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Senior Intelligence Officials: Attempted Terror Attack "Certain"

The five senior leaders of the U.S. intelligence community told a Senate panel they are "certain" that terrorists will attempt another attack on the United States in the next three to six months.

If true, why do you think the jihadists feel emboldened?

The Obama administration is seen as weak against terrorism.
Its continued backlash against the policies of the former Bush administration.
Not sure.

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April 14, 2009

Can There Be Peace In Our Time?

Dr. Laina Farhat-Holzman

• Turf. Our earliest ancestors required a certain amount of land for hunting and gathering. When they were few, different clans simply avoided others and rarely fought. However, as populations grew, conflict was necessary to guarantee enough land to feed the people. The last time this issue came up in our own time was Nazi Germany and Fascist Japan needing more “living room.” They invaded, respectively, the Soviet Union and China in the hope of dominating those lands and enslaving their people.
• Women. A study of Native American warfare before Europeans arrived showed constant conflict – much of it to capture another tribe’s women for childbearing. Females died in childbirth in such numbers that if a tribe did not find new women, they would not survive. In antiquity, Greek, Roman, and early Muslim warriors who won a war killed all the men and boys and enslaved and impregnated the women. Modern warfare in Central Africa and formerly in Bosnia shows a twist on this: raping and destroying the women of the enemy – a pattern of genocide that is horrifying.
• Food and Water. Those who first grew crops were always under attack by herders with horses, who found seizing food easier than growing it. Agricultural villages on rivers or the seacoast were attacked by fishermen who moonlighted as pirates. They seized food and slaves (including women). Agricultural people had to learn to protect themselves, which they did with centralized rule and standing armies. Organized warfare was born.
• Climate Change. Sudden climate changes (of which the earth has had many) produce droughts, floods, cold, searing heat, all of which can bring plagues, famine, and conflict. Today, as Bangladesh goes under rising waters, people are moving into under-populated Burma, which will eventually ripen into warfare.
• Nationalism. Nation-states have personalities and characteristics that endure. For all the attempt of the European Union to replace nationalism with a United States of Europe, when there is an emergency (financial, climate crisis, or population crash), the nation-states revert to self-interest.
• Energy Needs. Modern societies are voracious users of energy. Until we eventually harness the power of the sun for all of our energy needs (perhaps by 2050), nation-states may go as far as conflict to guarantee that they have energy sources (still petrochemical in our time). Note the Russians planting a flag on the sea floor of the Arctic to stake their claim to Arctic oil and gas.
• Developmental Conflicts. The increasingly technologically advanced countries are already being challenged (often violently) by the religiously-conservative societies that lag in development. Some of these countries can afford weapons or support terrorists with money acquired through sale of oil and gas.

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