The War of Words over the “War on Terror”

Posted by Enrique on 01.07.2010

Quagmire...



Hope you had a fear-free holidays, dear readers. Unfortunately, it's a new year and time to resuming our usual panicking. In the past few weeks, the so called War on Terror has suffered a few notable setbacks. On Christmas, an aggrieved Islamic radical named Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab attempted to blow up an airplane, and succeeded in blowing up his junk. In Iraq, the U.S. released an alleged terrorist who allegedly has the blood of American troops on his hands, in an alleged hostage swap for some poor British bastard that everyone's denying. A suicide bomber in Pakistan killed 96 people at a sporting event. Another suicide bomber killed half a dozen CIA agents in Afghanistan, devastating the agency's counterterrorism capabilities in the region.

Not surprisingly, former VP Dick Cheney had something very helpful and highly nuanced to say about President Barack Obama's semantic approach to our twilight struggle against Islamic evildoers. Apparently, Dick is troubled by Obama's avoidance of the phrase "war on terror," saying the president's word choice makes Americans less safe. Well, you'd expect him to say that, wouldn't you?

The story so far…

A few days after the attempted airliner bombing, President Obama made brief remarks in which he assured a frightened electorate that all is well. And he gave us a pep talk:

The president also had a message for the American people to not only "remain vigilant" but also to "be confident."

"Those plotting against us seek not only to undermine our security, but also the open society and the values that we cherish as Americans," he said. "This incident, like several that have preceded it, demonstrates that an alert and courageous citizenry are far more resilient than an isolated extremist."

I feel better already. I'm old enough to remember when John Ashcroft was attorney general, so I don't mind an administration adopting a circumspect tone in the wake of a bungled terrorist attack. Although you have to admit Obama was pretty quick to play the "isolated extremist" card. After the Fort Hood massacre, Obama made sure to admonish us not to jump to conclusions about Nidal Hasan's motives. That was widely interpreted as an attempt to downplay Hasan's apparent Islamism, and I get the sense the same instinct is behind Obama's "isolated extremist" comment. It's all very move along, nothing to see here.

I appreciate Obama's diligent effort to avoid using Islam-inspired crimes as an excuse to fear monger. He seems to take a great deal of pride in being the unBush, but there's such a thing as over-correcting. In his most recent weekly address, Obama again discussed Abdulmutallab's not-bombing, and assured us he's working on it:

Meanwhile, the investigation into the Christmas Day incident continues, and we're learning more about the suspect. We know that he traveled to Yemen, a country grappling with crushing poverty and deadly insurgencies. It appears that he joined an affiliate of al Qaeda, and that this group-al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula-trained him, equipped him with those explosives and directed him to attack that plane headed for America.

Never mind that "isolated" business, then. I've noticed this about lefties – they feel compelled to acknowledge that there's poverty in the world, as if paying it lip service earns them social justice karma points. I'm sure it comes from a compassionate place, but in this case that weird compulsion is incongruous. Abdulmutallab is an engineering student whose last known address is a $4 million London apartment. His father is a wealthy banker and erstwhile Nigerian government official. Based on what we know about Abdulmutallab, "crushing poverty" couldn't be a motivating factor.

In fairness, I may be making too much of Obama's word choices. Another person who over-analyzes the president's linguistic proclivities is the beloved patriot Dick Cheney. Specifically, Cheney would prefer if Obama used the word "war" more often. A lot more often:

"As I've watched the events of the last few days it is clear once again that President Obama is trying to pretend we are not at war. He seems to think if he has a low-key response to an attempt to blow up an airliner and kill hundreds of people, we won't be at war. He seems to think if he gives terrorists the rights of Americans, lets them lawyer up and reads them their Miranda rights, we won't be at war. He seems to think if we bring the mastermind of Sept. 11 to New York, give him a lawyer and trial in civilian court, we won't be at war.

"He seems to think if he closes Guantanamo and releases the hard-core Al Qaeda-trained terrorists still there, we won't be at war. He seems to think if he gets rid of the words, ‘war on terror,' we won't be at war. But we are at war and when President Obama pretends we aren't, it makes us less safe."

Well. I may have my picky disputes with Obama's word choices, but it's a bit menstrual to suggest they're making us less safe. As a practical matter, Obama's national security policies don't substantively differ from those of the Bush administration. The U.S. military is still engaged in two wars. Guantanamo Bay remains open. Suspected terrorists aren't privy to proper due process – some are adjudicated in civilian courts, some face military tribunals, and some are detained indefinitely. Obama ordered cruise missile strikes in Yemen before Christmas. It's dishonest and sort of silly for Cheney to act as if Obama has deviated significantly from policies Cheney himself helped execute.

However, I'm willing to take Cheney at his word when he says he doesn't want terrorists to have lawyers or Miranda rights. This is a restatement of the longtime rightwing complaint about treating terrorism as a criminal matter rather than a martial matter. I'm not entirely unsympathetic to this suggestion – I've argued the 9/11 attacks were a war crime and that military tribunals would be the appropriate venues for adjudicating the likes of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. But Cheney wouldn't stop there – he would apparently deny even basic civil rights from any Islamist malcontent who claims to be affiliated with whatever passes for Al Qaeda these days. Columnist Charles Krauthammer recently fretted about treating terrorism as a law enforcement matter, saying, "Once we've given Abdulmutallab the right to remain silent, we have gratuitously forfeited our right to find out from him precisely who else was involved, namely those who trained, instructed, armed and sent him."

Gee, I wonder if Krauthammer and Cheney would be willing to resort to torturing Abdulmutallab to obtain that information. I'm sure they mean well, but I think it's optimistic to assume Abdulmutallab can provide information that will save lives. Maybe he can, maybe he can't. I question the wisdom of giving the government blanket authority to torture people because of the possibility they might provide useful information. What if the government's wrong?

It's often said the challenge of fighting Islamist terrorists is that the government has to get it right 100% of the time, while a terrorist only has to get it right once. I appreciate the quandary, but we're kidding ourselves if we think it's possible to stop every single motivated Muslim radical with a condom full of pentaerythritol tetranitrate crammed up his ass. At some point, bad things are going to happen to innocent people. It's a tragic fact of life. Adhering to the principles of due process may not prevent terrorist attacks, but I don't see how it encourages them. Muslim terrorists think God wants them to kill Jews and Americans – they don't care if we give them a lawyer or not. Sometimes crazy people do crazy shit, but we shouldn't sacrifice process just because we'd prefer to believe the illusion that the government is capable of preventing every incident of terrorism. Process is important, even more than word choices.