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Global War on Terror: A Loss of Direction
K P S Gill
As the third year since the catastrophic
attacks of September 11, 2001, in USA approaches completion, with
much of the world sliding, once again, slowly but steadily into a
torpor of denial, terrorism has once again issued multiple reminders
over the past weeks that liberal democracies everywhere are under
siege.
The worst of shocks were reserved for Russia, where Chechen
terrorists, apparently aided by a number of Arab nationals, took
over 1,200 persons hostage - a majority of them children - in a
school in Beslan. The bloody dénouement of this operation left 338
dead, including at least 155 children. But this was only the worst
of what Russia had already been subjected to in the preceding week:
two Russian passenger planes were blown up, apparently by Chechen
women suicide bombers, killing 89 persons on August 24. Then, on
August 31, another suspected woman suicide bomber blew herself up,
along with 10 commuters, at a Moscow subway.
In Iraq, on August 31, terrorists of the Ansar-al-Sunna slaughtered
12 Nepali hostages in cold blood, because they were "working for
Jews and the Christians". A number of other hostages of various
nationalities continue to be under threat in the custody of a
variety of Iraqi groups, including two French journalists, who they
have threatened to execute if the French Government fails to lift
its ban on headscarves for Muslim schoolgirls.
And so it has been over the past three years, with some tactical and
operational variations. Americans, Spaniards, the French, Italians,
Russians, Indians, Iraqis, Philippinos, Afghans, even Pakistanis and
Saudis - the terrorists' now-ambivalent allies and supporters - ,
along with others of various nationalities, have repeatedly been
targeted over the past three years by Islamist extremists hell-bent
on imposing their fantastical vision of a 'cleansed' and 'Islamised'
world order.
The liberal democratic response, however, has been, at best,
tentative and inconsistent. Indeed, the pattern of Islamist
terrorist attacks is itself at least partially responsible for this.
While targets have been attacked across the world, there has been no
attempt to engineer simultaneous attacks in a wide range of
countries. While part of the reason for this would be purely
operational, it is also the case that this has resulted in a
substantial fragmentation of responses. There is clearly a
deliberate, calibrated terrorist strategy, relying on a systematic
exploitation of the ideological divisions, the historical faultlines
and the geopolitical tensions in the free world - everything, in
fact, that creates obstacles to the emergence of a concerted and
coordinated global counter-terrorism response.
These multiple tensions within the loose global counter-terrorism
coalition remain visible even at moments of the greatest crisis and
tragedy. In the aftermath of the terrible catastrophe at Beslan, at
least some expressions of shock and condolence - most notably, those
emanating from Europe - were qualified by entirely inappropriate
riders seeking 'explanations' from the Russian Government about how
such a tragedy 'was allowed to happen'. Some commentators dwelt on
the 'root causes' and 'legitimate grievances' of the Chechens at a
time when all such political issues should have been clearly and
unambiguously subordinated to the unqualified condemnation of the
enormity and inhumanity that had far transgressed any conceivable
borders of explicable violence. It is useful, in this context, to
recall that Chechen separatism and terror continues to receive
'diplomatic support' and 'moral sympathy' at a number of
international, particularly including European, fora, as well as a
substantial measure of material support from sympathetic state
sources that largely remain outside the ambit of the international
condemnation of the 'sponsorship of terrorism'.
Within this context, it is useful to note that no single country in
the world has, in fact, any concrete idea, policy or strategy on how
it would deal with the kind of mass hostage situations -
particularly those targeting 'sensitive' segments of the population,
such as children, women, or very important personalities - on the
pattern of the Beslan Operation. For those who believe that it is
too soon after Beslan to expect state institutions to have devised
an operational policy of response, it is useful to recall that this
is far from the first hostage crisis at this scale, and Russia
itself has witnessed several in the past. Among the more prominent
of these, on October 25, 2002, Chechen rebels took 800 people
hostage in a Moscow theatre, demanding the withdrawal of Russian
troops from Chechnya. All 41 attackers were shot dead, and 129
hostages also died as a result of the anaesthetic used to immobilize
the terrorists. Earlier, on January 9, 1996, militants seized as
many as 3,000 hostages in Kizlyar. They were eventually attacked by
Russian troops, and at least 78 persons were killed. On June 14,
1995, rebels took 2,000 hostages in Budyonnovsk. In this case,
Russia eventually negotiated the release of hostages in exchange for
the rebels' escape, but more than 100 persons were killed during the
crisis.
Most Governments across the world would respond to comparable crises
with hysteria, despair and confusion, adding to the natural risks
attending such calamities. It is, consequently, imperative that hard
answers now be defined for the many questions of morality, policy
and tactics raised by such horrific possible scenarios. A clear,
detailed, unequivocal and unremitting policy for dealing with
hostage situations needs to be defined at the earliest, and this
must secure the sanction, if not of the entire 'international
community', at least of those within it who are committed to the
'war against terrorism'. Regrettably, the struggle against terrorism
needs an ideological commitment far beyond the opportunism and
political expediency that currently dominates the policies of most
countries.
It is imperative, moreover, to revaluate our understanding of the
'war on terror'. This struggle cannot simply be conceptualised as a
military operation, and has far deeper and more complex dimensions,
which require inputs across a wide range of non-military parameters.
Unfortunately, the world has substantially failed to recognize these
parameters, and existing institutional responses, sanctions and
penalties are simply not enough.
The reasons for this failure are not, by any means, rooted in the
impossibility of the task. Indeed, responses are not all that
difficult to work out. The tragedy is, most of the 'experts'
currently working in this field are mere academics, desk officers,
policy makers and politicians, most of whom have little real
experience of the field, and who jealously guard their 'turf'
against hard practitioners of counter-terrorism strategy and
tactics. The examples of the miscalculations and misadventures of
these doctrinaire 'experts' are too numerous to be listed and can,
indeed, be multiplied ad infinitum. What is needed, however, is to
evolve systems within and between countries that will optimize
coordinated responses on a day-to-day operational basis. It is
critical to realize, today, that we are in fact confronted with the
challenge of policing a menace that is dispersed across the globe,
and the formalism of international treaties, bilateral agreements,
and the joint working group mechanisms that have been hammered out
between some countries, remain mired in legal and diplomatic
formalism, and are simply not working. Unless we develop
instrumentalities beyond these paper exercises, we will only see
horrifying events like 9/11 and the Beslan tragedy multiply in
ever-widening areas of the world. Any country that believes that it
is safe, or that it can exempt itself through policies designed to
appease or conciliate the terrorists is simply deluding itself.
K.P.S. Gill is
Publisher, SAIR;
President, Institute for Conflict Management
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