The fundamental principle underlying all of America’s worldwide
efforts to detect, disrupt and defeat terrorist threats, including
bioterrorism, is that it cannot be done unilaterally. The United States
recognizes that success or failure depends on other nations being both
willing and able to fight terrorism. The record on that score is very,
very clear.
Since 9/11 there have been tremendous successes in rounding up terrorists
around the world. It is commonly accepted that some 75 percent of Al
Qaeda’s senior leadership has been captured or killed, as well
as thousands of its lower-level operatives. The general public, at
least in the United States, is often unaware of the fact that, outside
the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq, local forces have achieved virtually
all those
successes albeit sometimes with considerable American assistance,
especially from the CIA.
It must be clearly stated that the United States has the legal right to take
direct action against terrorists who pose an imminent threat to Americans, and
must be prepared to do so. We also recognize, however, that such direct action
will not, and most probably should not, be the solution to defeating terrorism.
We realize that foreign partners acting in their own self interest will provide
the key.
In that context, it is essential that foreign governments and institutions encourage
their citizens to reject ter-rorism as a tool for achieving political goals.
This has little maybe nothing to do with whether people love
or
hate America. It has little or nothing
to do with religious views. It has little
or nothing to do with political views. It has everything to do with rejecting
the whole idea of murdering innocent civilians to promote a political cause.
Bioterrorism, in particular, presents four unique and frightening challenges
that demonstrate just how important
it is that we should not fail:
- A biological attack would probably not respect geographic boundaries.
We often hear it said that terrorists do not respect borders, and that could
be especially true in the case of a contagious agent, such as smallpox or pneumonic
plague.
- The attack could well be silent, meaning that its onset may not be
detected until the infection is already spreading rapidly.
- It may be very difficult to identify, let alone apprehend, the perpetrators.
The lag between an initial attack and the emergence of symptoms could give the
attackers a head start that would make it very difficult to track them down.
- It may be difficult, or even impossible, to determine whether a bioterrorist
attack is intentional or not.
These four factors support the argument that bioterrorism, perhaps more than
any other terrorist threat, demands an approach marked by international engagement
and bridge-building between our resources.
An exercise called Atlantic Storm was conducted in January 2005 by the University
of Pittsburgh and Johns Hopkins University and the transatlantic biosecurity
network, in which former senior government officials from several North American
and European countries were asked to consider their
nations’ responses to bioterrorism,
including a smallpox attack in Europe.
Some of the challenges revealed by the exercise concerned the limited world supply
of smallpox vaccine and how it might or might not be shared among
nations, national differences in vaccination policies, the impact of our
responses on relations among allied
nations and the international economic disruptions that certain responses would
cause. It is important that all those
involved in addressing the bioterrorism issue build on work such as Atlantic
Storm and many other similar ongoing efforts and cooperate to build synergies.
(The Atlantic Storm website is
www.atlanticstorm.org.)
“We must learn from
real world outbreaks
of contagious diseases”
It is also very clear that tremendous lessons can and must be learned about responding
to a bioterrorist attack from real world outbreaks of contagious diseases, such
as SARS. I was the U.S.
Ambassador to Mongolia in 2003, when the SARS outbreak occurred. The main gateway
into Mongolia for both goods and people is through China. It was
interesting to watch the fear that spread throughout Mongolia and the roles played
by the various institutions,
including the World Health Organization. We should apply such lessons to the
fight against terrorism.
It is important, of course, that our efforts be operational, not simply theoretical.
Conferences and seminars, and even tabletop exercises, must clearly be the beginning
of an effort, or part of the effort they certainly are not the end of
the effort. But conferences and seminars have important roles to play in taking
stock and agreeing on a common
vision. They are especially important in addressing bioterrorism, and must be
part of a coordinated effort to build the necessary international partnerships.
John R. Dinger is Deputy Coordinator for Counter-Terrorism at the U.S. Department
of State.
As a career foreign service officer, he has held a variety of foreign posts,
most recently as U.S.
Ambassador to Mongolia from 2000 to 2003. He also served in Johannesburg, Rio
de Janeiro,
London, Sapporo, Fukuoka and Tokyo, where he was Minister Counselor and Consul
General. He was previously Director of the State Department’s Office of
Press Relations and Deputy Director of the Office of Japanese Affairs.
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