By Sophie Nitkin

The start of the school year brings back our focus on classes, homework, school sports and of course weekend social life. Terrorism is most likely to be the last thing on our minds. And even if an increased threat of terrorism prompts Homeland Security to raise the alert from yellow to orange, we’ve come to see that nothing ever happens anyway – so why should we worry?

Think there is no threat? Well, think again. For the past thirty years we brushed aside the threat of terrorism. The threat has always been real, but since terrorism rarely occurred in the United States, we severely underestimated the religious extremism, jihad, anti-American sentiment throughout the world before Sept. 11.

According to Dr. Jeffrey Bale, Senior Research Analyst in Chemical and Biological Weapons’ Non Proliferation Program at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, California, we can’t afford to pretend it couldn’t happen again. While we are beefing up security, it’s virtually impossible to defend every vulnerable target in the United States 24/7.

Bale says it’s no longer a question if terrorists will attack the US with a 9/11 magnitude but rather when they will attack and will we be ready? “Generally terrorist groups have been fighting with conventional weapons,” says Bale. “But they have expressed a keen interest in obtaining weapons of mass destruction and they certainly have some kind of crude chemical weapon capacity already. They may have radiological materials and they probably have not been able to acquire any kind of nuclear devices. Whatever biological war plans they have are very undeveloped, but I think this could all change in the future.”

An expert in unconventional warfare, terrorism, and political and religious extremism, Bale has spent the last 20 years monitoring the rise of Islamist terrorist groups. “These people are not hicks from the sticks,” said Bale. “The leadership cadres of Islamist terrorist groups are generally wealthy, well educated, they have college degrees in the sciences and they are familiar with modern technology and have been exposed to the most modern scientific information.” Their knowledge and their know-how gives ammunition to their ideological battle: “to unite the entire Muslim world into a single entity which is in accordance with Islamic law and ultimately to expand and dominate the entire world in conversion or conquest.”

While this may sound far-fetched to us, Bale is one of a number of experts who recognize the potential apocalyptic intentions of these groups who are very likely to engage in acts of terror to achieve their goals. “Those of us who study extremism, whether political or religious, unconventional warfare and terrorism are intimately familiar with the attitudes and activities of a multitude of violent groups whose agendas are extreme and utopian and whose interests are in many respects irreconcilable with those of Western democracies.”

Islamism has been a major focus of Dr. Bale’s studies. Islamism, not to be confused with Islam, radically rejects western secular values. Islamism is extremely intolerant of western influences of any kind in the Muslim world. Islamists wish to create an Islamic state modeled after the Koran and Mohammed himself, and even the less committed, more moderate Muslims are apt to experience hostility from extreme Islamists because they are not as dedicated to these ends.

Islamist groups intent on achieving their goals through Holy War, or jihad such as Al Qaeda, Hamas and Hezbollah have their differences, too. The more radical Sunnis, which include groups such as Al Queda and Hamas are not fond of terrorist groups like Hezbollah because they are Shiites. “If [Osama] bin Laden were to take over the world tomorrow,” says Bale, “the Shiites would be amongst the first to be executed. But that doesn’t mean that [these groups] won’t engage in operational collusion and collaboration especially against enemies that they hate even more, like the United States, the West, or Israel.”

While not every Muslim is willing to strap explosives around themselves and blow themselves and others up for the Islamist cause, Bale says, “Even if you were to say that only 1% of the Muslims were supporters of the Islamists, that’s still a hell of a lot of people when you are talking about over a billion Muslims.” Bale also contends that most Muslims give “silent applause” to the attacks against the West because of the common resentment and humiliation they feel. Silent applause extends to agencies in many Middle Eastern governments that support the activities of many terrorist groups. Bale says it is publicly known that certain members of the Saudi royal family support the terrorists financially, and many so-called charities have been set up to help fund their causes.

So, while it’s far easier to negotiate with or go after states that disagree with our policies or are intent on causing us harm, how do we go after terrorists whose covert and clandestine operations are hidden from us? “Unfortunately, the only [short term] way to deal with them is to hunt them down and kill them before they kill us and that’s essentially what the war on terrorism is boiling down to in the most basic sense.”

But there’s a long-term solution too. Bale believes that the United States as well as other Western nations have to reconsider policies they have adopted that have only agitated the problem. In a sense, the US has shot itself in the foot by supporting some bad regimes that have allowed the spread of bad propaganda against the West.

In the end, however, most of the solution is incumbent on the people and the governments in the Middle East. The governments in the region need to take responsibility for their own country’s problems rather than divert the source of their problems onto the United States, the West and Israel. Changes need to be made in their education systems, for example, which have been responsible for indoctrinating generations of young kids with hatred of anything that is considered to be unIslamic or anti-Arab. “The long term solution is changing the societies in the Middle East – but again, none of us should be holding our breath. That’s going to be a very long term difficult process.”

As teenagers and future leaders it is our responsibility to learn as much as possible about the dangers that confront our country and our world. “Some of these things are a product of historical, cultural, political, structural, geopolitical factors that no one has any control over and you shouldn’t lose sleep worrying about things you have no control over,” says Bale. On the other hand Bale says it is important to be realistic. “These problems aren’t going to go away if we just hold hands and sing Kumbaya.” Many countries in the world have interests that are mutually exclusive of those of the West, which makes negotiation and willingness to compromise very difficult. “Sometimes there is no way to deal with these things in a peaceful way and I think we have to be realistic about the nature of the world. If one really wishes to make the world a better place, and many of us hope to contribute in some way to that process, one must first understand the nature, extent and seriousness of the manifold problems that present obstacles to significant improvements in the human condition,” Bale said. “Sometimes these things will not disappear on their own and they need to be confronted before they can be resolved. So, that’s my advice to young people, to hope for the best but be aware of the reality and prepare for the worst.”

Dr. Jeffrey Bale, Senior Research Analyst in Chemical and Biological Weapons’ Non Proliferation Program at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, Calif.