Bush war on terror draws fire as misguided venture
Washington,
Mar
30:
Five-and-a-half
years
after
the
September
11
attacks,
President
George
W
Bush's
war
on
terrorism
has
emerged
as
a
wasteful,
misguided
exercise
that
poses
its
own
threat
to
US
national
security,
experts
say.
A
growing
number
of
analysts
and
former
US
officials
say
the
global
war
on
terrorism
has
undermined
US
influence
abroad,
forced
onerous
costs
in
American
lives
and
money
in
Iraq,
and
unleashed
a
huge
government
spending
spree
that
has
often
funded
projects
unrelated
to
national
security.
It
has
also
produced
a
climate
of
fear
in
the
United
States
that
helped
justify
the
war
in
Iraq
and
the
curtailment
of
civil
liberties
at
home,
they
said.
''The
atmosphere
of
anxiety
and
uncertainty,
and
the
vagueness
of
the
definition
of
the
enemy,
makes
the
country
more
fearful
and
more
susceptible
to
being
steered
in
irrational
directions,''
said
Zbigniew
Brzezinski,
who
was
US
national
security
adviser
to
President
Jimmy
Carter
in
the
1970s.
Unlike
the
muted
response
to
attacks
by
Britain
and
Spain,
experts
say
the
U.S.
has
overreacted
to
the
September
11
attacks
that
killed
3,000
people
in
New
York,
Washington
and
Pennsylvania
in
2001.
Congress
has
spent
nearly
271.5
billion
dollars
on
homeland
security
since
September
11,
with
money
often
going
to
projects
that
have
nothing
to
do
with
security
but
that
are
important
to
politicians
and
their
constituents,
according
to
a
survey
by
the
conservative
American
Enterprise
Institute.
At
the
same
time,
the
number
of
potential
terrorism
targets
identified
by
Congress
has
exploded
from
160
in
2003
to
80,000,
allowing
such
unlikely
sites
as
a
Midwestern
apple
festival
and
a
roadside
theme
park
in
Florida
to
bid
for
funds.
Meanwhile,
the
private
sector
--
lobbyists,
interest
groups,
industries,
the
media
and
even
universities
--
has
also
used
the
national
security
label
aggressively
to
sell
its
own
agendas,
experts
say.
''What's
clear
is
that
there
is
no
focus
whatsoever
in
the
way
we
are
fighting
terrorism,''
said
Veronique
de
Rugy,
author
of
the
AEI
study.
Department
of
Homeland
Security
spokesman
Russ
Knocke
dismissed
the
criticism
as
old
and
inaccurate,
saying
the
Bush
administration
had
never
viewed
sites
such
as
small
theme
parks
to
be
critical
national
assets
deserving
of
funds.
''This
has
no
basis
in
fact,''
he
said.
Knocke's
boss,
Homeland
Security
Secretary
Michael
Chertoff,
has
also
taken
issue
with
the
assertion
that
the
US
response
to
September
11
is
exaggerated.
''If
we
begin
to
heed
arguments
that
somehow
our
concern
about
security
is
overblown
...
then
I
feel
we're
going
to
feel
consequences
in
the
loss
of
lives,''
Chertoff
said
in
a
speech
outlining
his
priorities
for
2007.
But
terrorism
experts
say
the
United
States
has
yet
to
develop
a
clear
understanding
of
the
threat
posed
by
al
Qaeda
and
other
Islamist
militant
groups,
despite
the
war
on
terrorism
and
a
total
of
500
billion
dollars
spent
on
wars
in
Iraq
and
Afghanistan.
The
most
pernicious
effect
of
the
war
on
terrorism
has
been
the
Iraq
war,
which
has
claimed
the
lives
of
more
than
3,200
US
troops
and
tens
of
thousands
of
Iraqi
civilians
and
damaged
US
standing
in
the
Muslim
world
for
generation,
experts
say.
''Iraq
has
been
vastly
worse
than
anything
terrorism's
ever
done,''
said
Ohio
State
University
political
science
professor
John
Mueller,
author
of
a
book
about
the
war
on
terrorism
titled,
''Overblown.''
While
both
Democrats
and
Republicans
have
acknowledged
the
shortcomings
of
US
policy
in
Iraq,
experts
say
politicians
have
not
questioned
the
war
on
terrorism
mainly
because
it
remains
a
vote-getter.
''Politicians
are
acting
this
way
because
they
think
they'll
lose
votes
if
they
don't.
Basically,
it's
a
big
pork-barrel,
so
the
pork-barrel
leaders
are
there
in
five
seconds,''
said
Mueller,
using
American
vernacular
for
the
politics
of
self-enrichment.
Reuters