BY BERNARD LEWIS
Friday,
April 26, 2002 12:01 a.m. EDT
When Osama bin Laden launched his attack on the U.S. on Sept. 11, he
was proceeding on an assumption of the weakness of American resolve. It is
a point he made clear in many of his previous statements, notably in his
interview with John Miller of ABC, on May 28, 1998:
"We have seen in the last decade the decline of the American government
and the weakness of the American soldier, who is ready to wage cold wars
and unprepared to fight long wars," he said. "This was proven in Beirut
when the Marines fled after two explosions. It also proves they can run in
less than 24 hours and this was also repeated in Somalia. . . .
[Our] youth were surprised at the low morale of the American soldiers.
. . . After a few blows, they ran in defeat . . . they
forgot about being the world leader and the leader of the new world order.
They left, dragging their corpses and their shameful defeat."
As they saw it, the Islamic fighters in Afghanistan had defeated and
destroyed the mighty Soviet Union. Dealing with the U.S. would be a much
easier task.
This was his belief and the source of his resolve. The same message
appears in several other statements--that Americans had become soft and
pampered, unable or unwilling to stand up and fight. It was a lesson bin
Laden extracted from our responses to previous attacks: He expected more
of the same. There would be fierce words and perhaps the U.S. would launch
a missile or two to some remote places, but there would be little else in
terms of retaliation.
It was a natural error. Nothing in his background or his experience
would enable him to understand that a major policy change could result
from an election.
As we now know, it was also a deadly error. What in fact followed--the
campaign in Afghanistan, the overthrow of the Taliban, the declaration of
war against the "axis of evil"--must have come as a shock to him and to
his various sponsors and helpers. The assault of Sept. 11 was surely
intended as the opening salvo of a war of terror that would continue until
its objectives were obtained--that is, the eviction of the United States
from the world of Islam and, most important, the overthrow of the Arab
regimes seen by us as friendly, and by al Qaeda and many of their own
subjects as renegades from Islam and puppets of America.
That was the plan, anyway. It was the shock of America's rapid and
sharp reaction that made bin Laden blink. After the U.S.'s initial
response, he halted his campaign and adopted a more cautious attitude. But
some recent American actions and utterances may bring a reconsideration of
this judgement and the halt to which it gave rise. Our anxious pleading
with the fragile and frightened regimes of the region to join--or at least
to tolerate--a campaign against terrorism and its sponsors has put the
U.S. in a corner where it seems to be asking permission for actions that
are its own prerogative to take.
Likewise, the exemptions accorded to some terrorist leaders, movements
and actions not immediately directed against us have undermined the strong
moral position which must be the foundation of our global war on
terrorism. The submission to being scolded and slighted, as Secretary of
State Colin Powell did in his recent meeting with the king of Morocco, and
his failure to meet with the president of Egypt, make the U.S. seem it is
reverting to bad habits. That only further contributes to a perceived
posture of irresolution and uncertainty on the part of the U.S.
administration.
This irresolution on our part has brought a corresponding uncertainty
on the part of our nervous and hesitant allies, not without reason. Their
fears have deep roots in the memory of what happened after the Gulf War
when we called on the people of Iraq to rebel against Saddam Hussein and
then abandoned them. Having granted Saddam a cease-fire, we sat and
watched as he destroyed the rebels, group by group and region by region,
using the helicopters we had thoughtfully allowed him to retain.
The leaders of al Qaeda launched their war against the U.S. in the
belief that they were attacking a soft and demoralized enemy. They thought
they could proceed with impunity. It would be wise not to let that
misapprehension creep back.
Mr. Lewis, professor emeritus of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton,
is the author, most recently, of "What Went Wrong? Western Impact and
Middle Eastern Response" (Oxford University Press, 2002), available from
the OpinionJournal bookstore by clicking here.
