Combate ao Terror: Força Bruta ou Inteligência?

Artigo de Brian Burton sobre os paradoxos do combate ao terrorismo: "International terrorism cannot be neutralized through large-scale employment of armed forces. What these wars have demonstrated is that the U.S. does not possess a clear understanding of the threat environment, nor does it have an effective overall strategy or appropriate military forces to mitigate this threat. America faces a threat that is globally diffuse and adaptable. It is, therefore, necessary for the U.S. to adopt a subtler strategy that enlists the aid of allies around the world, and develop similarly subtle forces to counter terrorist groups abroad.

The U.S. is in the paradoxical situation in which al-Qaida-type international terrorism is the most direct security threat, but this threat is less significant in strategic military terms. It is essential to keep this threat in perspective. The Soviet Union, armed with thousands upon thousands of nuclear weapons, presented an existential danger to the U.S. Although terrorists clearly have the potential to kill U.S. citizens in large numbers and disrupt American prosperity through low-technology but innovative and highly effective means, the damage that they can inflict is orders of magnitude less than that which the Soviet Union posed or some hypothetical future peer competitor would pose. That is not to understate the destruction that terrorists can cause or the importance of countering international terrorism. The proliferation of modern communications and weapons technologies has placed increasingly destructive capabilities at the disposal of more people worldwide, ensuring that the potential for terrorist attacks capable of killing hundreds or thousands will be an enduring threat to American society. Given that the basic responsibility of the U.S. government is to protect American citizens’ rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, deterring and countering terrorist attacks must be a priority in any U.S. defense strategy"