From Beirut to 9/11 -Robert C. McFarlane [pictured above]
Twenty-five years ago, Iranian-trained Hizbullah terrorists bombed the United States Marine barracks in Lebanon, killing 241 Americans who were part of a multinational peacekeeping force (a simultaneous attack on the French base killed 58 paratroopers). The attack was planned over several months at Hizbullah's training camp in the Bekaa Valley in central Lebanon.
Once American intelligence confirmed who was responsible and where the attack had been planned, President Reagan approved a joint French-American air assault on the camp - only to have the mission aborted just before launching by the secretary of defense, Caspar Weinberger.
Four months later, all the marines were withdrawn, capping one of the most tragic and costly policy defeats in the brief modern history of American counterterrorism operations.
One could draw several conclusions from this episode. To me the most telling was the one reached by Middle Eastern terrorists, that the United States had neither the will nor the means to respond effectively to a terrorist attack, a conclusion seemingly borne out by our fecklessness toward terrorist attacks in the 1990s:
*in 1993 on the World Trade Center
*on Air Force troops at Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia in 1996
*on our embassies in Tanzania and Kenya in 1998
*on the destroyer Cole in 2000.
The writer was U.S. national security adviser from 1983 to 1985.
(New York Times)
Twenty-five years ago, Iranian-trained Hizbullah terrorists bombed the United States Marine barracks in Lebanon, killing 241 Americans who were part of a multinational peacekeeping force (a simultaneous attack on the French base killed 58 paratroopers). The attack was planned over several months at Hizbullah's training camp in the Bekaa Valley in central Lebanon.
Once American intelligence confirmed who was responsible and where the attack had been planned, President Reagan approved a joint French-American air assault on the camp - only to have the mission aborted just before launching by the secretary of defense, Caspar Weinberger.
Four months later, all the marines were withdrawn, capping one of the most tragic and costly policy defeats in the brief modern history of American counterterrorism operations.
One could draw several conclusions from this episode. To me the most telling was the one reached by Middle Eastern terrorists, that the United States had neither the will nor the means to respond effectively to a terrorist attack, a conclusion seemingly borne out by our fecklessness toward terrorist attacks in the 1990s:
*in 1993 on the World Trade Center
*on Air Force troops at Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia in 1996
*on our embassies in Tanzania and Kenya in 1998
*on the destroyer Cole in 2000.
The writer was U.S. national security adviser from 1983 to 1985.
(New York Times)
1 comment:
In the 1990's, the 1993 World trade Center bombing is the only terrorist case where the perpetrators were brought to justice here in America. We cruise missile attacked those we believed responsible for the USS Cole (also believed to be those who attacked the barracks). I think in the 90's we did a better job than anytime before or since. We did virtually nothing in the 80's. We have been misguided and ineffective in the first 8 years of this decade.
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