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December 03, 2004

Domestic Security

Gerald Dworkin: December 3, 2004

So far –rather surprisingly—there has been no discussion of the issue of domestic security. In this post I define that issue rather narrowly—the prevention of further domestic attacks by Al-Qaeda or other jihadist organizations. I believe many  voters chose Bush  on the basis of a belief that the policies pursued by the administration in the prior three years were effective, and would continue to be effective, in deterring and preventing such attacks. And that they did not have a similar confidence that Kerry and his policies would have a similar effectiveness.

 The one firm data point is that there has been no repetition of 9/11 in the three years following that attack. And there have been successful attacks in other parts of the world—notably in Spain.  It, of course, does not follow that the domestic policies of the Administration—particularly those of the Justice Department under Ashcroft—explain the data point. Indeed many of the prosecutions of suspected Al-Qaeda operatives have had to be dropped or plea-bargained down to much less dangerous offenses. But it is a reasonable hypothesis that domestic policies had something to do with the prevention of further attacks.

 Further, the absence of such attacks is surprising. Had I been asked on 9/12 what my guess would be about whether we would be attacked again within the next three years I would have said somewhere between 50% and 75%. I suspect that most people would have also given estimates in that range. Given that for many people, including the so-called “security moms”, the issue of avoidance of such attacks ranks pretty high on their list of desirable ends, the failure to address these concerns could be a significant factor in the Democratic loss. Note, by the way, that the percentage of voters who specified the much more abstract “moral values” as their reason for voting the way they did was actually down from both the 1996 and 2000 elections.

 It is not enough to argue that the invasion of Iraq has contributed, not diminished, to the number of people in the world who are prepared to commit such attacks. This is certainly true and important but, unfortunately, that fact means that it is all the more important that we take domestic measures to ensure that greater willingness does not translate into greater success.

 What needs to be spelled out is how to increase domestic preparedness without the kinds of sacrifices of civil liberties that most of us worry about. This does not mean that there will not be some diminution of the range of freedoms we have enjoyed but it does mean that that we can give reasons for where—and why-- we draw the line even if we are prepared to shift its location somewhat.

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Comments

Posted by: Brian Weatherson

I'm sounding a bit like a broken record about this on various blogs, but we really don't know that there have been no attacks by Al Qaeda or related organisations since 9/12 because we don't know who was behind the anthrax attacks.

When we're talking about the competence of the Bush administration in dealing with terrorism, I think it is vitally important that the anthrax attacks be pulled out the memory hole they've fallen into. They were the very first terrorist attacks (possibly not Islamic terrorist attacks, but terrorist attacks) after terrorism became the #1, #2, #3, #4 and #5 priority of the administration, and they don't appear to have ever made it as far as first base in the investigations.If this had happened under Clinton the right-wing press would be up in arms about this failure, and for once they'd have a point.

Posted by: Brian Weatherson | Dec 6, 2004 10:37:08 PM

Posted by: Lindsay Beyerstein

Given that for many people, including the so-called “security moms”, the issue of avoidance of such attacks ranks pretty high on their list of desirable ends, the failure to address these concerns could be a significant factor in the Democratic loss.

I don't think scant attention to civil defense sunk the Democrats. Kerry addressed domestic security over and over again. He talked about the absurdity of x-raying airline passengers and not cargo holds. He promised to do something about the huge number of cargo containers that enter the our ports without being inspected. He promised to double the number of special forces operatives. He championed intelligence reform before Bush acknowledged the need. He assailed Bush for losing track of Osama Bin Laden. He reminded Americans that Bush tried to block the creation of the 9/11 Commission.

What else was he supposed to do?

Posted by: Lindsay Beyerstein | Dec 6, 2004 11:12:06 PM

Posted by: D.A. Ridgely

Mr Dworkin writes: "It is not enough to argue that the invasion of Iraq has contributed, not diminished, to the number of people in the world who are prepared to commit such attacks. This is certainly true and important...."

Well, it is certainly important if true. It seems to me, however, we would have to know both how many such persons there were before the Iraq War and how many there are now. Does he? I certainly don't.

Posted by: D.A. Ridgely | Dec 8, 2004 9:31:59 AM

Posted by: vegetius

Mr Dworkin writes: "It is not enough to argue that the invasion of Iraq has contributed, not diminished, to the number of people in the world who are prepared to commit such attacks. This is certainly true and important...."

I've heard this repeated in many forms ad nauseum.
Before this is used in a preface to an argument, I'd like to see some quantiative evidence.

How many men were on the AQ rolls before 9/11?
How many are there now?

The reasoning behind this assumption is that any
action againt the Islomfacists is counterproductive. So why do anything??
Let's just give up.

Posted by: vegetius | Dec 10, 2004 3:02:14 PM

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