Does the Terror Alert System Help Terrorists?
The color-coded nationwide terror alert system, adopted six months after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, probably helps terrorists more than it helps make Americans secure, according to Ivan Eland, director of the Independent Institute s Center on Peace & Liberty, in his latest op-ed. Not only do federal orange alerts unnecessarily startle 285 million Americans, most of whom live far from the most likely terrorist targets in major U.S. cities, in effect they tell terrorists when their activities and electronic chatter have been discovered by anti-terrorism officials. Although raising the alert level nationwide results in greater state and local protection of, for example, subway stations, shopping malls and airports, it probably wastes scarce state and local resources where the threat is not acute and gives the general citizenry everywhere no useful information about what they should do, writes Eland The government s advice to the public essentially boils down to be alert and keep shopping
