What Political Effect Will the Next Terrorist Attack on the US Have?
By Ken Bell

Isn’t it strange that Americans are so blase about one of the most remarkable events that has transpired since September 11, 2001? The one that hasn’t happened—yet.

If you consider the point soberly, it is simply astonishing that the Bush administration has, through a combination of good luck, hard work and a vigorous prosecution of the war against FascIslam, prevented any terrorist attack on the soil of our very open and not very vigilant society for nearly three years.

This is not a trifle. Particularly when, during that same period of time, we have liberated the peoples of two tormented countries, definitively ended the nuclear ambitions of a third, dismantled a vast conspiratorial network for the dissemination of nuclear weapons to rogue states, decimated the ranks of Al Qaeda’s terrorist international, and are presently engaged in the remarkable enterprise of aiding the emergence of two fledgling democracies in a part of the world which has known only despotism of one variety or another.

George W. Bush has been very busy, and it’s not a claim but a demonstrable fact that the American people, and others, are safer because of his actions.

I’m told that Michael Moore’s latest fictional hit job does not include scenes from any of the hundreds of hours of torture tapes recorded for Saddam Hussein’s pleasure, but does feature a brief scene of Iraqi children flying a kite (assertedly before the war). In Afghanistan—another war of liberation Moore opposed—even that would have been a criminal act. I’m told he also fails to mention the children’s prison, the gassed villages, the hundreds of thousands interred in mass graves, the torture and murder of those kite-flying children before their parents eyes as a means of ‘persuasion’?

Mere oversight, perhaps. Senator Ted Kennedy may believe that Saddam’s torture chambers have simply “reopened under new management,” but are we Americans as a people so morally blind as to be unable to discern the difference?

This is not a trifle, either.

America has been kept safe from harm for more than a thousand days not despite but because of the Bush administration’s aggressive actions against FascIslamic terrorists and the states which aid, abet and harbor them. But time is against us. A terrorist act in America will inevitably succeed, probably within the next hundred days—if only because the incentives are so immense from the vantage point of those who wish to murder us. The FascIslamists are ever so keenly aware that we are at our most vulnerable to their particular brand of persuasion during our democratic elections. They also see the narrow gap between the numbers who favor a continued assertive prosecution of the war and those who seek to return to the old failed pretense that terrorism is “primarily a law enforcement problem.”

When it does happen—and it assuredly will—how will the American people react?

In Madrid one bloody day in March changed the government and led directly to surrender. The mere threat of beheading a single hostage led the Philippines to withdraw from Iraq in ignominy. Will another act of terrorism on American soil make John Kerry president? Will we also surrender?

There are persuasive reasons for pessimism. First, the major media’s transparent opposition to the war and its conduct continues to grind away at the consensus that prevailed in the immediate aftermath of September 11th. It is difficult, if not impossible, to imagine that our journalistic elite might be jolted into objectivity by another act of mass murder. Their herd instinct for mass delusion grows legendary.

Then, too, the administration has been less than eloquent or articulate in explaining its strategic rationale for the conduct of the war. (Yes, actions do speak louder than words; but we cannot forget that this is a government which, incredibly, apologized for including sixteen words in a State of the Union message that were and are quite literally true and unassailably factual, after being challenged by a small-fry self-promoting ‘diplomat’, appointed through an act of nepotistic influence, who evinces no regard for the difference between truth and expedient lie.)

Moreover, a substantial fraction of the populace is war-weary or even war-unconscious, even though objectively the rewards of its conduct to date have vastly outweighed the painful but necessary costs. The opposition has nominated the most consistently pacifist major party candidate, with a truly extraordinary record of repeated votes against defense and intelligence over the course of two decades, since the election of 1972.

And finally, as any disinterested political junkie will attest, the polls already look very dicey for the president’s re-election. Perhaps as bad as they looked for Lincoln in the early summer of 1864. Will the next act of terrorism be the coup de grace?

There are, of course, two critical variables which may significantly affect the political impact of the next terrorist attack: the target and the method of attack—the what (or where) and the how.

An attack upon either of the two political conventions, or coincident with them—the Democratic convention taking place in Boston near the end of this month, or the Republican convention in New York at the end of August and beginning of September—unless decisively foiled, is likely to ‘benefit’ the Democrats as well as the terrorists.

An attack upon the Boston convention would evoke enormous sympathy for the Democrats—more substantial and long-lasting in impact if the act of terrorism is ‘successful’ than if it is not. It would also serve as dry tinder for the flames of the incendiary conspiracy crowd, egged on by mad cinematographers and loopy linguists. As pundits would observe that ‘motivates’ the party’s base vote.

An attack coincident with but not upon the Democratic convention, unless decisively foiled, would be a rhetorical goldmine for the opposition. Their only risk would be of repeating the Minnesota wake gambit.

Conversely, an attack upon the Republican convention would have differential effects. If ‘successful’ in terrorist terms, a direct attack might kill or incapacitate much of the political and intellectual leadership prosecuting the War On Terror. Even if unsuccessful, such a strike would be embarrassing, even humiliating, unless summarily thwarted. The mad conspiratorialists would openly speculate that ‘they let it happen now’ or even that ‘they’d planned it this way.’ While most Americans aren’t susceptible to such delusions, any outburst of sympathy would be mitigated by the fact that, since the Republicans are in power, they are ‘responsible.’ A coincident strike would likely have similar impact.

One of the few terrorist acts which might more likely ‘benefit’ George W. Bush in political terms is an attack upon the Olympics—particularly an act directed against the American athletes. A botched response could prove fatal to the president’s prospects for re-election, but either an attack which was foiled or a ‘successful’ attack responded to forcefully would most likely unite much of the American public around a patriotic symbol, more powerfully than any other event since 9/11. Then, too, the administration’s responsibility would be mitigated in the public’s eyes because the event would have occurred in Greece, not Boston or New York or Houston. Similarly, it is evident that the administration is taking very great precautions about the Olympics, to include the presence of a contingent of Special Forces troops, and is thus unlikely to be charged with a lack of due diligence.

At this point it is important to distinguish two very different aspects of this question which we must keep quite distinct when ‘thinking about the unthinkable.’ Our own calculus of the likely political effects of any new terrorist attack against America is not by any means necessarily the same as the calculus of FascIslamic terrorists. Their strategic situation, their cultural perceptions and their political calculus will be very different from our own. After all, their expectations of the impact 9/11 would have on the actions of the American government and the American psyche were profoundly wrong. (Though it should be admitted candidly that their expectations might have been closer to reality with a different set of actors—say, Bill Clinton, Sandy Berger and Dick Clarke.) Until now the FascIslamists have shown that they understand the Europeans much better than they understand us—a perception which has only been reinforced by the 3/11 bombings in Madrid.

It is always hazardous to venture guesses about your enemy’s intentions and perceptions, but you must. The venturing of accurate and informed guesses—and not the caricature of recent news coverage and “analysis”—is the quintessential objective of ‘intelligence.’
And paradoxically, it is very likely that Al Qaeda’s calculus would lead them to a hierarchy of targets that is the exact opposite of that which we would predict according to our own reckoning.

You would think, as an American contemplating the target hierarchy in terms of its likely political effects, that Al Qaeda would be most likely to strike the Democratic convention, directly or coincidentally. Or, if they were sufficiently audacious and willing to assume risks, the Republican convention. An attack upon the Olympics would more likely be antithetical to their interests, unless they were supremely confident that everything would go according to plan.

But we and our nemesis to not inhabit the same perceptual world.
They ‘misunderestimate’, or, at the very least, misperceive us.

Al Qaeda may despise the ‘weak horse’ crowd in American politics, the Democrats whose very symbol is appropriate, but the terrorists are sophisticated enough to recognize them as potential allies, or at least as dupes. Rhetorically, with just a few notable exceptions, their words have been those of the Spanish socialists or the Philippines’ Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. As a consequence, though we would consider an attack upon or coincident with the Democratic convention to be the most likely to ‘succeed’ in the terrorists’ terms, and, therefore, their most likely course of action, it is in reality the option they are least likely to choose.

Their cultural proclivity toward the ‘personalization’ of conflict makes it significantly more likely that they would strike, or strike coincidentally with, the Republican convention, or (for example) at the Texas White House in Crawford during the Democratic convention. It would be wise for us to remember that the plane which came crashing down into that Pennsylvania countryside on the 11th of September was targeted alternately at the Congress and the White House.

But from the vantage point of the FascIslamic terrorists, there is reason to suppose the most likely target of opportunity will be the Olympics. There is the precedent of the Black September strike at the Munich Olympics, which resonates with radical Islam. Greek security is notoriously lax, and despite the pressure of the occasion and the presence of American Special Forces, certain inherent vulnerabilities remain. Geographically, Greece is more accessible, and more likely than the US to have been widely interpenetrated by sleeper cells of terrorists that have gone undisturbed by Patriot Act enforcement measures. Then, too, the Olympics provide a truly global stage that is almost unparalleled And finally, it should be clear to all of us by now that Al Qaeda and its ideological compatriots perversely relish slaughtering those who are utterly innocent. They seem to prefer it.

None of this, of course, is to claim that it is more likely that Al Qaeda and its allies will strike at or coincident with the ‘big events’ of the next few months than it is that they will see other long-term plans come to fruition and more unpredictably attack the Port of Houston or LAX or the Statue of Liberty or any among dozens of possible targets. While the impact of a terrorist attack directly upon one of the ‘big events’ would appear to maximize the impact, any other strike would still deliver a powerful message. But how will the American public read that message?

I count myself among those who hope but aren’t certain that it will increase our resolve.

Last Fall the Austin Review observed that this election was shaping up as perhaps the most consequential since Lincoln defeated McClellan in 1864. It’s still looking that way.

–From the July 2004 Austin Review