more susceptible to unpredictable acts of violence than a tightly controlled one. All that means, though, is that trying to prevent any given terrorist incident is like trying to guard against being struck by lightning on a clear day. You can’t do it, so you accept the small risk of dying and go on with your life.
What took place Tuesday was a horrendous catastrophe leaving wounds that may never fully heal. It demands greater vigilance than we’ve had to exercise before. But permanently robbing our daily lives of normality is more than even these terrorists can do.
Patriotism in time of war
Now more than ever, we need to make sure that the United States makes plenty of room for dissent
Sunday, September 23, 2001
The war against terrorists has hardly begun, and the anti-war activists are already in midseason form. A group called the Washington Peace Center, which urges the United States not to answer “violence with vengeance,” is planning demonstrations in the nation’s capital on Sept. 30. Harry Belafonte and Danny Glover are among the organizers of a coalition urging the administration not to take rash action but to work “cooperatively as part of a community of nations within the framework of international law.”
Several hundred students rallied at Harvard Thursday with signs bearing messages like “War Is Also Terrorism.” One speaker announced, “As long as the United States is exploiting the rest of the world to create your own wealth, you won’t ever have peace.”
You may be thinking the obvious: What morons. And you’d be right. If these imperturbable opponents of war had been around on Dec. 7, 1941, they would have urged President Roosevelt to arrange a friendly chat with the Japanese and try to understand their grievances.
But while the peace activists may have very little to say that is persuasive, we should be grateful they’re speaking up. War is a time for unity, but not uniformity. Now more than ever, we need to make sure America makes plenty of room for dissent.
That has not always been the case. During World War I, one man went to prison under the Espionage Act for telling volunteer knitters, “No soldier ever sees these socks.” In the infamous postwar Palmer Raids, the FBI arrested thousands of people and held them incommunicado for their leftist political beliefs and their suspected involvement in domestic bombings. “Most of those arrested,” reports “The Oxford Companion to American History,” “were found to be harmless.”
After Pearl Harbor, Japanese-Americans were hauled off to internment camps, not for their views but for their ancestry. Furious over an embarrassing Chicago Tribune exclusive about the Battle of Midway, FDR wanted publisher Robert McCormick, one of his staunchest critics, put on trial for treason.
During the Cold War, panic about communism fueled the rise of McCarthyism, which tarred countless innocent people as subversives. The abuses uncovered in the Watergate scandal stemmed from the Nixon administration’s paranoia about opposition to the Vietnam War. They were merely the culmination of decades of illegal surveillance and harassment of dissidents.
The flurry of flag-waving in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 atrocities was a spontaneous show of national sorrow, pride and determination. It reflected a warm and generous brand of patriotism, and an outpouring of sympathy for those who died at the hands of terrorists.
But during times of war, some people try to use our national banner as a gag. A generation ago, flag decals proliferated with slogans like “America: Love It or Leave It,” self-styled patriots beat up anti-war demonstrators, and country singer Merle Haggard had a hit song expressing a common sentiment toward anyone opposing U.S. policies: “You’re walkin’ on the fightin’ side of me.” The widespread conviction was that questioning the war was tantamount to betraying your country.
We’ve learned a lot since then. Still, the impulse to equate loyalty with blind allegiance is not dead. When a reporter dared to ask about the Fox News Channel’s decision to adorn all its broadcasts with an American flag, senior vice president John Moody replied, “I’d sure prefer that to a hammer and sickle, I’ll tell you that.” There you have it: Either you’re a loyal American who loves the Stars and Stripes, or you’re a filthy communist. It’s even been argued that anyone selling stocks is unpatriotic.
Reverence for Old Glory can easily turn into idolatry. Georgetown University law professor David Cole guesses that though Congress has repeatedly failed to approve a constitutional amendment banning desecration of the flag, it probably wouldn’t have the nerve to block it now.
During brief and controversial military campaigns, like the ones against Saddam Hussein and Slobodan Milosevic, Americans seem to have no trouble letting the skeptics be heard. But in a long and arduous undertaking like the new war against terrorists, where doubts have been scarce, the patience of the majority toward the minority may prove limited — particularly if things go poorly and the national consensus starts to unravel. Then the impulse to silence disagreement could emerge.
We need to keep in mind that you can love your country even if you don’t support whatever is necessary to bring back Osama bin Laden’s head. During wartime, soldiers need to obey their superiors without question. Citizens, however, have a duty to think for themselves, to tolerate different and even foolish opinions, and to challenge their leaders when they are wrong. If our enemies are attacking freedom, this is no time for us to abandon it.
A war that we can’t avoid — and a war that we can
Thursday, October 11, 2001
This war is different from the wars Americans are used to. Not because the enemy is mysterious and elusive. Not because we are unable to define our exact mission. Not because we may never achieve a clear victory. What distinguishes this war from our other recent military undertakings, from Kosovo back to Vietnam, is simple: It wasn’t optional.
We didn’t choose to go to war against the Al Qaeda terrorists and their sponsors in Kabul. They chose to go to war against us. Osama bin Laden and his allies have taken our past retreats (from Lebanon and Somalia, for example) as proof that the United States can’t endure casualties. But that’s a gross error. This time, we’re fighting to protect Americans on our soil from foreign attack, and that makes all the difference. Retreat offers no escape.
Much has been made in recent weeks about the alleged demise of the Powell doctrine. Authored by the current secretary of state, it says that the U.S. should use military force only when it has precise goals, an exit strategy and firm public support — and then only if it’s willing to employ decisive force. Yet today, we are told, an administration in which Colin Powell plays a central part has embarked on a war that fails to meet those conditions.
In fact, there’s no contradiction. The essence of Powell’s view is that you shouldn’t resort to military force unless your stake is big enough to justify the cost. We lost more than 6,000 lives on Sept. 11, and if the terrorists aren’t stopped, more Americans will die. Stakes don’t get much higher than that.
The real reason many people want to discredit the Powell doctrine is not because they want to attack the terrorists and their accomplices in Afghanistan. It’s because they want to take the war to someone else.
The Weekly Standard magazine recently published an open letter to President Bush, signed by a long list of conservatives, urging “a determined effort to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq.” Anything less, they claim, “will constitute an early and perhaps decisive surrender in the war on international terrorism.” While the signers recommend assisting Iraqi opposition groups, they also say “American forces must be prepared to back up our commitment to the Iraqi opposition by all necessary means.”
If Hussein had a hand in the attacks, taking him out would make perfect sense. But there has been a conspicuous lack of evidence against him. Last month, reports The Wall Street Journal, an Al Qaeda spokesman denounced the Iraqi dictator, whose regime is secular rather than Islamic, as a “false God.” And no one has made a good case why we should use this opportunity to settle an