attitudes that I can think of. — Dale
    When I read this you seem to be implying that only muslims hold such attitudes, and that may or may not be true.


    CB said, “Some 13 percent of U.S. Muslims believe that suicide bombings can be justified.”

    That’s the remark I was commenting on, but let’s not torture our logic so that we ignore the connection between Islam and suicide bombers. It’s primarily their M.O. Especially since the IRA got out of the business.

    I don’t put high school shooting as terrorism because it lacks the political motvation. Using the air force in urban warfare is terrorism to me.

    I put Paris Hilton on my list of 72 Virgins for my hero heavenly reward. I hope she qualifies.

  • ‘…and get the things I want.”

    Uh, “and get the things they want,” that should have been.

    Comment by Swan

    Calling Dr. Jung. Calling Dr. Jung.

  • (Andrew Sullivan writes, “The truth is: it’s amazing we haven’t had more of this kind of thing, especially in the US. When it comes, we need stamina, stoicism and calm. And it’s coming.”) That, plus the news that America offers better opportunities than Britain for true assimilation, is off-target, I think. Somewhat true, but only a little.

    Sorry, but in America we have had the same kinds of terrorist activities the Brits are facing today – half-baked attempts by not-quite-competent true believers, over-hyped by the authorities. The guys from the pizza store who wanted to shoot up the local army base, and the Caribbean guys who thought they could blow up an aviation fuel pipeline at JFK are the most recent episodes in my area, but earlier we had the shoe bomber and the “Al Qaida Cell” in Buffalo. All great stuff for cable news ratings, but passage of time has painted them as more misguided than dangerous.

    Won’t the same thing happen to the guys who couldn’t get their cell phones to detonate the car bombs and the guys who made themselves the only casualties of their kamikaze attack on an airline terminal? We should be more concerned about the shipping that is not inspected and the power plants that are not hardened than with these soap opera antics.

  • Suicide bombings…

    Is it the bombing part or the suicide part that the other 87% objects to?

    Are suicide bombings against unmanned government targets justified in any cases at all? None? Never? Against no opponent on the face of the earth? How about remote control triggered bombings where the bomber lives on?

    Polls are like computers: garbage in, garbage out.

  • I’m surprised no one (I believe) has mentioned just how hard it is to do anything to us. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself. The major reason it’s so hard is for anyone external to hurt us is because we’re so damn far away. Bush constantly repeats the myth that the oceans can no longer protect us. They can and they do, and it would take incredible technology or logistic ingenuity to overcome that fact.

    Oklahoma City was home-grown, the work of American nut-jobs so far as I know. 9/11 was a unique event, though Bush & Co. would like to have us all believing that Al Qaedans are hidden under every bed. They aren’t. And they’re not going to be (barring a new high school fad).

    Furthermore, unlike most European nations, we have never held colonial dominion over a single major Muslim nation. The British and French and Italians and Spanish (where all the attacks have occurred so far) have many Muslim nationals (and grandchildren of Muslim nationals) living amongst them. Most, I’m sure, are loyal citizens of their adopted nations, but there are connections there which can be used for good or ill. There are no such historical colonial connections here.

    Most of the schemes to bomb the hell out of us in America are pipe dreams cooked up in the bedrooms of adolescents will illusions of their own future grandeur but no money, no weapons, no troops or troop transports, no overseas connections, nothing. We should be ashamed of ourselves for paying any attention at all to such pipe dreams and the propaganda of fear pumped out by the Bush administration. Maybe we should turn our attention to something useful, like debating how many angels can dance on the head of pin.

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