Useful Fools

In August, an Al Qaeda’s plot to simultaneously destroy numerous transatlantic airliners with liquid explosives was thwarted. The plot reportedly involved the use of liquid explosives and other components to be assembled on-board into a bomb, which would then be detonated in-flight.

Many have argued that the new security measures attempt to protect against a non-existent threat. While the security measures are arguable in their efficacy, contrary to the skeptical assertions, the is very real.

Some have argued that small amounts of liquid explosives are not powerful enough to take down an airliner. Indeed, Al Qaeda’s Ramzi Yousef , in a Project Bojinka 1994 test, used a few ounces of nitroglycerin that failed to bring down a 747, but killed a passenger and blew a hole in the side of the aircraft. Nitroglycerin is a very powerful liquid explosive easily made from common chemicals, and is the explosive component of dynamite. This test proved only that a few ounces, not placed in an optimal location, will not always take down a large commercial airliner.

A suicide bomber, with the same amount of explosive, would be able to set off the explosive in an optimal location – such as at the cockpit door, just above the central fuel tank, or other places where a relatively small explosive could destroy the aircraft’s ability to fly. Additionally, there exist a number of powerful liquid explosives, including binary formulations which are stable until the ingredients are mixed.

Others have said it would be too difficult to make a suitable explosive in flight. This is probably because the plot allegedly involved in-flight manufacture of TATP, a popular terrorist explosive. Making TATP is not technically difficult, but the process is time consuming and very hard to conceal, and the explosive is very sensitive, which could result in too small an explosion too soon. One might as well make nitroglycerin on board.

All of this is well known to counter-terrorism officials. After all, TATP is the explosive of choice for Palestinian suicide bombers, and the high sensitivity of the explosive has led to many “work accidents” - the Israeli term for unintentional explosive suicides from premature detonations.

Even so, TATP can be used as a detonator for an otherwise too stable explosive. The “shoe bomber” attempted to set off TATP hidden in his shoes, which was intended to detonate a significant quantity of the very powerful PETN.

Thus, given the considerable terrorist experience with TATP, and Al Qaeda’s previous use of it, TATP could in fact have been pre-made and included only as a trigger.

Thus the plan would have been:

1. - Carry aboard a small amount of TATP for use as a detonator
2. - Carry aboard a stable liquid explosive, or the component halves of a binary liquid explosive
3. - Access (and perhaps mix) the liquid explosive and attach the TATP detonator. This could easily be done quickly in a toilet
4. - Either detonate the explosive in the toilet, or run to a sensitive spot and detonate it there. The latter approach would require a short period of protection of the bomber while the TATP was being set off.

Many related approaches are also possible.Hence preventing passengers from transporting liquid explosives onto an aircraft is clearly needed. The current security measures make that transport much harder, but not impossible. Whether they are appropriate is a harder question.

The arguments against coercive interrogation are so absurd that some of their famous promoters are either treasonably dishonest or dumb as rocks. I keep running into:

“…the danger that our enemies will not treat our troops well.”

John McCain should know better, but Mr. Arizona Narcissist (who graduated near the bottom of his Anapolis class) has never been too bright. The only opponent of consequence we have fought who sort-of paid attention to the Geneva Conventions was Nazi Germany - and they didn’t do a good job of it. The argument is amazingly specious, and it shows Colin Powell is a dishonest SOB, John McCain is an idiot, the MSM are on the other side (well, we knew that anyway)…

“…it will bring us down to their moral level.”

So a little waterboarding or other ccercive techniques (which we use in training on our own troops, myself included) brings us down to the moral level of 7th century savages who behead reporters, intentionally kill thousands of civilians, and in general behave as the spawn of the devil?

“…it doesn’t work.”

Anyone who has been to SERE school in the last 40 years knows better. Anyone who has paid attention to the patterns of our successes against Al Qaeda knows better.

“…we will lose support in the world.”

Support? What support? If our friends only support us when we hobble ourselves at great cost in American lives, then I suggest they deal with Islamofascism and Jihadism all on their own. Screw ‘em.

“…it starts us down a slippery slope.”

Every moral choice involves drawing a line on a slippery slope - only the moral coward insists on staying comfortably back from the edge.

“…sadists torture people. Dictators torture people. We will be just like them.”

Errr… oh really? That passes for logical thought in elite eastern schools these days? (not to mention that we aren’t talking about torture).

“…it constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.”

You say, what? We don’t interrogate as punishment. Come back when you learn what the issues are.

“…it ignores international law.”

Well, a European judge held that Common Article Three requires each prisoner have a private toilet (among other things). Is THAT a law we want to be party to? Europe may be suicidal, but only half of America is. We certainly don’t want our American interrogators under threat of having such logic turned on them (as McCain and Powell find so important).

Election
Iraq has just completed a remarkable election. Iraqis showed a strong desire for democracy, with a large percentage risking their lives and that of their families to vote. This is a tremendous success for Iraq and for the coalition. It should presage the start of the end for the “insurgency” in Iraq, and hence enable foreign troops to be withdrawn over time.

With the election comes the time to re-examine the Iraqi situation, and that of the overall war on terror. George Bush, the central figure in the war, is being criticized and praised. The United States is relatively isolated in the world (although much of that was inevitable, as Europe fades in importance and the Pacific Rim grows) and is facing much criticism.

George Bush, Personality
George Bush is completely genuine in his desire to spread democracy. Bush is an unusual politician in that he personally feels, as a result of 9-11, a “mission”: protect America and the world from megaterrorism, where the greatest threats involve the use by Islamic extremists of WMD’s, especially nuclear explosives. He has a related mission of halting nuclear and long range missile proliferation.

He has a broad strategy, but key is spreading democracy to failed states. Iraq is the test case of a dangerous and unpopular dictatorship being transformed into a local democratic form.

A significant advantage that Bush has as commander of this battle is his single minded determination, to the extent of forgoing some political considerations in the furtherance of national security. Additionally, his immediate intuitive understanding of the strategic depth of the megaterrorism problem, still not appreciated by many of his critics, indicates an effective viewpoint and abilities. His war cabinet is unusually good, with experience deep into critical agencies. His weaknesses are a reluctance to communicate frequently with the American people, his delay in ridding himself of low performing appointees from cabinet level on down - especially in the State Department, CIA and FBI, and his failure to veto bills from congress. The latter may be necessary to preserve the political capital needed to carry out his war aims and his Supreme Court goals, although with a more favorable congress for at least the next two years, this may be less of an issue.

The Strategy
The hope and theory (largely from neocons) is that this democracy, a great good in itself, will spread itself by destabilizing dictatorships. The preemption doctrine is for states that are major threats where internal democratic movements are likely to fail. The success of communism, Baathism and Naziism in preventing internal regime change suggest that totalitarian states can usually defeat democracy movements.

Those who ridicule or question Bush’s motives will think this analysis naive. They are wrong. This is the core of the administration’s “war on terror” (horrible name - almost as bad as “Patriot Act”) strategy. Other parts include Homeland Security (not being done well, but ultimately impossible even with significant reductions in civil liberties - primarily privacy), diplomacy, the Preemption Doctrine, covert action (such as the use of Special Forces throughout the Sahel), improving and refocusing internal and external intelligence, the Proliferation Security Initiative (apparently quite effective
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From Yahoo (hat tip Drudge)

NEW YORK (AFP) - Human Rights Watch listed the names of 11 senior Al-Qaeda suspects it said were held by the CIA (news - web sites) in secret locations overseas, where some had reportedly been tortured.

The suspects were detained with no notification to their families, no Red Cross access and, in some cases, no acknowledgement that they are even being held, the New York-based watchdog said in a 46-page report.

“‘Disappearances’ were a trademark abuse of Latin American military dictatorships in their ‘dirty war’ on alleged subversion,” said Human Rights Watch special counsel Reed Brody.

“Now they have become a United States tactic in its conflict with Al-Qaeda,” Brody said.

These terrorists were captured on foreign territory and are at war with us, but target civilians and ignore all laws of war. They have said they want to kill or conquer all of us.

But “human rights groups” always have to go complain when we do those sometimes terrible things.

Would you feel safer with them in power, or someone who understands the stakes like George Bush?

Most Americans felt that the World Trade Center should be replaced with a defiant symbol - the same structure or more - representing America’s refusal to be cowed by cowards.

But that isn’t what’s happening. Mary Hart reports that a much more wimpy, artsy-fartsy approach is being taken.

Check it out at her site.

While the media has ignored it, Cuba has the third largest biotechnology industry in the world, making it a significant potential biological warfare threat. It also has a highly dangerous leader. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, Fidel Castro tried to persuade the Russians to launch Cuban-based nuclear-armed missiles at the United States [note 1].

Until this year, the Pentagon’s threat assessments about Cuba were controlled by a now jailed Cuban agent. Other agents have been found around U.S. military bases. There are likely other Cuban agents still in place in the U.S.

Cuba is one of the two remaining Rogue Communist states, the other being North Korea. Cuba has ties to the international drug trade and is listed by the United States as a state sponsor of terrorism. It is believed to sell equipment suitable for biological weaponry to other rogue states or even terrorists.

Given his hatred of America, the approaching end of his life, his history of recklessness and lack of respect for life, might Castro launch an anonymous biological weapons attack against the United States, expecting that we would blame Al Qaeda?

President Bush appointed a commission last year to make recommendations about freeing Cuba. That commission has just released its report.
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Fox News will read it’s own list next weekend, in response to Ted Koppel’s disgusting climbing on the coffins of those killed in the Iraq theater of battle. Koppel’s actions were clearly meant to delegitimatize that war, by showing only its cost in lives, not showing the cost of Afghanistan, and not mentioning any of the positive accomplishments of the war.

Fox will create a list of positive accomplishments in the War on Terror.

This is a better way to honor the dead - a positive tribute to what they achieved, instead of a cynical partisan use of the dead to imply that they died for nothing.

It is no wonder that the following appears in his biography.

In 1994, Koppel was named a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres from the Republic of France. He has received honorary degrees from numerous universities in the United States.

It has been clear to those who pay attention that the purpose of the 9-11 commission is political theater, not improving our security. Otherwise it wouldn’t be forcing Condi Rice to testify in public when she has done so in private; it wouldn’t be holding its hearings and releasing its report during the presidential election season; it wouldn’t be generating partisan leaks.

Democratic Senator Zell Miller points out the danger to our nation represented by this process.
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Syria, a major safe harbor for terrorists and a chemical weapon armed country may be about to stop supporting terror and perhaps give up its WMDs.

This represents a triumph for the forces of diplomacy, especially France and the United Nations
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Today there was apparently an extremely significant victory in World War IV (poorly named The War on Terror). Libya has announced that it is abandoning its WMD programs (including a very advanced nuclear program that was “close to producing weapons”).

The left is baffled. How could this have happened? Did the sanctions finally work?
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