WASHINGTON, 26 March 2007 — The “war on terror” has created a national culture of fear in America. The Bush administration’s elevation of these three words into a national mantra since the horrific events of 9/11 has had a pernicious impact on American democracy, on America’s psyche and on US standing in the world. The phrase itself is meaningless. It defines neither a geographic context nor our presumed enemies. Terrorism is not an enemy but a technique of warfare — political intimidation through the killing of unarmed noncombatants.
Constant reference to a war on terror did accomplish one major objective: It stimulated the emergence of a culture of fear. The war of choice in Iraq could never have gained the congressional support it got without the psychological linkage between the shock of 9/11 and the postulated existence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. Support for President Bush in the 2004 elections was also mobilized in part by the notion that “a nation at war” does not change its commander in chief in midstream.
By claiminh that its war is similar to earlier US struggles against Nazism and then Stalinism (Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia were first-rate military powers, a status Al-Qaeda neither has nor can achieve), the administration could be preparing the case for war with Iran.
The culture of fear is like a genie that has been let out of its bottle. It acquires a life of its own — and can become demoralizing. We are now divided, uncertain and susceptible to panic in the event of another terrorist act in America itself.
In his latest justification for his war in Iraq, President Bush even claims absurdly that he has to continue waging it lest Al-Qaeda cross the Atlantic to launch a war of terror here in America.
Such fearmongering, reinforced by security entrepreneurs, the mass media and the entertainment industry, generates its own momentum. The terror entrepreneurs, usually described as experts on terrorism, are necessarily engaged in competition to justify their existence. Hence their task is to convince the public that it faces new threats. That puts a premium on the presentation of credible scenarios of ever-more-horrifying acts of violence, sometimes even with blueprints for their implementation.
That America has become insecure and more paranoid is hardly debatable. Just last week, here in Washington, on my way to visit a journalistic office, I had to pass through one of the absurd “security checks”. A uniformed guard required me to fill out a form, show an I.D. and in this case explain in writing the purpose of my visit. Would a visiting terrorist indicate in writing that the purpose is “to blow up the building”?
Government at every level has stimulated the paranoia. Consider, for example, the electronic billboards over interstate highways urging motorists to “Report Suspicious Activity” (drivers in turbans?). Some mass media have made their own contribution. The cable channels and some print media have found that horror scenarios attract audiences, while terror “experts” as “consultants” provide authenticity for the apocalyptic visions fed to the American public. Hence the proliferation of programs with bearded “terrorists” as the central villains. Their general effect is to reinforce the sense of the unknown but lurking danger that is said to increasingly threaten the lives of all Americans. The entertainment industry has also jumped into the act. Hence the TV serials and films in which the evil characters have recognizable Arab features, sometimes highlighted by religious gestures, which exploit public anxiety and stimulate Islamophobia. Arab facial stereotypes, particularly in newspaper cartoons, have at times been rendered in a manner sadly reminiscent of the Nazi anti-Semitic campaigns.
Social discrimination, for example toward Muslim air travelers, has also been its unintended byproduct. Animus toward America even among Muslims otherwise not particularly concerned with the Middle East has intensified, while America’s reputation as a leader in fostering constructive interracial and inter-religious relations has suffered egregiously.
The record is even more troubling in the general area of civil rights. The culture of fear has bred intolerance, suspicion of foreigners and the adoption of legal procedures that undermine fundamental notions of justice. In the meantime, the “war on terror” has gravely damaged America internationally. For Muslims, the similarity between the rough treatment of Iraqi civilians by the US military and of the Palestinians by the Israelis has prompted a widespread sense of hostility toward America in general. It’s not the “war on terror” that angers Muslims watching the news on television, it’s the victimization of Arab civilians. And the resentment is not limited to Muslims. A recent BBC poll of 28,000 people in 27 countries that sought respondents’ assessments of the role of states in international affairs resulted in Israel, Iran and America being rated (in that order) as the states with “the most negative influence on the world.” Alas, for some that is the new Axis of Evil!
The events of 9/11 could have resulted in a truly global solidarity against extremism and terrorism. A global alliance of moderates, including Muslim ones, engaged in a deliberate campaign to extirpate both the specific terrorist networks and to terminate the political conflicts that spawn terrorism would have been more productive than a demagogically proclaimed and largely solitary American “war on terror” against “Islamo-fascism.”
— Zbigniew Brzezinski was national security adviser to President Jimmy Carter.
