[Peace-discuss] Bomb India?

[Brussel Morton K.]

Pertinent remarks, from John Feffer's Foreign Policy in Focus. --mkb

Bomb India?

After the attacks in Mumbai last week, should the United States bomb  
suspected terrorist cells in India? Send the Marines to Kashmir where  
one of the suspected groups behind the attacks - Lashkar-e-Taiba -  
originates? Or initiate regime change in Pakistan, which has provided  
support for several terrorist outfits operating in South Asia?

These are, of course, absurd options.

And yet the Bush administration, in its "global war on  
terror" (GWOT), pursued just such tactics against the Taliban in  
Afghanistan, Saddam Hussein in Iraq, and suspected terrorist hideouts  
in Pakistan. Fat lot of good it's done us. The Taliban is back in  
Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda, which didn't exist in Iraq before the  
invasion, has a foothold there now. And Pakistan, thanks to former  
dictator Pervez Musharraf and his intelligence agency, remains  
Terrorism Central.

This military approach to terrorism has generated ineffectual,  
counterproductive, and quite often surreal policies. Declaring a war  
on terror elevated al-Qaeda and its brethren to the status of  
warriors. It served as a great recruiting tool for Osama bin Laden,  
and made the United States and its citizens a lightning rod for  
attacks. Other countries - China, Russia, Sri Lanka, the Philippines  
- have drawn inspiration from the United States for their own  
crackdowns on a range of purported terrorists.

This follow-the-leader effect may prove most horrific in the case of  
India. Believing neighboring Pakistan to be behind the Mumbai  
attacks, India is edging closer to its own war on terror. According  
to the Times of London, "The Indian government is now considering a  
range of responses, including suspending its five-year peace process  
with Pakistan, closing their border, stopping direct flights and  
sending troops to the frontier." It's one thing when the United  
States squares off against the ragtag army of the Taliban. But with  
both India and Pakistan in possession of nuclear weapons, any "war on  
terror" between the two can go global at a moment's notice.

When a group of militants wages a ruthless campaign against  
civilians, a government certainly must respond. But the issue is:  
what kind of response? Instead of using the military, the British  
have largely used their heads, relying on police work to track down  
and neutralize terrorists. Both the United Nations and Interpol have  
useful lists of best practices that focus on sharing information  
among police forces and shutting down the financing of terrorist  
networks. Instead of fighting fire with fire, we should be thinking  
of dousing the flames with water. In this case, the most effective  
fire extinguisher is the rule of law.

In an essay in the forthcoming Institute for Policy Studies book  
Mandate for Change, I argue that the Obama administration must  
replace GWOT with GDOL: Global Defense of Law. This alternative  
counterterrorism approach prioritizes international and domestic law  
rather than the projection of military force beyond borders. Who  
better than a former law professor to launch such an initiative?  
President Obama should embed counterterrorism in the international  
laws governing institutions such as the International Criminal Court  
as well as the domestic laws that safeguard the civil liberties of  
those living in the United States.

"September 11" entered our vocabulary as both an epochal shift and  
the starting point for the GWOT. "Mumbai" should likewise enter our  
vocabulary as the end of the GWOT and the beginning of a more  
sensible approach to countering terrorism.
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