The United States is no safer now than it was before Sept. 11, 2001, according to Rand Beers '64, a former member of the National Security Council, who spoke last night at a campus lecture hosted by the Institute of Security Technology Studies.
Beers resigned from his position as senior director for combating terrorism, as well as from his seat on the National Security Council, in March 2003 when President George W. Bush threatened Saddam Hussein with American intervention if Hussein did not step down from power within 48 hours.
"I left because I was concerned that we had lost our direction in the effort to combat terrorism around the world, and I was deeply concerned that the Iraqi intervention, which I regarded as an excursion from this effort, would end up creating more problems than it resolved," Beers said.
Beers said the Bush anti-terrorism policy is focused on offensive tactics and that the administration has a "disinclination for the defensive nature of homeland security." Criticizing the Bush administration's handling of the Department of Homeland Security, Beers said that he believes "the administration has done little or nothing ... to make the Department of Homeland Security work."
Beers also denounced some aspects of the Bush administration's anti-terror plan abroad. He highlighted several problems in the reconstruction of Iraq. Specifically, Beers deemed security difficulties as well as the lack of a clear power transfer plan to Iraqis as major problems.
These problems, furthered by "few friends and few dollars willing to be in Iraq," Beers said, are leading to a chaotic region, which is not aiding in the fight against what he defined as the broader "jihadist movement". This movement, larger than the organization Al Qaeda, includes other Islamic fundamentalist groups, which use acts of violence against the developed world. The United States' presence in Iraq is actually acting as a "provocation" for the jihadist movement at the moment, Beers said.
Beers also raised his concerns about the current situation in Afghanistan, citing that the area is experiencing more violence than it has "in quite some time". He said that he believed the administration took appropriate action in attempting to destroy Al Qaeda's haven in Afghanistan and initially made positive strides.
Beers said the operation began unraveling in March 2002. Forces in the region were used only to pursue Al Qaeda and the Taliban, but lent no support to the new, peacefully formed government.
The new government only had authority in Kabul with the surrounding areas still dominated by feuding warlords. Many United States forces were removed too early from Afghanistan in order to prepare to send them to Iraq, Beers said.
Beers also addressed the issue of domestic civil liberties during a question and answer period after the lecture. Beers said he finds the current direction of the loss of civil liberties in the United States as "perilous" but said it is a personal decision "how much we are prepared to give up in terms of civil liberties and privacy."
Since resigning from his positions with the Bush administration, Beers has signed on as an advisor for Sen. John Kerry's presidential campaign About 50 students and community members attended the lecture, which is the first in a series of lectures being hosted by ISTS.
