One of the topics that Americans are likely to hear a great deal of during this election season from candidates of all stripes is "whether or not the US is winning the War on Terror." Less Safe, Less Free is a useful tool in trying to come to terms with that topic. There is one story that the authors share which provides a good context for how much of the rest of the world might see the US. They met a young Muslim man in Florida who told the story of an encounter he had with a young boy in Saudi Arabia. The boy did not speak English but was eager to show this man his cell phone. On the screen were brutal torture images from Abu Ghraib. The Muslim man said, "When young boys have images of Abu Ghraib on their cell phones, you know we are in trouble."
The book is laid out in three main sections. The first is entitled "Less Free" and deals with the problems of the war on terror on the domestic front. The authors talk about the idea of preventative law enforcement and how the US policies of wire taping, spying, and rounding up of Muslims and Arabs in this country have not made the country safer. They review several cases that have been brought to court which have received significant attention elsewhere. The other part of the first section looks at the Bush administration's decision to go to war against Iraq, which was labeled a "preventative war." Again, the authors are merely recounting the argument put forth by the administration for such an action.
Section two is entitled "Less Safe" and presents the collateral consequences of US policy, particularly Iraq and Guantanamo. Here Cole and Lobel present a good analysis of the claims made by the government that its policies are winning the war on terror. The government cites its success on the website Lifeandliberty.gov. One claim the government makes over and over is that those detained at Guantanamo are helping to prevent further acts of terrorism. Cole and Lobel state, "With the exception of fourteen high-level detainees transferred from secret CIA prisons to Guantanamo in September 2006, there appear to be remarkably few actual terrorists held there - even according to the government's own assessment." Another claim has to do with immigration enforcement helping in the war on terror. The government claims it has deported 515 people it suspected as being terrorists. The reality is--the FBI cleared them for deportation only after they had determined they were not a terrorist threat. Even if these people were suspected of plotting acts of terrorism, how would deporting them actually prevent them from do so? Cole and Lobel also note that the federal government's conviction rate "in prosecution of federal crimes of terrorism since 9/11 is 29%, as compared to 92% conviction rate for felonies in general.
In chapter five, the authors look at the cost of the war on terror, both monetary costs and physical costs. Here they cited three main failures of the administration - 1) actual funds that could be used for real prevention have been diverted into the war in Iraq or for the detention programs like Guantanamo; 2) the administration has opted for short term solutions, which means long term solutions have been sacrificed; and 3) because the government has adopted the so called preventive paradigm, it has undermined US credibility abroad. On the last point, the authors cite data by the Pew Research Center, which suggests that of the countries that were poll anywhere between 50 - 85% believed that the US was acting purely in its own interest or without considering what it means for other countries. One other consequence of the US war on terror is that many "repressive regimes around the world have used the United States' shortcuts in the war on terror as license to adopt their own harshly coercive measures, often directed not at terrorists but at dissidents or opposition parties," according to Human Rights Watch World Report for 2003. These conclusions about the ill effects of the US war on terror are not just coming from NGOs like Human Rights Watch, but from a broad spectrum of foreign policy analysts, according to the authors. They cite a 2006 bipartisan survey of more than 100 top US foreign policy experts and 87% felt that the US war in Iraq made the US more vulnerable to global terrorism.
The last section of the book is entitled "An Alternative Prevention Strategy." Here the author's state that beyond a US withdraw from Iraq and an end to torture and illegal detentions there are other tactics that could minimize the possibilities of terror attacks against the US. First, the US must reduce its military presence around the world and close some of the existing bases. The money saved on base closing could be used to develop more diplomatic resources to deal with global conflict. Cole and Lobel also believe that the US must improve its relations with Muslim countries around the world and decrease our dependency on foreign oil. While I agree that these actions would have potentially positive outcomes, the book does not come to terms with the fact that it is US imperialism that determines these policies. To have less dependency on foreign oil and reduce military bases around the world would require a huge shift in the US economy and political culture, something the authors do not address. In fact, that is the major flaw of the book, in that it does not address to real motivations of US foreign policy. The authors limit their analysis to the current administration, which is understandable for practical reasons, but it ignores that these types of policies have been central to US foreign policy for over 100 years. Despite, these shortcomings, the book is still a useful tool for those seeking to understanding why the current US war on terror is failing.
David Cole and Jules Lobel, Less Safe, Less Free: Why America is Losing The War on Terror, (The New Press, 2007).
