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| October 2, 2001 |
When "For A While" Becomes Forever
Colonel Daniel Smith, USA (Ret.) Chief of Research, dsmith@cdi.org
It is now three weeks since the atrocities of Sept. 11. The president and other officials are busy reassuring the public that the government is taking steps to protect Americans from a new attack as it hunts for anyone even remotely connected with planning, financing, or in any other way contributing to the plot.
Officials also are urging Americans to return to their pre-Sept. 11 routines -- or as nearly as is possible. Even in the midst of death and tragedy, the living must live; there is work to be done and families to raise.
Unfortunately, there is also a newly manifested prejudice to overcome.
Gallup News Service, in a review of historical polling data, noted that "Americans traditionally have not held very positive views of Arabs." A February 1991 ABC poll taken during Desert Shield found that 59 percent of Americans associated the term "terrorists" and 56 percent associated the phrase "religious fanatics" with Arabs. A 1993 Gallup survey taken after the World Trade Center bombing revealed that 32 percent of Americans had an "unfavorable" opinion of Arabs.
Since Sept. 11, the poll responses have turned even more negative. A Time/CCN interactive poll on September 13 registered 57 percent of respondents supporting the use of "profiling by age, race, and gender to identify potentially suspicious [airline] passengers." When asked how they "felt" about Muslims (not just Arabs) living abroad, 31% responded they were less favorably inclined. That number increased to 41 percent with respect to Palestinians and 51 percent with respect to Afghanis.
More disturbing are two polls that included questions directed to security issues in the United States. Newsweek found (Sept. 13-14) that 32 percent of Americans thought that Arabs residing in the United States should be under "special surveillance." Thirty-five percent of those questioned in a CNN/USA Today/Gallup survey on Sept. 14-15 said they have less trust in Arabs living in the United States following the attacks. And Gallup discovered (Sept. 14-15) that the general public is "evenly divided" over the question as to whether all Arabs -- including U.S. citizens -- should be required to have special identification with them at all times.
Perhaps most surprising of all are some journalists, most vehement about their rights and freedom of the press, who are on public record supporting the use of profiling "for awhile."
Such results suggest that the terrorists have shaken, if only temporarily (one can fervently hope), America's embrace of diversity, which is one of our nation's most cherished strengths. Special identity cards are too much like yellow stars of David (Nazi Germany) or badges identifying Hindus (Afghanistan under the Taliban). Special surveillance is reminiscent of procedures applied against Japanese-Americans following December 7, 1941; so far no prominent person has suggested incarcerating citizens of Arabian or "Middle East" heritage as was done in World War II.
And how long is "for a while"? President Bush and other administration officials have talked of the war on terrorism as lasting five years, ten years, or more vaguely "for years." How long would "special measures" be directed toward "Middle East" persons? Moreover, who would be subjected to this suspicion and treatment? Would authorities exempt those who can trace their heritage to "friendly" countries?
In Chicago on September 27, the president said, "We must address the issue of airline safety in a constructive, smart way. For the sake of every passenger, every crewmember and every pilot, we are going to make our airline security stronger and more reliable." A week earlier, he had condemned emergent hate crimes against Arabs and Islamists.
The president is right on both counts. Security is a fundamental issue. But it must be security for all; no one group of law-abiding citizens, whether ethnic, religious, or any other category, can be singled out if America is to beat terrorism.
"The condition on which God has given liberty to man," said Thomas Jefferson, "is eternal vigilance." But liberty loses if vigilance descends into paranoia and ethnic, cultural, religious, or racial discrimination.
We might do well to combine Jefferson's observation with one from Benjamin Franklin: "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
The message is straightforward: only in our liberties is there true safety. Or more succinctly, only liberty is "forever."
Latin American Allies Can Help U.S. Fight Against Terrorism Without High-Tech Weapons
Victoria Garcia, Research Assistant, vgarcia@cdi.org and Rachel Stohl, Senior Analyst, rstohl@cdi.org
The United States government's attempt to stamp out terrorism worldwide will require the cooperation of close friends and allies. In this hemisphere, the United States will depend upon close relationships with South America to hunt down the terror networks. Before many of these countries can provide substantive assistance, they need to look inward. While many South American countries are requesting advanced conventional weapons to modernize their aging militaries, such weapons alone will not deal with the region's real problems -- drug trafficking, unequal income distribution, health care or illiteracy. Large arms purchases, in large part, will instead redirect limited economic resources and undermine attempts to improve living standards.
Throughout the region, the central problem that must be resolved is drug trafficking -- it breeds terrorism and threatens democracy. Drug syndicates have spent millions of dollars to ensure their continued existence by buying police and political protection -- in some cases reaching the highest levels of government. Drug trafficking has financed wars against democratically elected governments, and guerilla groups, such as the Revolutionary Armed forces of Colombia (FARC), have supported heinous narco-terrorist attacks with drug profits. While the Colombian government may request high-tech conventional weapons to address specific problems of internal security, others, specifically Chile and Brazil, seem determined to buy equipment of sophistication far beyond their needs, just for the sake of "modernizing" their aging militaries.
Sales of high-tech conventional weapons to Latin American countries have long been a controversial issue for the United States. On May 19, 1977, President Jimmy Carter issued Presidential Decision Directive-13 (PDD-13) restricting conventional arms transfers to nations that abuse human rights. At the time, military dictatorships, notorious for human rights violations, ruled many South American countries. Therefore, PDD-13 essentially instituted sales restrictions on the region as a whole. The directive lasted two decades, until Aug. 1, 1997, when the Clinton administration repealed the embargo and announced a new Latin American arms export policy that allowed the sale of high tech equipment to the region on a case-by-case basis. A potential arms race was slowed only by the economic crisis that plagued the region in the late 1990s.
Although there have not been any extraordinary purchases of advanced military equipment by Latin American countries since the arms embargo was lifted, the environment is ripe. Chilean President Ricardo Lagos announced in January that Chile was eager to purchase 12 F-16 fighters worth $600 million from Lockheed-Martin. Responding to Chile's announcement, the Brazilian government announced it has set aside $700 million to buy up to 24 supersonic fighters. This cycle is likely to continue and expand.
Although Latin nations now have relative military parity in terms of weapons' capability and modernity, Chile's purchase of advanced fighters will represent a considerable technological leap in the region, compelling other states to reinforce their defenses. Some South American leaders find this trend worrisome. Peru's new president, Alejandro Toledo, told South American leaders gathered for his inauguration on July 28 that the region should stop arms purchases: "I would like to take advantage of having all the South American presidents together to propose an immediate freeze on the purchase of offensive weapons in the region." In addition, earlier this year, Argentina's government publicly announced that it would not try to buy new warplanes even if Chile's purchase goes through.
The region has demonstrated a commitment to assist the United States in its efforts to combat terrorism, independent of the promises of advanced weapons. On Sept. 19, the Organization of American States (OAS) invoked a 1947 hemispheric treaty for the collective defense against outside threats as a response to the terrorist attacks in New York City and Washington. Although Mexican President Vicente Fox acknowledged that there are other crucial issues, such as poverty and drugs, that should be addressed and expressed hope for for a revised security treaty, the OAS decided to invoke the Rio Treaty to show unity within the Western hemisphere and a willingness to combat terrorism.
The United States and its hemispheric partners already have a precedent for law enforcement cooperation in the region. The 1997 Inter-American Convention Against the Illicit Manufacturing and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives, and Other Related Materials "the OAS Convention" was created to address the problem of illicit firearms trafficking. The convention is intended to curb and if possible, prevent the illicit flows of weapons that may ultimately benefit drug traffickers, criminal elements, and other non-state actors (including terrorists). The convention develops a system to license and track firearm sales; requires all weapons to be marked at points of manufacture, import, and export to facilitate global tracing of arms; institutes a comprehensive regime for information sharing and enforcement; and creates provisions for training and assistance in law enforcement. The United States already has implemented the majority of the convention's provisions (they are based on U.S. model regulations), but has not yet ratified it (of the 35 OAS member countries, only Cuba and Dominica have not signed the convention. Although the convention entered into force on July 1, 1998, after the second ratification, only 12 countries have ratified it thus far). The United States would be well served to ratify the OAS Convention quickly to foster continued law enforcement cooperation on tracing the weapons that allow terrorists to do business.
The united position of the hemisphere is a positive step for the Americas, but to serve as an enemy of terrorism, Latin American countries should focus on strengthening their own democracies and infrastructures to create an unfriendly environment for underground extremist elements, both in the domestic and international realms. High-tech weapons alone are not the answer.
Shelton Faults U.S. HUMINT Weakness -- General Hugh Shelton, outgoing chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, says that there is a price to be paid for the U.S.'s failure to emphasize maintaining its human intelligence (HUMINT) resources. According to Gen. Shelton the U.S.'s lack of human intelligence gathering capabilities is not a failing of the intelligence community, but the result of a conscious decision to "get out of the human intelligence business to a large degree." Such capabilities, says the General, cannot be developed overnight. "You can't create it when you need it. You've got to have it, and it's got to be in place."
New Fiscal Year Starts With Most Funding Work Undone -- Fiscal Year 2002 began on October 1, and, as expected, most of Congress's work on the federal budget has yet to be completed. Congress was already lagging far behind schedule prior to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, due to the Bush Administration's delays in delivering key budget information to the Hill and the change to Democratic control of the Senate. As of October 1, none of the 13 annual appropriations bills had been sent to the President. The two largest spending bills, the Defense and Labor/Health & Human Services/Education appropriations acts, have not yet been acted on by either the House or Senate.
Terrorism Fight Cuts Into U.S. Balkan Presence -- Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz said on Sept. 26 that the campaign against terrorism will force the United States to withdraw some weapons and assets from NATO operations in the Balkans. "It starts with reconnaissance and surveillance capabilities, specialized units that do intelligence or medical support," he said. These units are in high demand and the Pentagon only has a limited number of them. Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz said that Washington told its European allies to prepare for some of the U.S. units to be withdrawn. NATO's new monitoring mission to Macedonia, launched on Sept. 26, is to be led by German forces and has only minimal U.S. presence.
New Macedonia Mission Takes Shape -- NATO approved a new 700-strong mission for Macedonia after an eleventh-hour disagreement with the republic's government. The alliance wanted the operation, dubbed "Amber Fox," to include over 1,000 troops and have a long-term, if not open-ended, mandate. The Macedonian government forced the alliance to agree on a smaller mission with a duration of only three months. NATO troops will be tasked with protecting civilian monitors overseeing the implementation of the peace agreement that ended the fight between Macedonian security forces and a rebel group from among the country's ethnic Albanian minority. The mandate of the alliance's previous mission in Macedonia, tasked with disarming the Albanian rebels, expired on Sept. 26, after NATO met its target of collecting over 3,000 pieces of weaponry. Both allied missions officially occurred at the invitation of the Macedonian government but reluctant Skopje authorities have accused NATO of assisting the rebels and hindering the republic's military campaign against Albanian militants.
Quotation of the Week -- "There will be rumors and reports of troop deployments, special operations forces massing, and there may be at some point the use of military power. But it won't look like you want it to look. And it won't end like you want it to end. [The war on terrorism is] a different kind of war...I would hope that we would proceed step-by-step and proceed slowly and make full use of the elements of national power -- diplomatic, economic, financial, others -- before we become enamored with large-scale, conventional military engagements," General Wesley Clark, US Army (Ret.), former Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, speech at Old Dominion University, September 20, 2001.
This Week on America's Defense Monitor: "Isolating America"
Is America becoming increasingly isolationist? The Senate's rejection of the nuclear test ban treaty was but the latest episode in a trend toward "Fortress America" that includes rejection of treaties on landmines, a court for war crimes, and a perennial failure to pay U.S. dues to the United Nations. The public is right to ask whether major increases in military spending for programs like ballistic missile defense and hi-tech fighter planes are a better investment in the long run than fostering regional peace initiatives, helping our former enemies become democratic friends, and using diplomacy to help prevent conflicts.
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