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Fighting Fire With Fire
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11123 |
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Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
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| Issue
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3 / 1986 |
2,916 Words |
| Author
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Neil C. Livingstone
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Perhaps it is a sign of the times. The first sentence diagramed in the new Harbrace College Handbook is "The hijacked plane has safely landed." Terrorism, it seems, is an all-pervasive feature of modern life, inescapable even in a college handbook on style.
Virtually every news magazine and wire service named terrorism as one of its top news stories in 1985, eclipsed only by the AIDS epidemic on some lists.
There is little promise of relief in 1986 with respect to international terrorism. Libya's erratic strongman, Colonel Muammar Qaddafi, has publicly declared that, if provoked, he will train and equip Arab guerrillas for "terrorist and suicide missions" against Israel and the United States.
Mohammed Abbas, the accused mastermind of the Achille Lauro hijacking, allegedly told a western reporter that he plans to hold a secret conference of "revolutionary forces" to develop a global strategy for waging war against the United States in 1986.
The so-called Islamic Jihad similarly has vowed to intensify its "holy war" against the U.S. Add to this increased attacks in recent months against U.S. and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) targets by European terrorists, and trepidation by authorities in this country that Central American violence may soon spill over into U.S. cities.
Nevertheless, despite widespread public concern over international terrorism, many observers are asking whether it isn't becoming a little like the weather: something everyone talks about but no one does anything about. With the exception of the daring mid-air interception of the Egyptian jetliner bearing the Achille Lauro pirates, the United States has scored few real victories against international terrorism. Even that episode can be attributed more to a fortuitous set of circumstances and the dogged determination of one National Security Council staffer than to any particular policy or design.
More typical is the fact that the hijackers of TWA flight 847 and the planners and state supporters of the December Rome and Vienna airport massacres are still at large. The United States has yet to exact retribution for the bombings of the U.S. embassies in Beirut and Kuwait, the kamikaze attack on the U.S. Marine barracks at the Beirut airport that left 241 dead, and dozens of other outrages perpetrated by terrorists over the years.
Critics contend that the Reagan administration came to power with talk about "swift and effective retribution" against terrorists but that little tough action has been witnessed to date.
Some observers have even gone so far as to express the view that terrorism is simply a cost of doing business in the modern world, and also note that terrorists are too elusive to hit back at effectively. Striking at terrorist safe heavens and supporters like Syria, Libya, and Iran, they contend, is also ill-advised since absolute proof of guilt is hard to come by, and military action runs the risk of expanding into a major conflict.
The plain fact is that the United States does not have a comprehensive and consistent policy for dealing with
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