Counter Terror (Part 2)

Counter-Terror Policy (part 2)

What is the future of counter-terrorism?

• We have to answer and balance the Destroy vs. Deny vs. Diminish dimensions of a counter-terror policy, especially when the first appears the most pro-active and easiest to do in a self-satisfying manner
• Lopez and others suggest that the more (hence-forth) the US is bent on destroying, the more we alienate & mobilize opposition and recruit more terrorists.
• The key lies in supporting local, reasonable leaders who will take action
• we need to increase their capacity
• Take the thinking of Serrano, Cronin and others - we are in need of a long-term strategy……that demonstrates an awareness of globalization issues and possibilities
• The strongest possible way to do this is by bridging the national/regional/functional/international dimensions, to create some kind of legitimate redundancy --> so you respond to the global problem with a global solution of sorts.
• But the ‘national’ temptation (i.e. ‘go it alone’) – especially for the US at this moment, is a tough one to overcome

At this moment in US history in the world

• War on terror having been declared ‘open-ended‘ creates a continuous context that is both militarily and strategically linked to a type of total war;
• The military quagmire in Iraq is an example of this dilemma of fighting and ‘sort of winning’ but also sort of not winning. You stifle one problem but give rise to another…and you are now caught (great power dilemma)
   (see NPR: “Iraqi security collapses in Shiite area; Troops return”; “How much does the US still matter in Iraq?”)
• Worse yet, no security = no peace --> no economic progress towards reconstruction and increasing regional instability.
• Since the US government intertwines the two, ‘peace’ of a different sort is meant as ‘security’, which means winning the war (i.e.destroying)….makes it only a military issue.

Moreover, there is a large ‘terror-war’ trap that evades US thinking:

• The west (US) is so invulnerable militarily, the only way to ‘hurt it’ is in terrorist like form
• The breeding ground for the desire to hurt the US lies in resource rich yet poverty prone areas of the world which have been depleted of their economic and political futures (often with US/western complicity or action)
• In these areas and beyond them ‘watching’ are those trying to choose between Osama and others (locals or the West). If we destroy their cities (Fallujah) in order to save them - we generate more opposition/terrorists
    Wikipedia: “US Occupation of Fallujah”
    PBS - Online NewsHour video/transcripts: “Target: Fallujah”  Nov. 16, 2004; “Update: Fallujah” Nov. 12, 2004
    RAI, Ranucci, S. (2006). “The Hidden Massacre of Fallujah” -  video

Predictions

The US has a big interest in the preservation of the security status quo and will consider any ‘terrorist’ attack as a threat and respond with massive force to defend ‘norms’ [or supply routes], or to fight the terrorists ‘there’ rather than here (i.e. within the US)

Such wars, in fact, will widen the economic gap, environmental deterioration, and further exacerbate the quest for new resources, likely creating more failed states as the normal political space is completely replaced by these opposing armed forces

These wars will also be increasingly divisive within the western alliance

Some of these wars we think we can/should do little about as they seem not to be linked to terrorism (e.g.: Sudan - Darfur). Others we can manage with aid and limited involvement (e.g.: Colombia; Afghanistan)

Our wars will need to be ‘media managed’ and politicized from all angles to sustain the anti-terror campaign 

• (BBC 2006: “Pentagon boosts media war unit”; 
• “US ‘losing media war to al-Qaeda’”)

Being in charge of the ‘lessons of the war on terror’ debate, or the Iraq war debate will be critical. 
 

The style of control: building ‘global regimes’

• a regime as a set of rules and institutions which regulate a certain area of international life
• in the ‘old days’ nations built regimes through treaties - and some of these are very important (e.g.: Bretton Woods agreements for international monetary management; Kyoto Protocol on climate change)
• the ‘new days’ have witnessed the momentum to construct this from NGOs
   (e.g.: the global campaign to ban landmines was led by more than 1,400 NGOs, producing the Convention on the Prohibition of stockpiling, production, and transfer of anti-personnel mines and on their destruction - the Ottawa Convention 1997)
• citizens organize to create new or join existing NGOs….which simultaneously
• write the draft treaty - i.e. they provide the substance of the regime
• lobby international organizations (IGOs) and other global actors (e.g.: corporations)
• lobby governments, fellow citizens, and form groups to lobby governments

Examples of Global Regimes

• perfect example: the international movement in the mid-1990s to ban anti-personnel land mines…
• others follow with work on a small arms convention (treaty) esp. under the leadership of the United Nations [BBC video]

Lots of parallels in the human rights and environment areas

Regime is the CTC-CTED

• With a strong regional and functional component (esp. the extension of FATF)
• Getting serious about compliance –
• Build capacity in….
• Name and shame in other cases…
• Enforce compliance in others….usually via economic penalties
• This is complemented – NOT lead by – an enforcement strategy of law, intelligence and military
• It is empowered by a new development agenda: quadruple foreign assistance….(Jeffrey D. Sachs)

Counter-Terror Policies – Beyond the US

• EU
• India
• Israel
• Japan
• Pakistan