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The Real Threat To Terrorism, Part II

© lawhawk

Last week, I wrote about how the real threat to terrorism is the threat of peace breaking out. Among the issues that can also be raised is the way that military force can be used to deter terrorist acts from occurring.

The law recognizes a concept called anticipatory self defense where an individual - or in the case a government - can take prospective action against a percieved threat and attempt to eliminate it. The US has attempted to do just that through the bombings against Osama Bin Ladin's bases in Afghanistan as well as agains the suspected chemical weapons plant in Sudan.

Those strikes are reminiscent of earlier strikes by Israel against the Iraqi nuclear reactor at Osirak in 1981 where the Israelis sent a strike force of F-16 jets to eliminate this strategic and tactical threat to the Israeli existence. Israel argued that the existence of the plant and Iraq's known hatred of Israel would mean only a matter of time existed before the Iraqis would complete and mate a nuclear warhead with one of its long range Scud missiles and strike at Israel. Needless to say, Israel may have dodged a bullet as the Persian Gulf War demonstrated because Iraq did launch missiles at Israel (although those were suspected to possibly carry chemical or biological weapons). The fear generated by those weapons was enough to paralyze the country and threaten its existence therefore Israel acted within its rights to act in this manner.

Anticipatory self defense goes back even further in Israeli history - to 1967 and the preemptive strikes against Egyptian and Syrian forces massed on Israeli borders. Those strikes enabled Israel to decisively win in 6 days. Israel failed to preempt in 1973 because of the tremendous outrage expressed that Israel had launched a strike even though most countries realized that to do nothing would have resulted in a possible defeat. The October War in 1973 saw Israel choose not to preempt at the behest of the US even though all the warning signs were there. Israeli forces were routed early in the conflict in the Golan and in the Sinai, but several days into the war, the Israelis mounted an extremely effective counteroffensive and preserved the State of Israel.

Now, you might ask what this has to do with terrorism. Well, it has everything to do with the way that you respond. Do you sit back and wait for something bad to happen that you know is just a matter of time? Do you take preemptive action that might disrupt or eliminate those plans and possibly eliminate the threat completely? Or do you choose to negotiate with the terrorists and reach some understanding. This final question I will examine in my next article.

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