New Approach to Terrorsim
I think there is a real, fundamental problem with the way we have been approaching the "War on Terror". I really think it's time to take a step back, let the emotions subside and take a more rational approach.
I realize this is not a popular opinion in general, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say that politicians are TOO focused on terrorism. Now, I am not trying to say that terrorism isn't a problem and shouldn't be a significant focus, but it is not even remotly close to the only threat posed to America. What is not done is to balance the risks and costs of preventing them across many different threats.
Lets just take the two greatest threats from terrorism, bioterrorism and a nuclear weapon. Anything less than that would almost certainly kill fewer than 100 people and although it would be sad, is truely insignificant in the grand scheme of things. If we look at bioterrorism, it is indeed scary, but it is also quite difficult to pull off effectively. The anthrax letters contained a large amount of alegedly very pure anthrax yet killed only a hand full of people. Even an unlikely effective large scale attack would be significantly mitigated due to the fact that it would most likely be detected by biowatch and stockpiles of vaccines and anti-biotics distributed in time to save a large percentage of the infected. I find the odds of a biological attack that killed more people than the Flu (the flu kills ~60k per year) durring any given year to be very very low. Our anti-terror dollars are well spent in these types of mitigation strategies, and also improving the health care system in general. These types of general improvements would save more people in the long run than any sort of offensive actions that could be taken.
As for the release of a nuclear weapon, this is indeed a threat, but also a very low probability one. Nuclear weapons are very difficult to smuggle due to their radioactive signature. We already have the technology to detect them, we just need to ensure that it is more widely deployed. The most likely attack would be something like a suitcase nuke which although devastating would still most likely only kill in the 5 figures and we could quickly recover. The fallout would probably be on the order of a major natural desaster, but we recover from those frequently. I would bet on the odds that we take significant damage to a major city by a natural desaster well before we do so from a terrorist attack. The real place where we can make useful strategic investments here is in significantly improving our disaster response mechanisms. Katrina proved that we are woefully unprepared for such events and we have to get better.
I guess my thought is that we need to treat terrorism much like the Republicans would like us to treat global warming. Basically that we are better off not burdening our economy with overly expensive mitigation plans and focus on figuring out how we can adapt and minimize disruption. In my opinion the greatest threat from terrorism is not that islamo-facists will kill us all or take over America. The greatest threat is that our stuborn American pride will lead us to over-react when hit and over-extend ourselves to the point of self destruction (in fact this is exactly the stated goal of the terrorists). I know this is a bit counter intuitive, but just think about it. In general is our reaction to terrism rational or emotional? Which is better?
Lets just take the two greatest threats from terrorism, bioterrorism and a nuclear weapon. Anything less than that would almost certainly kill fewer than 100 people and although it would be sad, is truely insignificant in the grand scheme of things. If we look at bioterrorism, it is indeed scary, but it is also quite difficult to pull off effectively. The anthrax letters contained a large amount of alegedly very pure anthrax yet killed only a hand full of people. Even an unlikely effective large scale attack would be significantly mitigated due to the fact that it would most likely be detected by biowatch and stockpiles of vaccines and anti-biotics distributed in time to save a large percentage of the infected. I find the odds of a biological attack that killed more people than the Flu (the flu kills ~60k per year) durring any given year to be very very low. Our anti-terror dollars are well spent in these types of mitigation strategies, and also improving the health care system in general. These types of general improvements would save more people in the long run than any sort of offensive actions that could be taken.
As for the release of a nuclear weapon, this is indeed a threat, but also a very low probability one. Nuclear weapons are very difficult to smuggle due to their radioactive signature. We already have the technology to detect them, we just need to ensure that it is more widely deployed. The most likely attack would be something like a suitcase nuke which although devastating would still most likely only kill in the 5 figures and we could quickly recover. The fallout would probably be on the order of a major natural desaster, but we recover from those frequently. I would bet on the odds that we take significant damage to a major city by a natural desaster well before we do so from a terrorist attack. The real place where we can make useful strategic investments here is in significantly improving our disaster response mechanisms. Katrina proved that we are woefully unprepared for such events and we have to get better.
I guess my thought is that we need to treat terrorism much like the Republicans would like us to treat global warming. Basically that we are better off not burdening our economy with overly expensive mitigation plans and focus on figuring out how we can adapt and minimize disruption. In my opinion the greatest threat from terrorism is not that islamo-facists will kill us all or take over America. The greatest threat is that our stuborn American pride will lead us to over-react when hit and over-extend ourselves to the point of self destruction (in fact this is exactly the stated goal of the terrorists). I know this is a bit counter intuitive, but just think about it. In general is our reaction to terrism rational or emotional? Which is better?
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New Approach to Terrorsim | 6 comments (6 topical, 0 hidden)
New Approach to Terrorsim | 6 comments (6 topical, 0 hidden)
