Why the West is winning its War on Terror

On January 10, Raw Story published an incendiary article claiming that the War on Terror has been an unmitigated disaster, and that the Bush administration perversely welcomes new strikes by Al Qaeda.

That angle naturally made for a fantastic headline - White House: Increase in terror attacks since 9/11 a success - and the piece immediately became a hit on social media website Digg, clocking up 1,600 votes of approval.

But in this editorial piece, Martin Leo Rivers presents three compelling reasons for dismissing Raw Story's report as sensationalism, and instead concluding that the West is winning its fight against terrorism.

Eric Brewer began his Raw Story report by correctly noting that worldwide terrorism incidents have skyrocketed since George Bush took office.

He gave great prominence to two eye-catching charts - sourced from the RAND Corporation and the National Counterterrorism Center (NCC) - which appear to confirm that the Bush years have been accompanied by recurrent annual rises in global terror-related deaths.

But in the hackneyed anti-Bush rant that followed, Mr Brewer made a fatal error. Perhaps preoccupied with the thought of left-leaning Diggers lapping up his every word, he carelessly brushed aside several clear indicators that the threat from Al Qaeda is in decline.

So while Mr Brewer continues to dream about a long-anticipated dalliance with Michael Moore, allow me to step in and set the record straight on a few key points pertaining to recent global terror trends…

1. Civilian fatalities in Iraq are down by 60%

Mr Brewer rightly points out that global terror deaths surged from 2003 onwards as a consequence of "the carnage let loose in Iraq". What he failed to tell you, though, was that the tide has now well and truly turned.

According to Iraq Body Count - an independent public database set up to monitor Iraqi casualties - the number of people killed in post-war violence plummeted from as many as 24,295 in 2007 to a maximum of 9,028 in 2008. Though this excludes data from the final few days of December, the 60 per cent fall nonetheless affirms the remarkable success coalition forces have had in quelling the number-one terror hotspot on the planet.

Unsurprisingly, Raw Story did not mention Iraq Body Count's latest figures, opting instead to focus on more-dated statistics collated in the NCC's 2007 report. Rest assured, though, that Mr Brewer was fully aware of Iraq's impact on global terror trends when he penned his article. He will himself have read the following paragraph in his much-trumped NCC report:

"Of the 14,499 reported [terror] attacks [in 2007], almost 43 percent - about 6,200 - occurred in Iraq where approximately 13,600 fatalities - 60 percent of the worldwide total - were reported."

-- National Counterterrorism Center 2007 Report on Terrorism

2. Terror attacks in the West are down by 40%

By itself, Iraq Body Count offers a compelling reason to believe that the West is (finally) living up to its commitment to beat off Al Qaeda. But Mr Brewer will no doubt contend that he was looking solely at figures compiled by NCC and RAND - so let us look again at the former:

"The number of reported attacks in 2007 fell in the Western Hemisphere by 42 percent, in Europe and Eurasia by 8 percent, and in South Asia by almost 7 percent."

-- National Counterterrorism Center 2007 Report on Terrorism

Admittedly, those regions don't span the entire world. They notably exclude Africa, where terror attacks were up a disturbing 96 per cent in 2007. But the significance of a 40 per cent reduction in attacks in the West - a trend that Mr Brewer once again declined to mention - must not be downplayed.

Remember that the Western Hemisphere is home to many of Al Qaeda's prime targets. I'm talking about America, the UK, France, Spain - all countries at the top of Bin Laden's hit-list. If he were capable of striking them in any way, he would; and that is what White House spokesman Scott Stanzel was talking about when he spoke of the "success" Mr Bush has enjoyed since 9/11.

No less remarkable is a seven per cent reduction in South Asia attacks. When coupled with the Near East, this region accounted for a whopping 87 per cent of large-scale terror attacks in 2007. By glossing over this crucial statistic, Mr Brewer once again showed his utter disdain for any morsel of positive news about global terror trends.

3. US & UK spy agencies say the terror threat is falling

My final defence of the West's approach to combating terrorism comes in the form of two unrelated statements recently put out by the respective heads of America's and Britain's spy agencies.

Anti-war campaigners such as Mr Brewer typically reject warnings about domestic terror threats, labelling them mere smokescreens for advances by Orwellian-style police states. But what happens when our spy chiefs harp a different tune, and insist things are actually improving? Well, I can't really say - because Mr Brewer makes no mention of such comments.

"There have been fewer cases where terrorists have moved from facilitating and supporting terrorism to attack-planning."

-- Jonathan Evans, head of Britain's MI5 (January 2009)

"Bin Laden can't get an operational effort off the ground without it being detected ahead of time and being thwarted."

-- Dell Dailey, head of the US State Department's Counterterrorism Office (January 2009)

The simple truth is that Mr Brewer had no interest whatsoever in discussing the merits and flaws of Bush's controversial War on Terror. He had one thing and one thing only on his mind when he stormed into the White House press room last week: launching into a tirade against Bush that would have left-leaning Diggers clicking away like there's no tomorrow.

To that end, of course, he should be congratulated unconditionally. But as far as that whole "objective journalism" and "responsible reporting" malarkey is concerned, well, I'll let you make your own minds up.

Comments

[unfortunate names]

this was great. not enough voices willing to paint the whole picture.

[Lynne (weirdvis)]

Let's be honest and call it objective malarkey. A good piece, Martin. :D

[ContraRadical]

You're right in highlighting The Raw Story's omission of the recent decline in terrorism but you're missing the point by arguing that the West is winning since the article never claimed otherwise. The Raw Story piece solely focused on the Bush administration's characterization of their anti-terror efforts as a "success."

While success is a fairly subjective measure, Raw Story convincingly refutes the notion by pointing out 1)the Iraq War greatly and needlessly increased the number of terror attacks and 2)the administration failed to reduce the frequency of terror attacks to pre-9/11 levels.

If you wanted to take issue with the story you should have argued that Bush's efforts were successful but that's hard to argue given 100,000 avoidable deaths in Iraq and no net decrease in terrorism since 9/11.

[Martin (riverScrap.com)]

Hi ContraRadical - thanks for the thought-provoking comment. I can't agree with your assessment that Raw Story never claimed the West is losing its War on Terror though.

As you yourself noted, the article rejects any notion that America's anti-terror strategy has been a "success". How can you argue that Mr Brewer didn't suggest the West is losing its struggle, when he explicitly stated that its central strategy - the War on Terror - has been an unmitigated disaster?

I'm more sympathetic to your argument that invading Iraq greatly increased terrorism incidents around the world; however, I'm not sure it was as "needlessly" as you claim. In 2005/6 Iraq was awash with foreign insurgents, and it's fair to presume that if they weren't waging Jihad in Baghdad they would happily have been doing it in their home countries, or Pakistan, or perhaps even the West.

Don't get me wrong: I agree that the fumbled handling of the Iraq war led to unnecessary carnage. I'm simply saying that a surge in global terrorism was inevitable from 2002 onwards. So Raw Story is wrong to paint it as an unequivocal failure.

And as far as bringing terror attacks down to pre-9/11 levels, that simply isn't realistic yet. 9/11 completely changed the world and it gave the West (as well as India, Russia etc) compelling reasons to bring the fight to the terrorists. Which translates to a short-term spike in terrorist incidents.

[ContraRadical]

Let me use an analogy. If you had heart surgery and the surgeon did a great job clearing your arteries, or fixing a congenital defect, or whatever, but she also mistakenly cut off your foot, would you characterize the operation as a success?

Of course not because even when objectives are achieved, the efficacy of achievement is still important. That's Bush's policy failure; he created an unnecessary war zone and unnecessary terrorists.

Granted, as you point out, some foreign fighters would have ended up in Afghanistan if not Iraq. However there wouldn't the enormous number of terrorists the Iraq war specifically created (and continues to create), and more importantly, they wouldn't be fighting in densely populated urban areas causing huge numbers of civilian victims of terrorism.

It's a classic Pyrrhic victory, not a success.

[Martin (riverScrap.com)]

Nice analogy. I can certainly agree that the Iraq war created a lot of terrorists on top of those that already existed. It radicalised large numbers of Muslims; dramatically boosted Al Qaeda's propaganda efforts; and increased the terror threat abroad (notably in Turkey, Egypt and Jordan - all of which suffered attacks planned by Iraqi militants).

I guess the 'winning' / 'success' dispute just boils down to semantics. My fundamental point was that Mr Bremer's article acknowledged zero good news on the terrorism front, glossing over such information where it was available. Given the popularity of his article, I felt this warranted a rebuttal that painted a fuller picture of the global terror threat.