Refreshing (and Somewhat Surprising)

From Players in Blame Game, Little Offense

If blame is the Washington sport, then Day One of the new round of 9/11 commission hearings was structured like the Super Bowl.

[...]

But the players did not clash. Despite some sniping and testiness, the surprising theme was unity.

Democrats and Republicans alike -- past and present secretaries and deputy secretaries of state and defense -- spoke little of Clinton vs. Bush and lots about Before vs. After.

And this is clearly the case. Everyone can look back through the lenses of 911 and argue that what was done after the attack could have been done before, but clearly this is not the case:

At the time, said the Democrat Albright, "it was very hard to get congressional support for military action . . . because I think there was a whole question about how serious this all was."

Republican Rumsfeld echoed thus: "Unfortunately, history shows that it can take a tragedy like 9/11 to awaken the world to a new threat."

I will say, however, that less extreme measures than invading Afghanistan could have been undertaken, as I still argue that the there was insufficient responses to a series of attacks in the 1990s (e.g., the first WTC attack, the Cole, the African embassies and the Khobar Towers). Although, really, less than placing blame, I would argue that there is a lesson in the past which is that lack of response can lead to heightened attacks.

One can disagree with the logic, but that is a substantial portion of the reason that the Bush administration began thinking pre-emptively: the idea that trying to remove the conditions that would allow for the growth of terrorist and their capabilities, rather than waiting and dealing with the perpetrators of an attack after it takes place.

Indeed, this is the crux of the military v. criminal justice paradigms in the war on terror, in my opinion: do you act before or after you are attacked? Of course, the problem with pre-emptive action is that you have to base your decisions as to whom you will attack on intelligence and surmise--and thefore can make mistakes--while the cj approach allows you to at least know that an attack did take place. Both approaches have a price--I simply prefer paying the former, rather than the latter.

Posted by Steven Taylor at March 24, 2024 08:17 AM | TrackBack