If you just look at the Bush record on combatting terrorism and use minimal logic, the conclusions are pretty obvious. Weak on Terror By PAUL KRUGMAN Published: March 16, 2004 Columnist Page: Paul Krugman Forum: Discuss This Column E-mail: krugman@nytimes.com My most immediate priority," Spain's new leader, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, declared yesterday, "will be to fight terrorism." But he and the voters who gave his party a stunning upset victory last Sunday don't believe the war in Iraq is part of that fight. And the Spanish public was also outraged by what it perceived as the Aznar government's attempt to spin last week's terrorist attack for political purposes. The Bush administration, which baffled the world when it used an attack by Islamic fundamentalists to justify the overthrow of a brutal but secular regime, and which has been utterly ruthless in its political exploitation of 9/11, must be very, very afraid. Polls suggest that a reputation for being tough on terror is just about the only remaining political strength George Bush has. Yet this reputation is based on image, not reality. The truth is that Mr. Bush, while eager to invoke 9/11 on behalf of an unrelated war, has shown consistent reluctance to focus on the terrorists who actually attacked America, or their backers in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. This reluctance dates back to Mr. Bush's first months in office. Why, after all, has his inner circle tried so hard to prevent a serious investigation of what happened on 9/11? There has been much speculation about whether officials ignored specific intelligence warnings, but what we know for sure is that the administration disregarded urgent pleas by departing Clinton officials to focus on the threat from Al Qaeda. After 9/11, terrorism could no longer be ignored, and the military conducted a successful campaign against Al Qaeda's Taliban hosts. But the failure to commit sufficient U.S. forces allowed Osama bin Laden to escape. After that, the administration appeared to lose interest in Al Qaeda; by the summer of 2002, bin Laden's name had disappeared from Mr. Bush's speeches. It was all Saddam, all the time. This wasn't just a rhetorical switch; crucial resources were pulled off the hunt for Al Qaeda, which had attacked America, to prepare for the overthrow of Saddam, who hadn't. If you want confirmation that this seriously impeded the fight against terror, just look at reports about the all-out effort to capture Osama that started, finally, just a few days ago. Why didn't this happen last year, or the year before? According to The New York Times, last year many of the needed forces were tied up in Iraq. It's now clear that by shifting his focus to Iraq, Mr. Bush did Al Qaeda a huge favor. The terrorists and their Taliban allies were given time to regroup; the resurgent Taliban once again control almost a third of Afghanistan, and Al Qaeda has regained the ability to carry out large-scale atrocities. But Mr. Bush's lapses in the struggle against terrorism extend beyond his decision to give Al Qaeda a breather. His administration has also run interference for Saudi Arabia — the home of most of the 9/11 hijackers, and the main financier of Islamic extremism — and Pakistan, which created the Taliban and has actively engaged in nuclear proliferation. Some of the administration's actions have been so strange that those who reported them were initially accused of being nutty conspiracy theorists. For example, what are we to make of the post-9/11 Saudi airlift? Just days after the attack, at a time when private air travel was banned, the administration gave special clearance to flights that gathered up Saudi nationals, including a number of members of the bin Laden family, who were in the U.S. at the time. These Saudis were then allowed to leave the country, after at best cursory interviews with the F.B.I. And the administration is still covering up for Pakistan, whose government recently made the absurd claim that large-scale shipments of nuclear technology and material to rogue states — including North Korea, according to a new C.I.A. report — were the work of one man, who was promptly pardoned by President Pervez Musharraf. Mr. Bush has allowed this farce to go unquestioned. So when the Bush campaign boasts of the president's record in fighting terrorism and accuses John Kerry of being weak on the issue, when Republican congressmen suggest that a vote for Mr. Kerry is a vote for Osama, remember this: the administration's actual record is one of indulgence toward regimes that are strongly implicated in terrorism, and of focusing on actual terrorist threats only when forced to by events.
I don't entirely disagree...but do you think any of the other candidates would "get tough" on Saudi Arabia?? Somehow I doubt it. I can't imagine that if Al Gore were president...or if Ralph Nader were president...that our government would be exacting any meaningful pressure on Saudi.
It would have to be a politician with absolutely no ties to Saudi Arabia, and the only ones with that distinction are down at the City Council level of government!
i know...it's extremely frustrating, because it seems that self-interest completely overrides. so we're stuck with the same old, same old, no matter where you put your vote. that's not encouraging.
i really wish you'd label your threads as being and article by krugman, nytimes, etc. it'd save me clicking through only to discover another mindless anti-bush diatribe.
You mean the thread title/poster wouldn't have given you just an inkling that you weren't clicking on a link to an NRO article? Quit being so dramatic...
the other question i have...is what should we do in saudi that we aren't already doing?? i don't think anyone would advocate declaring war on saudi....so what do you do?
Please use this same policy when you post NRO articles and random web blogs that are completely biased to the right. This is a great point.
my understanding...and it may be wrong...is that the all-out search for osama took a break over the winter months because they wanted to start an offensive in the spring. and how relevant is OBL now?? would capturing him prevent things like what happened in Spain? somehow, I doubt it.
I think you take the long view and try and come up with a coherent policy that includes elements such as development of alternative energy sources, stopping active support of repressive regimes, and serving as an honest broker in the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. There's a lot we can do if our policy is not constrained by the influence of the oil industry.
i agree...but understand the consequences of that. seems we pissed of the saudis in the 70's and that didn't work out real well for joe consumer. i agree...we should be developing alternative energy sources, BIG TIME. it's hard for me to even imagine a world where we're not dependent on oil, but it's coming. hopefully in my lifetime.
Our hand is very weak in Saudi Arabia... we can't let the regime fall to radical Mullahs and end up with another Iran and they know it. That doesn't mean we have to coddle them and pretend there's not some issues that need to be addressed. We at least need to call them on a few of their minor bluffs. But now, that would take some international cooperation wouldn't it?
This is a good question. We can't just give up the hunt- we have to make a statement that we can successfully pursue, capture and/or kill any terrorist, particularly the most infamous one in the world. In the end, it wouldn't prevent events like the one in Spain. The autonomy of the individual cells is what makes the organization so effective. In fact, the argument could be made that capturing/killing OBL will be a bad thing, because the cause for vengeance will be greater than ever. OBL is a king, a demi-god, to these guys. Successful attacks will be carried out when we finally do find him, no question. But in the end, even if it has little effect on individual cells, justice must be done. We must find him. And again, because it bears repeating- if the war on terror is priority #1, why rest in the search for OBL a single day? That isn't being "tough on terror." Keep going after the financial support, pressure the govts that support them, and keep pursuing/capturing/killing the leaders at all levels. Anybody can do that, democrat or republican.
If you promise to do the same, should you post from "The National Review" or the American Heritage Foundation or such. The Bush administration did round up Saudis and bin Ladens and spirit them out of the country post haste after 9/11, and didn't interview them. Since we "knew" right away who was behind 9/11 (I guess bin Laden must have organized the financing, because the guys who scraped the plan together seem to have been other dudes) shouldn't we have at least questioned such individuals? We can say that maybe they were questioned in the past, but actually, they weren't. In the early 90's George the Elder had several of the bin Laden family exempt from any investigation whatsoever. I'll quote from The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, p. 98, by Greg Palast: FBI Document 199I "From less-than-happy FBI agents we obtained an interesting document, some thirty pages long, marked "SECRET."... According to insiders, FBI agents had wanted to check into two members of the bin Laden family, Abdullah and Omar, but were told to stay away by superiors---until September 13, 2001" (bold letters, mine; Palast doesn't try to point that out like I do, but the date is....rather odd?) "By then, Abdullah and Omar were long gone from the USA. "Why no investigation of the brothers bin Laden? The Bush administration's line is the Binladdins (a more common spelling of the Arabic name) are good folk. But the official line notwithstanding, some FBI agents believed the family had some gray sheep worth questioning---especially these two working with the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY), which the file labels 'a suspect terrorist organization.' "Let's be careful here: WAMY may be completely innocent. The FBI targets lots of innocents, too many in fact, but there were plenty of signs that the WAMY crew deserved the organization's scrutiny. WAMY, funded from Riyadh by royal charities, sponsors soccer teams and educational seminars. But in their Florida summer camp, besides the usual arts and crafts for the kiddies, youngsters received a pep talk on what were presented as the good Islamic practices of hostage-taking and suicide killings. (We at BBC obtained a video tape of one of these rap sessions.) WAMY literature was found in the apartment of one of the 1993 WTC bombers, praising "heroes" who killed unarmed Jews at worship. "No matter how vile WAMY's indoctrination chants, they are none of the FBI's business. Recruitment for terror, however, is. Before 9/11, the governments of India and the Phillipines tied WAMY to groups staging murderous attacks on civilians. Following our broadcast on BBC, the Dutch secret service stated that WAMY, 'supported violent activity.'" etc etc
Close your eyes and imagine for a moment the ear splitting screech you would hear from somewhere over to your Right, if a family named named Clinton had this kind of relationship with a family named Bin Laden. Now open your eyes and tell me about the Liberal Media.
keep in mind it could be that this is some freaky conspiracy internet stuff without a shred of evidence that a media source wishing to hold on to its credibility would wish to print.
