Have you ever heard the story about the man who painted the steps to his front door with bright yellow stripes? When a neighbour asked why, he claimed it was to keep the elephants away. “But there are no elephants,” exclaimed the neighbour. “Exactly!” the man said. “That just goes to show it’s working”. Similarly, the Bush administration maintains its ‘war on terror’ has been successful as there have been no terrorist attacks on its soil since September 11, 2001.

Personally, one does not feel that the ‘yellow stripes’ theory in relation to Bush’s ‘war on terror’ is actually working. It is far more likely 9/11 was a criminal one-off, akin to the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.

Moreover, the claim that there are so-called ‘sleeper cells’ around, sounds spurious seven years on. If they ever existed, they have hibernated long enough and chances are, they would have already attempted to carry out their nefarious plots if they so desired.

I wrote in 2001 and I will write it again now: September 11th should have been treated as a criminal act. Following that tragic day, the US garnered the sympathy of just about every country on the planet. People everywhere, including the Muslim world, went out on the streets bearing candles to honour the dead.

However, instead of capitalizing on that goodwill, instead of working with nations to hunt down the perpetrators, George W. Bush decided to raise a ‘Wanted Dead or Alive’ sign before invading Afghanistan to find Osama bin Laden.

Why do I say the war on terror is a dismal failure? To date, they have not captured Bin Laden or his Egyptian lieutenant, Dr. Ayman Al Zawahiri, and they do not even know where they are. Moreover, despite thousands of US and NATO forces being based in Pakistan, they have not even managed to detain Taliban leader Mullah Omar.
 

In fact, according to numerous recent reports from those on the ground; British commander Brig. Mark Carleton-Smith, British ambassador to Afghanistan Sir Sherard Cowper-Cowles and Australia’s Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon, a decisive military victory is not achievable. Both Carleton-Smith and Fitzgibbon believe the only way forward is to negotiate with moderate Taliban leaders.

Previously, the US and to a lesser extent its allies, thought brute force could achieve anything. They have been proven wrong time and time again. In the end, the only way to achieve progress is to work with others and open channels of dialogue even with those considered enemies. This is exactly what the US has been doing in Iraq to quell the influence of Al Qaeda, especially in the governorates of Diyala and Al Anbar, to oust foreign fighters.

Nevertheless, the true failure of the war on terror lies in its basic tenet. When it was first announced, linguistic experts railed at the idea of a war on an abstract. There will never be a world without terror, they said, which implies this is a war without end. In reality, it soon became evident that ‘terror’ in this context was a euphemism for ‘Islamic extremists’.

If one accepts the above premise, it stands as yet more proof of the war on terror’s failure. Surely, there are a lot more extremists today than there ever were in 2001. This is partly because the war on terror acted as an advertisement for little-known Al Qaeda: previously made up of ‘Afghan Arabs’ who worked with the US during the Russian occupation of Afghanistan.

The war on terror gave these battle-scarred stragglers an international platform. Additionally, it provided a perfect recruiting tool and spawned untold numbers of copycat groups and franchises worldwide.

Working out whether the war on terror has been a success or failure is really a matter of simple logic/mathematics. If it has succeeded, the number of individuals wishing to wreak harm on the West or Western interests would have substantially decreased. This has not happened. On the contrary, it has been waged in such a brutal fashion on all fronts, that it has stirred up anger in those previously pro-Western.

Sadly, the war on terror has, however, diminished freedoms and civil liberties for ordinary people. Under its auspices, governments have encroached on citizen’s rights; travel from country to country now incorporates intrusive rules and regulations; governments have the authority to monitor phone calls and emails, freeze assets/bank accounts, as well as detain individuals for longer periods without charge. It has also inspired bigotry against Islam and racism targeted at Arabs.

It could have been done differently. Rather than an invasion, over time, covert operatives could have been inserted into Afghanistan with the aim of getting close to Bin Laden and bringing him and his cohorts to justice. It could have been done quietly and efficiently; no Guantanamo, no Abu Ghraib, no torture, no wedding parties bombed, no service personnel gravely injured.

If it had happened that way, who knows, the US might have retained the elevated position it enjoyed post 9/11 worldwide and enhanced global trust. But in place of a new American century, the war on terror has elicited a new multi-polar world littered with competing and emerging powers; states eager to secure nuclear weapons.

Perhaps there is a lesson to be learnt: when fighting an enemy, every effort must be made not to become the enemy one is fighting.