1/22/10
On Christmas Day, America received a wake-up call in the war against terror.
On a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, a 23-year-old Nigerian with ties to Al Qaeda, attempted to detonate explosives hidden in his underwear. But for the heroic efforts of the passengers, America would have suffered its worst terrorist attack since 9/11 and more than 300 innocent travelers would have perished. Despite this, Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano said “the system worked.” Obviously, it did not.
Americans rightly have questions: How could our government miss an individual whose father, a respected banker, warned the CIA in November that his son was radicalized by al Qaeda in Yemen? How could our government miss this same individual who paid cash for a one-way ticket on Flight 253 and checked no luggage? How did the British manage to deny Abdulmutallab’s visa while we did not? How did we fail to recognize, and act upon, these signs? The list of failures goes on.
The bottom line is that the war on terror is still being waged. While the Obama Administration clearly hopes that a kinder, gentler and apologetic America will persuade extremists to end their war, the terrorists’ deep hatred of the United States –our values, institutions and freedoms – continues to burn deeply.
Our government was established, among other things, to “provide for the common defense.” Meeting that fundamental responsibility in the modern age requires the outright defeat of terrorists, and to achieve that we must take several steps.
The first step is for the Obama Administration to acknowledge that we are at war with terrorists. Renaming the global war on terror as an “Overseas Contingency Operation” or referring to terrorist acts as “Man-caused Disasters” are dangerous examples of political correctness run amok. Either we are serious about defeating terrorism or we are not. Correctly identifying our challenge, rather than ignoring it, is the first step to defending our nation against terror.
The second step is to address the poor flow of national security information within our government. Simply adding layers of bureaucracy and competing agencies has not worked to cure bureaucratic “stove piping.” The solution depends on an active and engaged leadership, beginning with the Commander-in-Chief and his appointees, for whom identifying and acting on threats to America, not political expediency, must be the top priorities. The near-attack on Christmas Day shattered the illusion that our national security agencies are effectively coordinating their actions. We need leadership to cut the red tape, end the inter-agency turf battles and better empower our men and women at home and abroad to succeed in preventing terrorist acts before they occur.
The third step is to stop treating terrorists as common criminals. The decisions by the Obama Administration to indict Abdulmutallab under the criminal justice system and to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in a New York City courtroom, affording them both the same constitutional rights as American citizens, are mistakes. Abdulmutallab and Mohammed should be identified as “enemy combatants” and tried by military tribunal. Terrorists are enemies of the state and they should be treated as such.
Further, the President’s decision to close Guantanamo without a plan for how to handle enemy combatants has further complicated our efforts. The Administration has correctly reversed its decision to release detainees to Yemen in light of reports that former Yemeni detainees planned the Christmas attack. However, the fact remains that nearly one year after the President decided to close Guantanamo, there is no plan for dealing with dangerous detainees that provides security to the American people.
The fourth step is to stand firm against rogue nations and their leaders, such as the Ahmadinejad regime in Iran, whose nuclear ambitions represents a clear and present danger to our staunch ally Israel, the other nations in the region, and the remainder of the world. The efforts of the Obama Administration to engage Ahmadinejad have resulted in contempt and defiance. Further, President Obama’s tepid statements concerning Ahmadinejad’s brutal crackdown on the “Green Revolution” last summer only emboldened the regime. It is a stark reminder that we can never appease the leaders of rogue states who take our failures to act or speak decisively as a sign of weakness.
We were lucky that hundreds did not die over Detroit on Christmas Day, but Americans should never be required to rely on luck for protection from terrorism. Terrorism remains the greatest national security challenge facing the United States and our national leaders must do more to protect our national security.
Ovide Lamontagne is a candidate for the United States Senate seat being vacated by Senator Judd Gregg.
