Week 6 Terrorism

Ethical Public Policy Dilemmas and the War on Terror

            The war on Terror has taken a toll on the United States since the September 11^th, 2001 strike on the World Trade Towers.  Following the 9/11 strike, policies and acts have passed that grants more power and authority to government agencies in an effort to deter future attacks.  These policies have come with a price of liberty and challenge the coverage of several amendments, mainly the fourth. 

            This blog is being written the day the strikes in Boston have occurred.  It is not yet known who conducted the attacks or what the motive was but this is an extremely high visibility attack that caused mass casualties.  Many are asking why hasn’t this happened sooner while others ask why did this happen at all.  The answers are not yet known; however, there will be much debate over the next few months about what powers need to be given and used in order to deter from this sort of an attack from happening again. 

            For this blog I will speculate as to what kind of policy changes we might see over the next few months.  First, we will assume this was a domestic terror attack.  If this were a domestic terror attack legislators may look to impose tighter laws restricting the sales of certain materials that can be made to use bombs or have authorities watch records of these materials being sold.  Other changes we may see would be an increase ability to scan internet searches to find people researching how to make high explosives or home made explosives using an IP within the U.S.  We will see policies to increase security for large scale events and possibly background checks for buying mass amounts of materials such as fertilizers that could be used to make explosives.

            Assuming this attack was conducted by a foreign group, possibly Middle Eastern due to media reporting that there were ball bearings in the bombs which is a signature ingredient in bombs made in the Middle East then there might be more dramatic changes.  Changes we could see will vary by strict sanctions against the country that sponsored it or immediate special operations or drone targeting of the group that is associated if it were not state-sponsored.  Worst case scenario, we may see a land invasion like occurred in Afghanistan, but that is unlikely due to the amount of money spent on Iraq and Afghanistan and the results of those expeditions.

            Lastly, it’s important to consider policy and terrorism on the minds of American citizens.  Living in terror is not a good thing; fear can drive most people to do almost anything.  Fear and the thought of being blown up make many Americans willing to give up some freedoms for increased safety.  If it comes to this, law makers will need to determine just how far freedoms can be infringed on before being ruled unconstitutional.