How do we fight terrorism?

The Washington Post ran an article today ("Europe's anti-terrorism agencies favor human intelligence over technology") about European anti-terror tactics and what the United States could learn. My immediate inclination was positive, thinking that the Washington Post was going to highlight what I assumed were more restrained, but successful, anti-terror squads. What I found instead disturbed me greatly.

The article focuses primarily on the French Central Directorate of Internal Intelligence (DCRI), France's lead anti-terror unit. To many Americans, Europe is perceived as a more liberal society where collective and individual rights are fiercely defended. This article paints a very different reality, however.

It explains how Europe, as do many countries, relies heavily on human intelligence (HUMINT) over electronic espionage. This is nothing new to the United States, the intelligence community has long realized that the sudden collapse of the Soviet Union caught them flat footed, with few assets (intel speak for sources of intelligence) outside of Communist regimes. It has been a major goal of the community to vastly expand our HUMINT capabilities, but we just don't have the history of success to build upon. Countries like Israel, France, and Great Britain have been in the anti-terror game for much longer, and as a result have the vital connections to many dubious global and local organizations. The 'dirty' nature of many of these organizations helps explain U.S. failures at HUMINT: we by law and morally struggle to deal with less-than-reputable persons.

But this is common knowledge. The startling element of the piece was the lack of regulation with which European anti-terror units operate. The ability to detain persons for 48 hours without access to defense counsel, surveillance cameras covering every inch of entire cities (which has been vital in preventing multiple terrorist attacks in London), and the ability to wire tap or execute eltronic survailliance without warrants are just examples of policies that are alarming to me. Europe has executed the exact opposite style of counter-terror policies than the one I'd hope for the United States, and here is the Washington Post arguing we should learn a thing or two!

The time has come America, we must have a talk. Is the government here to protect our bodies by providing security, at whatever cost, or is it meant to enshrine and defend our rights? I, for one, proudly proclaim my rights to be the most important.

As General Stark once said, "Live free or die: death is not the worst of evils."