America in danger

When the devil has no horns

Fighting The Outside-Inside Enemy
From The Statesman
25 May 2010

By ND Batra
IMMEDIATELY after the serendipitous discovery of the car bomb at Times Square on 1 May by vigilant onlookers, the New York Mayor, Michael Bloomberg, issued a stern public warning: “We will not tolerate any bias or any backlash against Muslim New Yorkers.” In times of crisis, politicians must put up a brave face and reassure the public that everything is under control. Preventing mass hysteria and violence spilling into Muslim communities as well as maintaining civil liberties has been the biggest challenge for law enforcement authorities wherever terrorists have struck whether in New York, London, Madrid or Mumbai. More so now when a new breed of smart, well-educated and socially assimilated young terrorists, with American accent, with American passports, some with American wives, have begun to appear on the scene, people so normal in their daily lives that you won’t mind helping them; even having a beer with them. What do you do when the devil does not look like a devil?

The Times, London, showed a picture of Faisal Shahzad, the accused New York failed bomber, as a young smiling father holding his new-born child in his arms with a cutline that created what psychologists call cognitive dissonance: “Faisal Shezad has admitted to receiving explosives training in Waziristan.” The self-contradictory picture of a most ordinary naturalised American Muslim young man coming from an elite Pakistani family - the son of a retired Pakistani Air Marshal - has created diffused and widespread anxiety in people’s minds as to who to trust and where the next terrorist attack might hit. Can a visitor to New York take a cab driven by someone who looks like a South Asian Muslim?
Potential target
UNSURPRISINGLY this kind of attack was not totally beyond the radar. The New York Police Commissioner, Raymond Kelley, told CBS “60 Minutes” correspondent, Steve Kroft, that although a car bomb attack was not unexpected, it’s worrisome nonetheless because “they’re mobile…. relatively easy to put together…. You can do it by yourself.” A car bomber can park his vehicle anywhere in New York and time it for a later blast as Shahzad did in Times Square. Not far from it is the Penn station, the busiest railroad hub in the United States that serves 600,000 passengers every day. It too must be a potential target for terrorists. Can one live in New York without being paranoid? But the mind of a jihadist cannot grow on its own; it needs nourishment, psychological reinforcement and the moral conviction to carry out terrorist attacks regardless of the consequences. And Pakistan has been a haven for terrorist ideology and training since long. New Yorkers got lucky this time, but such an attack could happen anywhere in the world, especially in a democratic and open society which by its nature is porous and vulnerable. For example, in spite of the 13 February Pune restaurant bomb blast, no one in India can say that another attack won’t happen.

Nor should the long-drawn out trial, conviction and death sentence of the sole surviving Pakistani gunman, Ajmal Kasab, for the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attack give Indians any assurance that another attack of this magnitude would not happen again, especially when the state-supported terrorist groups continue operating in the neighbourhood. So long the Al Qaida and its surrogates such as Tehrik-e-TalibanPakistan (TTP), Jaish-e-Mohmmed, and Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) with their Internet recruiting campaigns and terrorist training camps continue thriving in Pakistan, the likelihood of another terrorist attack in the United States, Europe or India is very high.

Last year 41 Americans were accused of plotting or abetting terrorist attacks against the US or abroad, including some that caught the headlines. For example: David Headley, a Chicago American Muslim of Pakistani origin charged with helping the Pakistani militant group responsible for the Mumbai attacks; Colleen LaRose, a Pennsylvania woman, also known as “Jihad Jane,” who was charged with plotting to attack a Swedish cartoonist who had caricatured the Prophet; Nidal Malik Hasan, a US Army major who went on a shooting rampage killing 13 people at Fort Hood Army base in Texas; Daniel Patrick Boyd, a North Carolina man who was charged with conspiring to attack the US Marine Corps Base in Quantico, Virginia and Najibullah Zazi, a permanent US resident from Afghanistan, who plotted a suicide attack on the New York subway system in February but lost his nerve and was arrested. What is the United States going to do? Connecticut Independent Senator Joe Lieberman would go to the extreme and revoke citizenship. “If you’ve joined an enemy of the United States in attacking the United States and trying to kill Americans, I think you should sacrifice your rights of citizenship,” he told the media. Even if it passes constitutional hurdles, Senator Lieberman’s proposal would not solve the immediate problem of uncovering Shahzad’s involvement with Al Qaida-Taliban networks in Pakistan. It might be a warning to some aspiring terrorists but to those who have already been brainwashed and become committed to carry out terrorist acts, American citizenship has no meaning. There is a certain Paradise over there, waiting to receive them.

Some American politicians are considering a move to suspend the Miranda warning in case of terrorist suspects. The Miranda warning is given to a criminal suspect to remind him of his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination before he is interrogated by the police. It is a protection against confession by police torture and is deemed a very important fundamental right. The warning reads: “ You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to you. Do you understand these rights as they have been read to you?”
Warning to Pakistan
TAKE the case of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, a Nigerian Muslim who attempted to detonate plastic explosives hidden in his underwear while on a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit, Michigan, on 25 December 2009. Soon after his arrest when he was read his Miranda rights, he stopped talking and refused to cooperate with the police. Nonetheless, he is in custody on charges of murder and use of weapons of mass destruction, and is awaiting further legal procedures. Some people argue that doing away with the Miranda warning in exceptional cases would facilitate confessions and save lives especially when dealing with terrorists. But creating exceptions to the Miranda warning is a slippery slope; eventually it might disappear. Americans have much greater faith in technological and diplomatic muscle than plodding legislative solutions to tackle the growing threat of outside-inside terrorism. As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton unambiguously warned Pakistan: “We want more. We expect more. We’ve made it very clear that if, heaven forbid, an attack like this that we can trace back to Pakistan, were to have been successful, there would be very severe consequences.” The United States might go beyond drone attacks, may even land boots on the ground, however savage they may be. Although the Obama administration plans to reduce its military presence in the region beginning July 2011, nothing is carved in stone. The United States is not going to run away in a hurry, as Afghan President Hamid Karzai was assured on his recent visit to the White House. It is time for the Pakistan military and ISI, the powers behind the democratic facade, to heed the voice of Uncle Sam, Pakistan’s major financial benefactor, who will brook no existential threat from any quarter. But this is also in Pakistan’s own national interest, a nation that has suffered so many self-inflicted wounds in order to spite and to inflict pain on its neighbours.
The writer is Professor of Communication and Diplomacy at Norwich University