CKNW Editorial
for October 8, 2001

I got the news of the attacks on Afghanistan yesterday morning at church …not a bad place to think about things. I found myself musing over war and how it has changed so dramatically over the centuries. The English long bow, the crossbow, gunpowder, the steam engine followed so closely by the internal combustion engine, the airplane and on it went until nuclear and the ability to deliver weapons unmanned. Now it’s terrorism – big time and world wide.

While the use of terror has always been with us, for much of European history, wars often were waged without too much involvement of ordinary people. World War II changed that forever – bombing of Dresden and other German cities and of course Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not done to damage military installations but to cow the populace and bring about a political result. I suppose the first major example of this was Guernica in Spain, bombed in 1937 by German planes fighting for Franco, followed three years later by the Nazi terror bombing of Rotterdam.

Terrorism as an individual act goes back a long way too but it has come into its own in recent years as radical movements discovered that while they could not match their enemies with conventional weaponry they could wreak havoc by destroying hateful landmarks, such as the statue to Nelson in Dublin, or by injuring large numbers of innocent civilians such as the Remembrance Day massacre in Enniskillen. The IRA, for example, could not destroy Great Britain nor its army. They set out, therefore, to so terrorize the civilian population as to accomplish politically that which they couldn’t do militarily.

The Taliban cannot defeat the United States and its allies – nor can all the militant radical Islam forces in the world. But they can make life miserable and on a never ending basis. This is the horrible part of terrorism of the sort practiced by Bin Laden – as long as there is a body of fundamentalist Islam opinion, reasonably well financed, it can fight its enemies and inflict horrible damage indefinitely.

We have become soft in North America. Until September 11, we just hadn’t experienced real terrorism other than a few mail boxes in Quebec back in the sixties. We don’t know what it’s like to live with terrorist activity on a daily basis as they do in Belfast and Tel Aviv – or indeed London. And we’re going to have to get used to it, for the world changed on September 11 and we’ll never go back.

And Canada is scarcely immune. If we think that all terrorist activities are now going to be targeted on big ticket items we’re sadly mistaken. The attacks on New York and the Pentagon were hugely complicated affairs calculated to get our attention in a big way. While we shouldn’t discount the possibility that there will be major efforts again, I think the bigger worry is the supermarket bombing and things of that sort. Moreover, unlike some, though by no means all Irish terrorist attacks, we can expect no warning.

I think Canadians from coast to coast have to do two things.

First, we must make it harder for terrorists to ply their trade. This means dramatically increased vigilance involving unexpected searchings and screenings. It will also involve buildings like this one not only having formal screening of people coming and going but a substantial upgrade of their defence mechanisms. Last week we had a possible fire and no one, least of all the building’s security personnel, had the faintest idea what was happening or what to do. It will involve places like CKNW doing a much better job of securing themselves against unidentified visitors. We would be very foolish to assume that, somehow, Vancouver is safer than New York, London or Los Angeles. There is as much propaganda benefit to be obtained by multi deaths in Vancouver as New York … perhaps more since it would show the world that no where is safe. This is why the IRA bombed Omagh and Inniskillen in addition to Belfast and London.

We must all become more alert to things like abandoned luggage. So my first of two main points is this – terror has come to North America and it will never go away. It is now part of your life and mine.

But there is another thing we must do. We must accept the fact that while there is no sense taking stupid risks, life must go on. Since no matter where we may be is potentially unsafe, we must accept that life itself isn’t as safe as it used to be. We have to be logical – if we are to be exposed to some extra risk no matter where we are, we had better get used to that and not shy away from, for example airplanes which might, in the shorter term, be more safe than a shopping center. This is because to get an airplane requires a lot of money, training, time and luck – a suicide bomber or even a planted bomb in a crowded place is relatively easy. Moreover, we’re able to check airplanes if we want to … which at least for the moment we do.

One can get used to these things and remain vigilant. People who live in areas exposed to terrorism have done just that for years as part of everyday life. Business goes on and life goes on.

I’m taking three trips in the next few months – London including a few days in Copenhagen, Mexico and New Zealand and I haven’t given a moment’s thought to canceling any of them. It would make more sense to cancel going to my favourite book store … or restaurant … or watering hole … or to work.

So my second point this morning is this – when there is nowhere safe, one place is just about as safe as another. Over the years, in London, I have been in the Parliament buildings, Harrods, Selfridges, the Tower and the Stock Exchange all of which, at one time or another, have been bombed. Life is and always has been a bit of a crap shoot.

We just have to all get on with our lives … and that’s going to take some getting used to … just as it has in so many other places in the world. Our incredible run of luck just ran out … and people all over the world are saying to North Americans – welcome to the real world, 21^st century style.