Someone actually just tried to use this in the HorsesAss comment threads to say that Carter was responsible for Al Qaeda. Unfortunately, that ignores the much larger roles that our support for Israel and our Saudi base had. And if you read The Looming Tower, it's somewhat overstated the level of support we gave specifically to Bin Laden and his loony toon gang of Arabs who fought over there.

Along with the "benefits" of globalization come the responsibilities. Meddling in one corner of the globe at one point in time can have long-ranging and unpredictable results far down the line. Our involvement in the Afghan/Soviet war has come back to haunt us; some stirred up Moslems HAVE become a problem (Osama was A-ok when he was OUR guy fighting the Soviets...a fact that Cheney and company conveniently like to forget), and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the events that followed, including the growth of the Taliban, have caused decades of suffering to the Afghan people (read "The Kite Runner" for a small taste). What's good for the US right NOW may not only be bad for the US in future, but it is irresponsible not to even consider the effects on other nations caught in the political games.

Carter may have started it, but Reagan and Oliver North increased their funding and training, and actually compared them, along with Nicaragua's, terrorist contras, to North America's founding fathers.

This is spot on. The war on terror should have been fought with law enforcement and international intelligence. The war in Iraq and the occupation has made things 100 times worse.

Hmmm. I'm not sure we're safer now. Thing is, in the Cold War, you had nations acting in their own self-interest, and a deterrent in the form of mutually assured obliteration. But a wacko terrorist isn't deterred by the threat of obliteration. For him, it means eternal martyrdom and a blissful afterlife with a roomful of willing virgins. He's crazy enough not just to do it, but to WANT to do it, desperately and completely with every fiber of his being. The world is like a lover that has wronged him, and if he (his twisted version of Islamic fundamentalism) can't have her, no one will.

The consequences of a terrorist successfully setting off a small nuclear device or some kind of "dirty bomb" in a major American city would likely be catastrophic. The world would panic. Markets would collapse, desperation would set in, and governments (ours, specifically) would react in a way that makes the "war on terror" look like a tea party. We could very well plunge into chaos, and the ensuing full-fledged negation of freedom could effectively erase the modern age. It might not be a Cold War-style nuclear holocaust, but it still has the potential to end "civilization as we know it."

The combination of motive and consequence in the terrorist age should concern us all, and make us that much more pissed off that Bush and company created this terrorist factory we call Iraq.

The response to a major (nuclear) terrorist event would only "end civilization as we know it" if went bonkers and started going after every suspicious nation in sight. I'm often stunned at people who think the world is more dangerous today, maybe it's because I went to high school over the control bunker for the American cruise missiles stationed in Europe, but in my encounters with people from intelligence and the military over the years, I have heard many stories that tend to imply that we came very, very close to going "toe to toe with the Rooskies" many times. (Check out Bob McNamara's horror stories on the extras of the 'Fog of War' DVD) The fact is that for almost forty years, the world was minutes away from being entirely destroyed, day and night. We were incredibly lucky to have escaped, and with some sanity and compassion we can stop our present situation from deteriorating that far. My hope is that a Democratic administration will begin to investigate the mythologizing of Al Qaeda and reveal what is common knowledge around most of the world (with due respect to the victims of 9/11): Osama bin Laden, but for one horribly successful strike, is the Wizard of Oz.

Charles-

People seem to be ignoring your request and pouring out their heartfelt feelings about Bush in Iraq (somewhat forgivable given Petraeus's performance yesterday), not discussing the relative dangers of the cold war vs. "the war on terror."

You are totally correct. The cold war was infinitely more dangerous than international terrorism. At least four times (Berlin Airlift, right before Stalin's death, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the downing of the KAL flight) the world stood at the edge of global themonuclear war.

As bad as a terrorist nuclear attack on NYC or Washington would be, GTW would have killed at a minimum a billion people, would have completely destroyed the entire technological and economic infrastructure of at least the "first world", and quite possibly ended the human race.

I find your article particularly inspirational since I know (from earlier posts) that you believe in communism (socialism?), and thus must have had very mixed feelings at the end of the Russian communist experiment.

Bravo.

Whoops, I posted this before I saw Grant's post...

@5

People forget that the Democrats are politicians too and like all politicians, surve the interests of their own power first and foremost The Bushies certainly showed that fear mongering in the name of national security is an incredibly effective way of consolidating power so no I don't expect a Democract administration to dispell the notion of bin Laden as boogeyman.

The success of the Bush argument that the world is unsafe and therefore we must wage a war on terror lies squarley on the shoulders of the American electorate. Had Americans not been so gullible as to buy the Sadaam - Al Quaeda link crap, the weapons of mass destruction crap or the yellow/orange/red terror alert crap then Bush et al would be exposed as the war-mongering oil profeteers we know they are.

Nowhere did I or would I claim that a full-on nuclear holocaust is on par with a single nuke detonated in an American city. That would be stupid. I'm just saying that, over 40 years of conflict, we never went over the edge and actually launched the missiles. Why? The deterrent of mutually-assured destruction kept them docked in the silos.

But that deterrent is absent in the terrorist's mind. Hence, a catastrophic terrorist attack is more likely now than all-out nuclear war was then. If you accept that logic, then you can see which time period poses the greater threat: this one.

Furthermore, while the possible ramifications of a terrorist attack are not as apocolyptic as all-out nuclear war, they're still pretty fucking awful, and yes, capable of bringing down modern civilization (for a few decades, anyway).

Matthew-

Wow, so we weren't really at risk for global nuclear destruction? Because of this thing called MAD? And it was guaranteed to work? Every time?

We were *lucky*. Before he died, Stalin was preparing to launch a nuclear war against the US. There's a guy for whom rational player models don't work.

In '62, LeMay was passionately advising Kennedy to attack Cuba. If he had, Cuba would have nuked us (with nukes that were operational but that we thought *weren't*), we would have nuked Russia, Russia would have nuked us and Europe, etc.

Imagine if this Bush were president during a cold war, with Cheney and Rumsfeld at his side. Sure they wouldn't nuke Russia? Willing to bet the lives of every person on earth?

I agree that the effects of a nuke on NYC or Washington would be bad. But it wouldn't bring down civilization. It would bring down the US in it's current form, though, because the laws they would pass would make Cheney blush.

For fuck's sake! I'm not saying we weren't at risk. Stop exaggerating my comments! Read it again you illiterate jackass.

Sure we got lucky. But we didn't get through 40 years--that's a long time, Goddamn it--by luck alone. Stalin may have been "preparing" to launch nukes, and LeMay may have been "advising" Kennedy to attack Cuba, but that's different than actually pushing the button, no? Rational men working in their own self-interests, and who actually fear death, go rubbery when the fact of nuclear annihilation is staring them in the face. It's no guarantee, of course. Duh. But it's a problem if you don't actually want to blow up the world.

Terrorists don't have that problem. Their self-interest is wrapped up in their fundamentalism, and death is a blessing. Taking millions of American devils with them only assures their blissful afterlife. Stalin didn't think like that, despite how fucking crazy and homicidal he was.

Lastly, I think you're greviously underestimating what could happen after a terrorist attack like this. If our freedoms are massively curtailed, the globe is engaged in a massive Christian vs. Islam conflict and the world has been plunged into a global depression, it may not be the end of civilization, but it's close enough to be pretty fucking concerned, no?

And no, I don't think Bush/Cheney would have launched the nukes if they'd been in charge back then. Much of the current administration (certainly Cheney) were at high levels of the government back then anyway.

Matthew- yyur rite- my sekret shame- kant reed. damit, xposed fur ahl too see...

@10,

Sure, Stalin was a nutcase, but what about his successors? Was the Soviet Union really as dangerous during Carter's administration?

keshmeshi- point taken. Brezhnev was no Stalin.

But the decay of the Soviet Union that is so clear in the luxury of hindsight was not at all clear at the time. The Soviets still brutally ruled the Warsaw Pact, including Brzezinski's (and my) homeland Poland. They still had more tanks, more bombs, more bombers, and more bombers than the west. And they had an ideology that still seemed antithetical to the west, vibrant, and on the ascendancy- vis. N. Korea, Indochina, Africa, Central America...

In hindsight, arming the Mujahideen was a bad idea, and a progenitor of today's troubles. But that doesn't diminish the threat the world faced during the cold war.

I got a Craigslist ride a while back from a guy whose brother was on a nuclear submarine that went on 9-month missions (my understanding was 6 was the max, so this either proves this was b.s., or more likely, there's a lot we don't know) under the Arctic icecap off the Russian coast, at the closest possible striking distance to Moscow. He said that in 1988 (1988! Perestroika time!) a technical flub brought them to within TEN SECONDS of launching against Moscow, and other cities. That sub had twenty missiles with ten warheads a piece on them. I've heard these kinds of stories before, and it is possible they are simply tall tales manifesting a pervasive fear, but...maybe not.

All the scary threats of random acts and fascist crackdown aside, the sheer heft behind that Cold War hair trigger is historically unique. I never understood why when the Wall came down, the vast majority of folks didn't acknowledge what a colossal bullet-dodge that was. When he was in Seattle in 1997, Don DeLillo expressed the same feeling; I've heard very little publicly expressed from any source on this since.

Man, we were lucky.

WHOEVER WINS, AFGHANISTAN LOSES