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The
War on Odor and The War on Terror
December
13, 2003
By Alexis E. Santí
 We
live in a world where the very word terror seems as
if it was just invented; everything has now become a function
of terror. Terror has become the most popular, pervasive,
ear-catching issue in our society today. Osama Bin Laden and
Saddam Hussein are the worlds top terrorists, or sponsors
of terror. Protesters in the streets of London raise placards
accusing Bush and Blair of being themselves terrorists.
At the same time the protesters themselves are considered
a brand of terrorists. Eco-terrorists vandalize Humvees in
a car lot. Lee Boyd Malvo and John Mohammed, the DC snipers,
are prosecuted under anti-terrorist legislation. Email spammers,
cyber hackers, also now seem to be considered terrorists.
Sellers of bootleg CDs, and knock-off Kate Spade handbags,
are also supporting terrorists. Terror has become the
most pervasive issue in our culture, and the direction our
foreign and economic policy is headed over the next generation.
We are in the midst of a war, a war that will cost countless
money, time and manpower: A war on terror.
Those who like Kurt Vonnegut's novels are familiar with the
character Kilgore Trout. Trout, a failed science fiction writer,
whose brief stories are referenced in Vonnegut's books, are
full of sardonic wit. In God Bless You Mr. Rosewater,
one of Trout's stories appears; a story of a country that
is at war with odor. A country, where millions are spent fighting
odors, chemicals are developed to neutralize every odor. Time,
money and manpower goes into a full-frontal attack on the
scourge of the earth, odor. Finally a dictator assumes
power that has an answer, a perfect solution to win the war
against odor. He is assailed as a genius, his solution: cut
off everyone's noses.
Terror's purpose is to cause fear. Thus, a fundamental part
of the war on terror must be to destroy fear. Yet, fear is
inherent in all man, thus, we must overstate the obvious:
we cannot destroy fear. But, what if we could find a nose
in the war on terror, a nose on fear that we could cut off?
There are three logical ways to search for the nose on terror;
they are by confronting terror on mental, physical and cultural
battleground.
The easiest way to confront terror and its cousin, fear,
would be by eliminating it inside of us - in some sort of
Clockwork Orange science experiment; destroy the very nature
of fear inside of us. Now, this won't happen, but what I think
can happen is to adapt to the notion that our world will always
be invaded by terror, that we are not ever 100% safe from
the madness of the world. The clearest example of this mental
shift is the lives of the Israelis, living, working and thriving
yet not knowing whether their bus is next. The events of September
11th initiated the American public into the global world of
terror and we have been playing catch up ever since. So the
nose here is understanding the world we live in now.
Physically there are two fronts where we can confront terror;
they are publicly and privately. Publicly, large masses of
men and women of the armed forces can invade nations. This
is, well, expensive, and does not exactly go after small groups
of individuals in the war on terror. Whatever side of the
political spectrum we fall, we cannot argue with the fact
that full-scale wars are not a very cost-effective way of
battling roving terrorists. The second way, which remains
eerily out of the news, is clandestine operations working
across the world, silently confronting terror. The world can
only hope that appropriate anti-terrorism units across the
world have already begun to collaborate and embed themselves
into the terrorist culture, with the goal of muting their
attacks on innocent citizens. Here, the nose that we've been
showing the world is our military might and it remains bloodied
so-to-speak.
Finally, confronting terror must happen culturally in the
United States. We relied on the breadth of our population
to win both World Wars and the Cold war. The resiliency of
the American society is woven into our ability to adapt and
tap into the diversity of our population. Today soldiers are
dying in the Middle East because their language training is
so insufficient that they can't read roadside signs that say
"Caution, Bomb!" in Arabic. America more than ever must begin
to educate our population regarding the history, culture,
region and languages of the world and specifically the Middle
East. If we are to assume that the immediate future of American
Foreign Policy will be centered on the Middle East, and Global
politics then we have much to do. American diplomatic, military,
civic corps, and the American public will be forced as a new
generation of multi-lingual, multi-ethnic, politically savvy
citizenry. Their mentors will be their neighbors, the grocer,
the cab driver, the professor long shunned by his home country
- their new country is calling on them to provide a service
to their country, educate and build America's best and brightest.
It is only by utilizing the breadth of our population that
America will achieve its full interests in the War on Terror.
We have the population, the ability and the vast understanding.
The United States must now more than ever adapt to a global
world based on an aggressive understanding of global politics,
history and the multiplicity of languages and cultures. Ignorance
unfortunately is no longer bliss, ignorance is in fact, the
very nose of terror that we must cut off.
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