The message in this graphic should go right up there with “Keep Calm And Carry On”. A quick web search finds it with slightly different wording, different formatting, different contexts, and so on. I don’t know who first repurposed Uncle Sam for it. I found this version at www.readingwritingrevolution.net/... where it was posted 9-28-2010.
The terror attacks in Paris have the usual suspects screaming about how we must be afraid and we must strike back. fisknp explains why this is both predictable and counterproductive with a very thoughtful diary on trying to come up with an intelligent response to the horror. (And there are several diaries pointing out that this kind of thing has been going on for a while elsewhere, but only Paris seems to be getting the big headlines at the moment.)
The purpose of terror is terror. While the damage inflicted by a terror attack is huge for those directly caught up in it, the main intent is to change behavior of the targeted population by instilling fear in them all out of proportion to the damage. It’s not the idea that a hundred people or more getting killed at once isn’t terrifying — it’s the idea that it could happen anywhere, anytime to YOU! It’s the intent of attacks like this to make the authorities respond to that fear with measures that institutionalize that fear and impose a burden on everyone.
The late science fiction writer Eric Frank Russell wrote a novel in 1957 called Wasp. Earth is fighting a war for survival against a rival stellar government across a number of different planets. The main character James Mowry is drafted to become a “wasp”. His job is explained to him with a couple of story examples. In one, a car speeding along a highway suddenly swerves off the road, killing the three passengers, all adult males in good health. In the other, a couple of dangerous prisoners escape, steal a car, but are recaptured after several hours on the lam.
In the second example, although the escapees didn’t accomplish much for themselves, they tied up hundreds of police officers across several states while the hunt was on, caused traffic to be snarled while roads were blocked, dominated the news headlines, had people locking their doors and staying inside, and so on. And the first example? Before dying, one of the crash victims explained the driver lost control of the car while trying to deal with a wasp that had gotten in…
The late Terry Pratchett described the book by saying he "can't imagine a funnier terrorists' handbook." Mowry is dropped behind the lines on one of the enemy’s planets where his job is to cause as much disruption as possible, tying up enemy resources and softening up the planet for invasion. He’s operating alone, and is highly expendable. It’s definitely asymmetric warfare — Terra (Earth) is both heavily outnumbered and outgunned, and the tactics Mowry uses are not pretty — but wildly effective.
One of his tactics is to plant time bombs on ships, designed to sink them at sea. Meanwhile, the enemy has been leaked plans for Terran minisubs that can be dropped from space to attack shipping, so they have to build an antisub fleet. What the Terrans are actually dropping are “periboobs” — submerged floating buoys that project a periscope above the water — and then sink when a ship that spots them gets closer. A whole fleet of phantom submarines! (Remember that fleet of ultra-lights that were going to be used to drop nerve gas on U.S. cities by Saddam Hussein? Oh wait — that story was planted on us by ‘our’ side through our media.)
If you want to look at terrorism from the other side, this book will do it.
Odds are you’ll find yourself rooting for Mowry (think about that for a moment) — because he represents us, the good guys, and his targets are from an oppressive, authoritarian government, obsessed with control and increasingly paranoid as Mowry’s campaign goes on. Mowry does not seek to make civilians victims directly (unlike the attackers in Paris), but his tactics are designed to divide them, make them lose confidence in their government and force the government to react in ways that make life harder for them. And that government, of course, justifies the measures it uses to stay in charge by the threat against it.
How do we deal with terrorism then? Simply being afraid and lashing out is a reflexive response, but not necessarily effective — and it’s among the reactions the attacks are intended to provoke. Terrorism makes people afraid, and fear makes people stupid. Stupidity is the last thing we need, because we’ve already got a huge surplus. The diary posted by fisknp is a good place to start.
Stop being afraid. Don’t be oblivious, but don’t let your mind be shut down by fear either, because that’s one more small victory for those behind the terror.