( CBS News) Percent not ... Charles Gibson, ABC News

1
JOHN MUELLER OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY
SIX PROPOSITIONS
RATHER UNUSUAL
ABOUT
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1. Seen in reasonable context, terrorism
generally has only limited direct effects
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• Worldwide chances of being killed by
  international terrorism over a lifetime
• 1 in 80,000
• Worldwide chances of being killed by a comet or
  asteroid over a lifetime
• 1 in 80,000
• Chances of an American being killed if there were
  one 9/11 in the U.S. every three months for the
  next five years
• 2 one hundreds of one percent

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Concerns about terrorism, 2001-2006
How worried are you that you or someone in your
family will become a victim of terrorism? Very
worried, somewhat worried, not too worried, or
not worried at all? (CNN/US Today/Gallup) Percent
very worried or somewhat worried.
How likely do you think it is that there will be
another terrorist act in the United States within
the next few months very likely, somewhat
likely, not very likely, or not at all likely?
(CBS News) Percent not at all likely.
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2. The costs of terrorism very often come mostly
from the fear and consequent reaction (or
overreaction) it characteristically inspires
6
Bin Laden goal overreaction

• It is easy for us to provoke and bait....All that
  we have to do is to send two mujahidin...to raise
  a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaeda in
  order to make the generals race there to cause
  America to suffer human, economic, and political
  losses. Our policy is one of bleeding America to
  the point of bankruptcy. The terrorist attacks
  cost al-Qaeda 500,000 while the attack and its
  aftermath inflicted a cost of more than 500
  billion on the United States.

7
Bin Laden goal fear

• America is full of fear, from its north to its
  south, from its west to its east. Thank God for
  that.

8
The costs of fear

• Economic
• Travel and tourism
• Waits in airports
• International commerce restrictions
• Human life
• Driving after 9/11
• Waits in airports
• Health effects, Chernobyl
• Opportunity costs
• Katrina
• Vaccines
• Crime
• Wasteful and counterproductive policies
• Iraq
• Generating Muslim hostility
• The quixotic quest for invulnerability

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3. The terrorism industry is a major part of the
terrorism problem.
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• Politicians
• Bureaucracy
• Media
• Risk entrepreneurs

The profits of doom
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--Department of Homeland Security

• Today's terrorists can strike at any place,
• at any time,
• and with virtually any weapon.

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Now putting your child on a school bus or driving
across a bridge or just going to the malleach of
these things is a small act of courage. And peril
is a part of everyday life.
--Charles Gibson, ABC News, September 11, 2006
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--Michael Ignatieff, 2004

• we can confidently expect that terrorists will
  attempt to tamper with our election in November
• a few individuals equipped with lethal
  technologies threaten the ascendancy of the
  modern state
• inexorably, terrorism, like war itself, is moving
  beyond the conventional to the apocalyptic

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4. Policies designed to deal with terrorism
should focus more on reducing fear and anxiety as
inexpensively as possible than on objectively
reducing the rather limited dangers terrorism is
likely actually to pose
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TARGET CITIES

• New York
• Washington, DC
• Chicago
• Los Angeles
• San Francisco
• Houston
• Seattle

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• Philadelphia
• Boston
• San Antonio
• Arlington
• Sacramento
• Portland
• Dallas
• Milwaukee
• Pittsburgh
• Fort Worth
• Phoenix
• Anaheim
• Santa Ana
• Oakland
• San Jose
• Indianapolis
• Honolulu
• Atlanta
• Tampa

Charlotte Jersey City Las Vegas Buffalo Newark Cin
cinnati Oklahoma City Cleveland Toledo Louisville
Baton Rouge Baltimore Detroit Minneapolis New
Orleans Kansas City St. Louis Omaha Miami Jacksonv
ille
TARGET CITIES
New York Washington, DC Chicago Los Angeles San
Francisco Houston Seattle
COLUMBUS
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80,000
THE QUEST FOR TARGETS
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(No Transcript)
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John Athanason, Weeki Wachee marketing and
promotion manager

• I cant imagine bin Laden trying to blow up the
  mermaids.
• But with terrorists, who knows what theyre
  thinking.
• I dont want to think like a terrorist, but what
  if the terrorists try to poison the water at
  Weeki Wachee Springs?

Athanson said Weeki Wachee Springs is working to
get some of the federal counterterrorism funding
that has been allocated to the Tampa Bay region
by the Department of Homeland Security.
--St. Petersburg Times, April 22, 2005
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• Police
• Nuclear
• Seek to reduce fear
• Absorb
• Put risks in context
• Explore security theater
• Avoid policy overreaction
• Reassess the quest for invulnerability

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Potential public policy projects

• Airport securitycosts, risk comparisons, costs
  of waiting
• Economic impact of terrorism response
• Is a repeat of 9/11 possible?
• Health impact of terrorism responsethe costs of
  anxiety
• Value of security symbols (theater?)visible,
  nonvisible
• Hardening potential targets (M. Stewart)
• Determining potential targets (malls? bridges?)
• Costs and value of relocating personnel (Army)
• Determining acceptable radiation levels for dirty
  bombs (cleanup costs, property value)
• Enlisting ordinary people as emergency responders
  or health workers
• Risk communicationcan accepted fears be reduced?
  Sunstein, Slovic
• Cost and other comparisons with anxieties about
  crime (property values)
• Costs and value of exit visas
• International economic effectsimmigration,
  commerce, tourism, travel
• Value of security cameras, if any
• Costs of increased border waits
• Evaluation of the air marshal program

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Potential public policy projects

• How has DHS determined risk?
• Assessment of DHS expenditures
• Incentives to increase fears
• Value and costs of police at subway entrances
• 9/11s impact in reducing spending and increasing
  saving
• Impact of terrorism on charitable giving
• Opportunity costshealth service, crime
• Terrorism and other instances of probability
  neglect
• Democracy, security, and the pork barrel
• Efforts Hollywood and television to exploit fears
  of terrorism (24, WTC)
• The media and terrorism
• Terrorism reporting (compare to crime or health
  reporting?)
• The incentives for politicians, bureaucrats to
  exaggerate the threat
• The cost and effectiveness of policing efforts
• The fate of the 9/11 Commissions recommendation
  on getting responders to be able to communicate
  with one another and the communications industry
• The war in Afghanistan and the war on drugs
• Fear of terrorism and political outbidding

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Potential public policy projects

• Policing terrorismcosts and effectiveness
• Insurance opportunities
• Costs and effectiveness of data mining
• Comparisons with policing domestic Communism
  (Stephan and Communazis)
• Potential value of repeated terror warnings on
  reducing fear (cry wolf)
• Assessment of official predictions about the
  imminence of another attack
• Impact of terrorism warnings on politics, on
  Bushs approval ratings
• Getting computers to work at the FBI and NSA
• Costs and value of heightened border security
• Costs and effectiveness of the US-VISIT program
• Tradeoff between policing terrorism and policing
  crime
• Opportunity costs of the war on terrorism
  (health, Katrina)
• Security barriers in panic situations
• Comparing terrorism to other risks (lightning,
  astroid impact, eating nuts, deer)
• Reasons for the remarkable absence of terrorism
  in the US since 9/11
• Costs and value of requiring passports to go to
  Canada, Mexico
• Costs and value of training security guards

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5. Doing nothing (or at least refraining from
overreacting) after a terrorist attack is not
necessarily unacceptable
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• Lebanon 1983
• Lockerbie 1988
• Somalia 1993
• World Trade Center 1993
• Oklahoma City 1995
• Khobar Towers 1996
• U.S.S. Cole 2000
• Anthrax 2001
• Madrid 2004
• London 2005

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6. Despite U.S. overreaction, the campaign
against terror is generally going rather well
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The United States is living on borrowed time--and
squandering it.
How much security is enough when the American
people can conclude that a future attack on U.S.
soil will be an exceptional event that does not
require wholesale changes in how they go about
their lives.
The entire nation...must be organized for the
long, deadly struggle against terrorism.
--Stephen Flynn
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I think, therefore they are, 2003
The greatest threat is from al-Qaeda cells in the
US that we have not yet identified. al-Qaeda
maintains the ability and the intent to inflict
significant casualties in the US with little
warning. That threat is increasing partly
because of the publicity surrounding the DC
sniper shootings and the anthrax letter
attacks. al-Qaeda has developed a support
infrastructure inside the US that would allow the
network to mount another terrorist attack on US
soil.

• --Robert Mueller February 11, 2003 testimony

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I think, therefore they are, 2003
The greatest threat is from al-Qaeda cells in the
US that we have not yet identified. al-Qaeda
maintains the ability and the intent to inflict
significant casualties in the US with little
warning. That threat is increasing partly
because of the publicity surrounding the DC
sniper shootings and the anthrax letter
attacks. al-Qaeda has developed a support
infrastructure inside the US that would allow the
network to mount another terrorist attack on US
soil.

• --Robert Mueller February 11, 2003 testimony

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I think, therefore they are,
2005
I remain very concerned about what we are not
seeing. (bolded)
unable to identify a single true al-Qaeda sleeper
cell anywhere in the country --FBI, secret
report, 2005

• --Robert Mueller February 16, 2005 testimony

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2007
We believe Al Qaeda is still seeking to
infiltrate operatives into the U.S. from
overseas.

• --Robert Mueller January 11, 2007 testimony

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• 19 in US before 9/11?
• 9/11 effect, Afghanistan
• many arrests (overseas)
• reactions to post-9/11 terrorism
• al-Qaedas vast enemies list

• all Middle Eastern regimes
• Muslims who don't share their views
• most Western countries
• Jews
• Christians
• the governments of India, Pakistan, Afghanistan,
  Russia
• most news organizations
• the United Nations
• international NGOs

amount of destruction
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--Ken Macdonald QC, 23 January 2007
London is not a battlefield. Those innocents who
were murdered on 7 July 2005 were not
victims of war. And the men who killed them were
not, as in their vanity they claimed on their
ludicrous videos, soldiers. There were deluded,
narcissistic inadequates. They were criminals.
They were fantasists.
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9/11 aberration or harbinger?
Lockerbie 1988 Oklahoma City 1995 Aum Shinrikyo
1995 DC sniper 2003 WWII But WWI, WTC 1993
Charles Krauthammer, 2004 three years in which,
contrary to every expectation and prediction, the
second shoe never dropped Graham Allison, 2004
in the weeks and months following 9/11, the
American national security community focused on
what was called the question of the 'second
shoe.' No one believed that the attacks on the
World Trade Center and the Pentagon were an
isolated occurrence
In our recent Western history war has been
following war in an ascending order of intensity
and today it is already apparent that the War of
1939-45 was not the climax of this crescendo
movement. --Arnold J. Toynbee, 1950
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THE END
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