BOMBING THEIR WAY TO OBLIVION

Bombings may spur antiterror unity: Nations tighten ranks after attacks in Morocco and Saudi Arabia show terrorists target more than the US. (Howard LaFranchi, 5/19/03, The Christian Science Monitor)

The Sept. 11 attacks convinced Americans that Al Qaeda sees the US as its principal enemy. That is still true. But the strike in Casablanca, Morocco, on Friday - targeting a Spanish cultural center, the Belgian Consulate, a Jewish community center, and a cosmopolitan hotel--as well as the recent bombings in Saudi Arabia demonstrate how radical Islam is fixed on other totems as well. These include Western influences in Muslim culture, economic globalization, and modernization in general.

In one sense, that reality makes vanquishing groups like Al Qaeda seem all the more daunting because their targets are so diffuse. But the most recent bombings may also bring more of the world together in trying to quell terrorism. To the extent that such attacks continue and include non-American targets, they reinforce the notion temporarily lost during the animosity over the Iraq war that much of the world is vulnerable to terrorist violence and that strong international cooperation is needed curb it.

"These tragic events ... have been a massive jolt to Saudi Arabia, to the US, to all peace-loving people around the world that we have to redouble our efforts and we have to pursue the terrorists vigorously," said Adel Al-Jubeir, the foreign policy adviser to Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah, in a recent Washington press conference. [...]

At home, the Bush administration is already facing criticism on the issue. Democratic presidential candidates, in particular, are chiding the White House for its handling of the war on terrorism. In an appearance in Iowa Saturday, Sen. Bob Graham of Florida said the administration had "let Al Qaeda off the hook" with the focus on Iraq.

Such comments may indeed revive broader criticisms that the war in Iraq could hurt the war on terrorism, while also adding pressure to repair foreign ties to better fight global terror.

"Remember it was people like Brent Scowcroft [national security adviser to the first President Bush] who before the war in Iraq said, 'Hey, wait a minute, don't divert your attention when we haven't won the war on terrorism yet,' " says Lawrence Korb, a former Reagan administration official now at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. "Their point was, you don't want to alienate the people you need to fight the war that involves the biggest threat to your national security."

These recent blasts point out the deep stupidity of two groups: (1) the terrorists and (2) the "realists". The terrorists' stupidity lies in just how counterproductive these acts are, serving merely to drive Arab nations closer to America and turning what have been relatively safe havens for them into serious participants in the war on terror. Meanwhile, the realists' (like Mr. Scowcroft & Mr. Korb) argument that people we'd alienated would try to teach us a lesson by allowing terrorists to operate freely from their soil was never worthy of any serious consideration. At the end of the day,
America has rather little to fear from Islamicists, while those who are angry with us--France, Germany, Saudi Arabia, etc.--need be terrified. What
realistic possibility was there ever that they would ignore a vital internal security problem just to spite us? Posted by Orrin Judd at May 19, 2003 8:00 AM