Special Section: At War - War, not 'Crimes': Time for a paradigm shift.(Brief Article)

'Make no mistake: The United States will hunt down and punish those responsible for these cowardly acts." So spoke President Bush in his address to the nation soon after the catastrophic events of September 11.

I agree with the president's sentiments but disagree with two specifics in this statement. First, there was nothing cowardly about the attacks, which were deeds of incredible-albeit perverted-bravery. Second, to "hunt down and punish" the perpetrators is deeply to misunderstand the problem. It implies that we view the plane crashes as criminal deeds rather than what they truly are-acts of war. They are part of a campaign of terrorism that began in a sustained way with the bombing of the U.S. embassy in Beirut in 1983, a campaign that has never since relented. Occurring with almost predictable regularity a few times a year, assaults on Americans have included explosions on airliners, at commercial buildings, and at a variety of U.S. governmental installations. Before last week, the total death toll was about 600 American lives.

To me, this sustained record of violence looks awfully much like war, but Washington in its wisdom has insisted otherwise. Official policy has viewed the attacks as a sequence of discrete criminal incidents. Seeing terrorism primarily as a problem of law enforcement is a mistake, because it means:

Focusing on the arrest and trial of the dispensable characters who actually carry out violent acts, leaving the funders, planners, organizers, and commanders of terrorism to continue their work unscathed, prepared to carry out more attacks.

Relying primarily on such defensive measures as metal detectors, security guards, bunkers, police arrests, and prosecutorial eloquence- rather than on such offensive tools as soldiers, aircraft, and ships.

Misunderstanding the terrorist's motivations as criminal, whereas they are usually based on extremist ideologies.

Missing the fact that terrorist groups (and the states that support them) have declared war on the United States (sometimes publicly).