Pro vs. Con: America is not safer five years after 9/11

By Chase Miller
Collegian Reporter
September 20, 2006

In a ubiquitous time of retrospect, five years after the events of Sept. 11, it is necessary to ask: “Are we as a nation safer today?”

Has anything changed in terms of national security? Conservatives, stop flipping through your playbooks for the answer, you umbilical party liners; the answer is no. No matter how many times our fearless leader dresses up in his monkey suit, curls his lip back in that “I’m yer buddy” kind of look, and tells us with furrowed, somber brow that headway is being made in the war on terror, the numbers seemingly always say otherwise.

So then, this is the point when the conservatives say, “We haven’t had an attack on American soil since Sept. 11, so there you go!” Well, as of Sept. 12, 2006, you can eat those words. On a day where the terror alert level was hovering around a queasy looking orange color, four Islamic militants executed yet another attack on the transplant American soil of our Syrian embassy in Damascus. While you’re eating those words, though, don’t fill up – there are a few more courses to dine on.

Recently, the Christian Science Monitor, the Washington Post and other major news outlets reported the number of worldwide terrorist attacks considered “serious” by the U.S. government tripled from 175 in 2003 to 655 in 2004. In fact, it is becoming more evident that the Bush Administration is going to great lengths to conceal the ominous statistical information on international terrorist attacks.

In 2003, the goverment stopped posting the annual “Patterns of Global Terrorism” report on the State Department’s Web site (www.state.gov) because it projected the highest number of terrorist attacks in its 19-year history. The “Country Report on Terrorism”, a palpable propaganda fact sheet that paints the Bush Administration as shining red, white and blue freedom fighters, has replaced it. So while the country becomes less safe as the world around us explodes in record numbers of terrorist acts, the Bush Administration continues to beat their playbook, saying, “We’re making great progress in the war on terror!” Thanks, Tony Snow.

While the war rages on with the extremist group Al-Qaeda in Iraq, everyone forgets before the invasion of Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s terrorist group was called Jama’at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad and they were loosely affiliated with Al-Qaeda at best. According to a Sept. 24, 2004 Washington Post article, only after the invasion did al-Zarqawi and Osama bin Laden begin to work together. America, in truth, has made itself less safe by losing focus on real threats in the fight against terrorism. In fact, the entire war in Iraq has increasingly compromised American security in post-9/11 times.

Former Vice Admiral of the Navy and prospective Pennsylvania Congressman Joe Sestak has been frequently quoted, even here on La Salle’s campus, saying, “For the cost of two days in Iraq, we could screen 100 percent of all air cargo on passenger planes.” Furthermore, Iraq has become a breeding ground for terrorist groups, demonstrated by the fact that the CIA director’s think tank, the National Intelligence Council, recently reported Iraq has replaced Afghanistan as the main training ground for “professionalized” terrorists. Iraq is thus the red-headed step-child growing up to take its revenge.

So is America safer since 9/11? It’s all objective. I’m inclined to say no, but I’m sure the conservatives out there would find some way to refute my opinion over their tapped phone lines. Maybe Big Brother will help them out while he’s listening in.

millerc10@lasalle.edu