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Eye on the Empire
by Alan Bock

Perhaps the most encouraging thing about the terrorist alert first issued on Sunday was the relatively extensive debate it engendered in much of the country, even though the alert was in some ways calculated to be responsive to criticisms of previous alerts. Instead of being a vague and generalized alert about a possible attack somewhere in the vast United States, it was focused on five specific buildings in New York, New Jersey and Washington, D.C. And the authorities told us a little bit about material found on a computer in a raid in Pakistan, and about a 25-year-old Pakistani computer expert named Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan (which might or might not be an alias), who was questioned, and whose interrogation, in addition to the materials on the computer files, might have had something to do with an official sense of urgency.

Of course it came out on Monday that most of the material regarding security systems and procedures at the five buildings was assembled prior to the 9/11/2001 attacks. Surely some security procedures have been changed since then. So government spokesmen were forced to respond to questions about the relevancy and immediacy of the material. "We know this is a terrorist organization that does its homework," Homeland Security Czar Tom Ridge said. "Al Qaeda often plans well, well in advance. We also know that they like to update their information before a potential attack."

At the same speech Tuesday, Ridge also insisted that "We don?t do politics in the Department of Homeland Security," which is palpably ridiculous. Whether the warnings were intended to deflect attention from the "bounce" in the polls that John Kerry ended up not getting from the Democratic convention I have no real idea. But the warnings are quintessentially political in the sense that the authorities are deathly afraid that a terrorist attack will happen without them having warned us about it and created the illusion that the government?s frenetic activities have some real connection to protecting the American people. So their incentive is to cry "wolf" even if they have only a shred of a hint of a possible attack to make themselves look good if an attack actually occurs. If that isn?t a political motivation I don?t know what is.

All right, all right, I?ll give them one possible benefit of the doubt. It is just possible that one of the intended effects (besides urging Americans in general to be a little more vigilant and more accustomed to having armed government goons on the streets and in subways and tunnels) is to alert terrorists that authorities are onto them so they will abandon these specific plans. It is virtually impossible to know if that has happened in connection with this or other alerts, but it is at least theoretically possible.

OTHER MOTIVATIONS

That said, this particular alert is somewhat different from previous alerts in ways that lead one to hope U.S. government leaders are becoming a little more sophisticated. And it sheds light on other issues as well.

Within hours of the alert being issued, new stories were in circulation suggesting that this alert was based in large part on documents captured in a raid on an alleged al Qaeda cell in Gujarat, Pakistan. Whether the detailed information came from questioning a 25-year-old computer expert identified as Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan (which could be an alias) or from examining two computers and other electronic equipment is still unclear. But the information is described as a "treasure trove" that has offered U.S. intelligence experts much more detailed information than they had before about al Qaeda?s inner workings.

This alert is thus responsive to several criticisms of past alerts. It identifies specific targets (although apparently not a specific time). And it is based on specific intelligence the outline of which officials are willing to share with the public.

The alert demonstrates two other facts. First is that day-to-day, apparently boring and often unrewarding police and intelligence work ? done of necessity in conjunction with governments in other countries ? will be essential to neutralizing terrorists. Military action may sometimes be needed, but relentless grunt work is a key to ultimate success.

It will take years ? if ever ? to develop agents within jihadist terrorist groups who could be instrumental in eventually dismantling them. Meantime it behooves the United States to work with other countries.

A second point it that jihadist terrorists still seem focused on what Homeland Security Tom Ridge called "iconic economic targets." This suggests a fundamental misunderstanding of the American economy and market economies in general, a misunderstanding shared by many Americans.

We may never know if Osama bin Laden expected the entire American economy to collapse or to be irreparably damaged by the attacks on the World Trade Center. But there is little doubt that he and others have an essentially hierarchical understanding of the U.S. economy, a vague belief that it depends on orders from a few oligarchs at the top to function.

Fortunately, a market economy ? which the United States does not have in a pure form given the extent of government intervention ? is more a bottom-up than a top-down affair. Economic coordination results from millions of decisions and transactions undertaken voluntarily rather than from orders from the top.

As the 9/11 attacks, which damaged but hardly destroyed the economy, demonstrated, such a decentralized structure is more resilient than a top-down hierarchy. This implies that one defense against terrorism is further decentralizing authority structures rather than gathering more power at the center.

We hope the attacks the alert anticipates never occur. It may be small comfort but it should be some comfort to know that even if they do, they will damage America but not destroy it.