Paul Wolfowitz: Has the U.S. Grown Complacent Since 9/11?
[Paul D. Wolfowitz, a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is a former president of the World Bank and deputy secretary of defense.]
Sixty years ago on Dec. 7, 1949, Americans marked the eighth anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, the worst enemy attack on American soil at that time. That attack, which left 2,400 Americans dead, stunned the country and mobilized the U.S. into action on a scale without precedent in history. As Winston Churchill said, ''The United States is like a giant boiler. Once the fire is lighted under it, there is no limit to the power it can generate.''
However, eight years after Pearl Harbor, the boiler was running out of steam. The country had grown complacent. Secure in the knowledge that the Axis powers had been totally defeated, the U.S. was well along the way to dismantling what had been the most powerful armed force the world had ever seen. Barely six months after that eighth anniversary, on June 25, 1950, another wake-up call sounded when North Korea invaded South Korea. The U.S. 24th Infantry Division, rushed from Japan to help the South Korean defenders, suffered terrible losses--3,600 dead or wounded and almost 3,000 captured. The U.S. Air Force lost 18 fighters and 29 bombers to what had been considered a vastly inferior North Korean air force, while downing only five enemy fighters. By August, the U.S. had been nearly driven off the Korean Peninsula by what was, at best, a third-rank military power.
Americans are known to be forgetful about history. That's not always a bad thing. Certainly, it's better than living in the past. When Saddam had declared that the incorporation of Kuwait as Iraq's 19th province was ''a fact of history,'' I recall the Chief of Staff of the Omani Armed Forces saying that ''Until people stop talking about history around here, there will never be any peace.'' And few countries could have put the past behind them as quickly as the U.S. did with Germany and Japan after World War II.
Forgetfulness has its price, however. As we mark the eighth anniversary of the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, we are in danger of becoming complacent once again. Perhaps that is because--thankfully--there have been no more attacks on American soil during those eight years. No one predicted that we would be so fortunate, and to this day we cannot fully explain why we have not been attacked again Our success in breaking up planned attacks, including through information obtained from captured terrorists, is certainly part of the explanation. Although the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq continue--and we must be careful about premature declarations of victory--they have so far proven to be setbacks for the enemy. And improved domestic security has not only prevented attacks but also serves as a deterrent.
But the enemy has certainly not given up. In the last eight years, there have been successful attacks on the U.K., Spain, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Turkey, to name just a few. And this is an enemy with great patience and a long time horizon. It took more than eight years from the first attack on the World Trade Center in February 1993 to prepare the second, more devastating, one. There is a grim joke about a member of the Taliban who meets an American who is bragging about his expensive Rolex: ''Yes,'' says the Talib, ''you have the watch but we have all the time.''
Unfortunately, this struggle will be with us for a long time to come and it could re-emerge in more dangerous forms if we try to pretend that it's no longer serious. Even if the terrorists are in retreat, extremist views are still gaining strength among large segments of the world's population. And the threat that terrorists might someday get their hands on weapons of mass destruction remains and could easily grow if nuclear proliferations continue. A successful attack with biological or nuclear weapons could produce casualties that would dwarf those of Sept. 11. Beyond the death and destruction, such an attack could transform the way we live and lead us to hunker down into closed societies and closed economies...
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Sixty years ago on Dec. 7, 1949, Americans marked the eighth anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, the worst enemy attack on American soil at that time. That attack, which left 2,400 Americans dead, stunned the country and mobilized the U.S. into action on a scale without precedent in history. As Winston Churchill said, ''The United States is like a giant boiler. Once the fire is lighted under it, there is no limit to the power it can generate.''
However, eight years after Pearl Harbor, the boiler was running out of steam. The country had grown complacent. Secure in the knowledge that the Axis powers had been totally defeated, the U.S. was well along the way to dismantling what had been the most powerful armed force the world had ever seen. Barely six months after that eighth anniversary, on June 25, 1950, another wake-up call sounded when North Korea invaded South Korea. The U.S. 24th Infantry Division, rushed from Japan to help the South Korean defenders, suffered terrible losses--3,600 dead or wounded and almost 3,000 captured. The U.S. Air Force lost 18 fighters and 29 bombers to what had been considered a vastly inferior North Korean air force, while downing only five enemy fighters. By August, the U.S. had been nearly driven off the Korean Peninsula by what was, at best, a third-rank military power.
Americans are known to be forgetful about history. That's not always a bad thing. Certainly, it's better than living in the past. When Saddam had declared that the incorporation of Kuwait as Iraq's 19th province was ''a fact of history,'' I recall the Chief of Staff of the Omani Armed Forces saying that ''Until people stop talking about history around here, there will never be any peace.'' And few countries could have put the past behind them as quickly as the U.S. did with Germany and Japan after World War II.
Forgetfulness has its price, however. As we mark the eighth anniversary of the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, we are in danger of becoming complacent once again. Perhaps that is because--thankfully--there have been no more attacks on American soil during those eight years. No one predicted that we would be so fortunate, and to this day we cannot fully explain why we have not been attacked again Our success in breaking up planned attacks, including through information obtained from captured terrorists, is certainly part of the explanation. Although the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq continue--and we must be careful about premature declarations of victory--they have so far proven to be setbacks for the enemy. And improved domestic security has not only prevented attacks but also serves as a deterrent.
But the enemy has certainly not given up. In the last eight years, there have been successful attacks on the U.K., Spain, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Turkey, to name just a few. And this is an enemy with great patience and a long time horizon. It took more than eight years from the first attack on the World Trade Center in February 1993 to prepare the second, more devastating, one. There is a grim joke about a member of the Taliban who meets an American who is bragging about his expensive Rolex: ''Yes,'' says the Talib, ''you have the watch but we have all the time.''
Unfortunately, this struggle will be with us for a long time to come and it could re-emerge in more dangerous forms if we try to pretend that it's no longer serious. Even if the terrorists are in retreat, extremist views are still gaining strength among large segments of the world's population. And the threat that terrorists might someday get their hands on weapons of mass destruction remains and could easily grow if nuclear proliferations continue. A successful attack with biological or nuclear weapons could produce casualties that would dwarf those of Sept. 11. Beyond the death and destruction, such an attack could transform the way we live and lead us to hunker down into closed societies and closed economies...