U.S. Anti-Terrorism Policy: Get Lucky

“I know, too, that Islam has always been a part of America’s history."

That’s what President Obama said in his Cairo speech, an early effort to reach out to Muslims throughout the Middle East and the world. The problem is, he is dead wrong. Muslims were not here prior to or during the Revolution. They did not participate in the Civil War though for centuries they were notorious as slave traders. During World War Two they were on Hitler’s side. And, over the weekend, a naturalized American, formerly from Pakistan, is alleged to be the man who tried to kill a lot of Americans in New York’s Time’s Square. So, while not “always” having been part of America’s history, Muslims are currently leaving their mark on it in the twenty-first century.

“overseas contingency operation” against “man-caused disasters”

This is an administration that abandoned the descriptive “war on terrorism” in favor of “overseas contingency operation” against “man-caused disasters.” That was an early indicator that the White House is clueless. As recently as November 5, 2009, a Muslim member of the U.S. Army killed thirteen fellow soldiers at Fort Hood. The National Security Adviser, Jim Jones, was quick to write off the Fort Hood attack as “not terrorism related.” This is a president who took his sweet time responding to the Christmas day attempted airliner bombing, calling it an “isolated incident” despite law enforcement reports that such attempts have been increasing in recent times. The “underpants bomber”, Umar Farouk Adbulmutalleb was arrested, debriefed, and read his Miranda rights within an hour after being taken into custody, all with the blessing of White House counterterrorism chief, John Brennen. This is a classic example of how not to deal with a terrorist. Meanwhile, Attorney General John Holder has been hot for holding the trial of the mastermind of 9/11 in New York! And this is an administration that came into office promising to close down our detention facilities at Guantanamo.

We have a complete idiot, Janet Napolitano, as the Secretary of Homeland Security

We have a complete idiot, Janet Napolitano, as the Secretary of Homeland Security. We are all now too accustomed to her glassy-eyed, deer-in-the-headlights responses to events that threaten the nation’s security. Apparently, the Obama administration’s anti-terrorism policy can be summed up in two words, “Get lucky.” There are still liberals ready to condemn the United States for 9/11 and subsequent attacks. The liberal mantra is that these attacks are the result of our actions in the Middle East, but that misses the point that the primary characteristic of Middle East Muslims is to always blame someone or some nation for their own failures. The United States, the Great Satan, and Israel, the Little Satan, are the convenient targets of blame. Israel has been relentlessly attacked and the U.S. has been provoked throughout the latter part of the last century with countless attacks on our citizens abroad, our embassies, and on 9/11. We must thank the many patriots working in our national intelligence gathering system and we can thank the personnel of the FBI and local law enforcement people for the extraordinary job they did in identifying and arresting the alleged Time Square bomber. What we are learning, however, is that it is extremely difficult to thwart such acts of terrorism, that we allow far too much traffic to and from the hotbeds of terrorism in the Middle East, and that the sheer avalanche of intelligence we secure daily often obscures an attack. What we know is that we have a White House filled with incompetent advisers to a president who is in total denial. © Alan Caruba, 2010

Alan Caruba——Bio and Archives

Editor’s Note: Alan passed away on June 15, 2015.  He will be greatly missed

  Alan Caruba: A candle that goes on flickering in the dark.

 

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