Australia's apathy in the face of worsening terrorist threats.

Over the past couple of years, I have been more emotionally engaged with Anzac Day and Remembrance Day than ever before. Some would no doubt say that it is an artefact of growing old, but I can remember when the World War II veterans marched straight-backed and in perfectly formed ranks. There is no question that age wearies their bodies, but the comradeship remains and includes, with justification, the veterans of Korea and Vietnam--two publicly and politically unpopular military conflicts.

This article attempts to provide some insight into the situation in which Australia is enmeshed, especially the "war on terror", for there is no doubt that veterans of this campaign will join those mentioned above. It is worth summarising briefly the nature of our predicament:

* Australia is involved in the struggle against Islamic terrorism by virtue of being a liberal, Western, globalising democracy--a system that is antithetical to fundamentalist Islam.

* Al Qaeda declared war on the US and the West in 1986, but it was its second attack on New York's World Trade Center, namely 9/11, that brought the problem of Islamic terrorism into focus.

* Since that horrific and graphic day in September 2001, Al Qaeda--or other terrorist organisations with which it has operational links--has carried out further "successful" bombing attacks against civilian populations in many Western countries and, somewhat surprisingly, in India. Moreover, US authorities have uncovered a considerable number of other planned terrorist attacks.

* Australia has been threatened by both Al Qaeda, and Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), the latter being responsible for the Bali bombings of 2002 and 2005. This threat has been spelled out by both organisations and constantly reiterated by Australian intelligence authorities. There is no reason to believe that Australia is any less of a terrorist target than the US and the UK.

In addition, while we have been spared the horrific bomb attacks, such as those in London, Madrid and Mumbai, the Bali bombing was widely considered to be the first direct attack against Australian interests, and for that reason it merits some attention.

LEST WE FORGET 

At 01:00 (AEST), on 12 October 2002, in the Kuta district of Bali three bombs were detonated. The deadliest blast occurred inside a nightclub, with a second detonation outside and the third near the US Consulate in Denpassar. Some 202 people were killed, of whom 164 were foreign tourists and 88 Australian. (All loss of human life in such a situation is tragic, and we should not forget that 38 Indonesians and 24 British citizens also perished along with citizens of another 18 countries).

Indonesian authorities rounded up a number of Jemaah Islamiyah activists, three of whom were sentenced to death for the attack; another JI member was a suicide-bomber. Validation of responsibility for the attack was given, albeit indirectly, by Abu Bakar Bashir, the so-called spiritual head of JI, whose gentle and apparently benign appearance masked a mind which condoned violence. He was jailed for three years but released on appeal.

It should be remembered that this atrocity happened less than five years ago and served to alert Australia of the nature of the war on terror proclaimed by US President George W. Bush on 22 September 2001, three weeks after the attack on the World Trade Center. At the time of the Bali bombings, it was reported that the Prime Minister John Howard had hugged the father of a missing Australian citizen and, in words that should be quite unambiguous, told him: "We'll get the bastards who did this." (1) And thankfully, due in no small part to the efficiency of the Australian Federal Police, this task was accomplished.

However, Bali is in Indonesia and, to date, we have been spared an attack on Australian soil. That Australia should be so fortunate owes much to the following cases:

* On 19 June 2006, Faheem Khalid Lodhi became the first person to be found guilty of planning a terrorist attack on Australian soil. He was subsequently sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment. Willie Brigitte, a French citizen believed to be connected with Al Qaeda, was sentenced to nine years' jail in France in March this year, but part of the evidence suggests that he was engaged in planning terrorist operations in this country, including an attack on the nuclear reactor at Lucas Heights in southern Sydney. The French court heard that he was affiliated with the Pakistan-based terrorist group, Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET), known to have links with Al Qaeda.

* A successful prosecution case against "Jihad Jack" Thomas on terrorist grounds in 2002 resulted in a jail sentence of five years, the main claim being that he was a "sleeper agent". That sentence was subsequently quashed in August 2006, but a control order was placed on him. In December 2006, it was announced that there would be a re-trial, with evidence largely based on a somewhat imprudent interview he granted to ABC televisions Four Corners program. (2)

* In November 2004, Jack Roche, a convert to Islam, changed his plea to guilty on charges of planning to bomb the Israeli embassy in Canberra. In April 2005 he was sentenced to nine years in jail. This case is complicated by the fact that Roche unsuccessfully attempted to contact ASIO. Prime Minister Howard later conceded that security authorities had made a "very serious mistake" in ignoring Roche. Roche was apparently trained by Al Qaeda and had contact with the notorious JI terrorist Riduan Isamuddin, more popularly known as Hambali, who was arrested in 2004. (3)

* In November 2005, the Australian security authorities rounded up a number of suspects in Melbourne and Sydney, under the code name Operation Pendennis. These suspects are presently before the court.

* In a case apparently connected with Operation Pendennis, a Sydney resident, Taha Abdul Rahman, was arrested on the charge of possessing stolen weapons, namely rocket launchers. The Australian Federal Police Force has not publicly linked Abdul Rahman to a planned attack on Lucas Heights, but he is believed to be associated with a group planning such an attack.

* On 1 May 2007, Australian Federal Police arrested two suspected Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) supporters in an early-morning raid in Melbourne. Newspaper reports state that the two suspects were arrested in connection with financing the LTTE. A Sri Lankan Government source was quoted as saying that it was the first time that Australian law-enforcement authorities had taken "direct action against the wide spread fund-raising activities by the terror outfit on the Australian soil". (4)

In themselves, these cases support the contention made by the security and police authorities that there have been attempts to establish terrorist cells in this country and sleeper agents, ready to be activated at a given time. As a former intelligence officer, I would take such contentions as a "given", and certainly not subject to serious challenge.

Indeed, just about seven months ago, Dennis Richardson, a past Director-General of Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), and now Australian Ambassador to the US, stated inter alia that "Islamic terrorism has become a deeply interconnected global phenomenon with terrorists having killed more Australian civilians than American or British civilians in the past five years". He went on to say that "it was a mistake to compartmentalise terrorist attacks in Bali, London and elsewhere without recognising the growing common global ideological links between them.... It's all part of one story.... Unless you understand that, then you are not seeing what is happening globally and how it's connected." (5)

However, the press and electronic media convey little, if any, sense of urgency about the problem confronting us. At time of writing, the US Department of Homeland Security rates the current terrorist threat level as "elevated" (yellow) (6) and, despite uncovering some quite serious terrorist threats over the past few months, some in the media are expressing the view that Al Qaeda has shot its bolt in terms of attacking the US heartland.

By contrast, the United Kingdom Home Office puts the threat level at "severe", the second highest on a five-stage scale from critical to low. The definition of severe is: "An attack is highly likely." (7) The situation in the UK merits significant research and analysis, given the recent British trial of five of seven would-be bombers, who were convicted on 30 April of planning a series of suicide attacks between January 2003 and March 2004. After a five-week trial, their sentences add up collectively to 95 years. It was deemed that there was insufficient evidence to try a sixth suspect and the seventh member has so far eluded the authorities.

The planned bombings precede the murderously successful attacks of 7/7 (7 July 2005--a date that now has the same resonance for Britain as 9/11 for the US) when 57 people died in attacks on public transport across London. The UK security authorities have come under trenchant criticism because of an undetected connection between those tried recently and the suicide-bombers of 7/7--a clear failure of intelligence.

During this time frame, a report from the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre (JTAC) apparently found its way into the The Sunday Times of 22 April. It reportedly raised the spectre of a major attack in the UK, preferably before Prime Minister Tony Blair steps down in June this year. A member of the Al Qaeda network allegedly said that the operation would be "on a par with Hiroshima and Nagasaki and will shake the Roman throne". (8)

Cautious conservatism dictates that such information be taken very seriously and it comes in the light of reports that, during this counter-terrorist action, Operation Crevice, the UKSIS and UKSS (MI6 and MI5 respectively) had been run like medieval fiefdoms--a common enough weakness of intelligence services in the West generally. Significantly, the heads of both organisations have since been replaced.

Sniggering from across the Atlantic on security matters is not exactly unknown, but the same criticism can be levelled at US authorities. In an admittedly right-wing (printed and electronic) journal, a reporter Adrian Morgan has boldly asked: "UK's MI5: Infiltrated by Islamists and Renegades?" (9) The case that Morgan makes is extremely serious and highlights critical operational failures: the title is extremely appropriate. Echoes can be found in the British press, some elements of which have been calling for an inquiry into the 7/7 conspiracy, especially the escape of the ringleader. (10)

Space does not permit a full examination in this article of the UK plot, except that it is important to note that those involved are regarded as "homegrown terrorists" who intended to use bombs basically made from ammonium nitrate fertiliser. Some idea of the scale of the problems faced by the UK authorities was contained in a speech delivered last November by Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller, then head of MI5, who stated that her agents were tracking 30 plots, involving 1,600 fanatics. She warned that the menace facing Britain would remain with it for a generation. (11)

The cost to the UK in terms of manpower and logistical support for counter-terrorist operations, spread across police and security and intelligence organisations, is horrendously expensive and places inordinate pressure on those involved. It is not a situation to be envied.

THE AUSTRALIAN SITUATION

Fortunately, a successful terrorist attack on Australian soil has yet to take place, although the local cases mentioned above confirm a proportional presence of hostile elements. Anyone who seriously considers that an attack can be prevented indefinitely is seriously deluded. The major problem for our authorities appears to be that Australians are, by turn, complacent, ignorant or intellectually impervious to the threat posed by Islamic fundamentalist terrorism.

We do not need members of the US Senate to tell us what we already know, namely that the war in Iraq was (a) a dangerous mistake, (b) not linked to weapons of mass destruction and (c) ill-conceived, without an exit strategy. While a strong case can be made for carrying the war against Al Qaeda to Afghanistan, no such case existed in Iraq until the US-led invasion. Quite predictably, it has been claimed that the Iraqi conflict has led to more radicalism in the Islamic world and no shortage of recruits for terrorist acts, including suicide bombings.

In reality, the war in Iraq has been lost. Given the horrendous civilian casualties caused by well-armed groups engaged in inter-communal sectarian violence, and the death of over 3,000 US troops plus a small but significant number of allied soldiers, it remains to be seen how the situation can be stabilised and foreign forces extricated without involving Syria, Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia and a number of other countries implacably opposed to America. Australia has been lucky that we have had only one non-combat casualty in Iraq, a number of injuries among our troops deployed in Afghanistan, and one unfortunate suicide related to the latter campaign.

Australia has been a willing ally of the US in the Middle East and Afghanistan since the first Gulf War and, while our forces have been in harm's way, we have so far been spared body-bags being returned home. For all of the foregoing, the complacency or lethargy in the population at large concerning terrorism is a disturbing trend. The credo of being "alert but not alarmed" appears to have been transmogrified into "laid back and out to lunch".

Whether we like it or not, we are at war, and no one should forget that fact. In 2005, there were claims that Al Qaeda was finished, yet recent events suggest that it has regained strength, is using Iraq as a training ground and, far from being an idea rather than an organisation (a view offered by some critics), there appears to be a steady stream of volunteers to Pakistan for training and possible deployment. We were also assured, only a few years ago, by Sidney Jones, director of the Jakarta branch of the Brussels-based International Crisis Group, that Jemaah Islamiyah had been smashed in Indonesia. (12)

However, more recently, the same Ms Jones, touted as an expert on JI, has been forced to leave Indonesia for the relative safety of the UK, but not before issuing a warning that JI was back and actively recruiting, in the classic phrase: "I think you have to assume that the organisation may have shrunk less than we thought in the past couple of years." (13) If we can learn one lesson from so-called experts, it is that Islamic terrorist organisations are extremely resilient and there is certainly no shortage of volunteers, including converts from Western society.

TERRORISM AND THE CIVIL RIGHTS IN AUSTRALIA

The great strengths of Western democracy are grounded in freedom of speech and expression, embodying regular elections and rule by the majority, i.e., government of, for and by the people. It embraces principles of social equality and respect for the individual within a community. An impartial judiciary and separation of powers are largely taken for granted, especially by those of us who have known no differently.

The freedoms of our system have been wrested from absolute rulers, tyrants, cliques and cabals over hundreds of years. The British system, which is often taken as the paradigm for democracy, has shown a great strength in times of adversity, especially when threatened by external forces, as has been seen in two world wars.

In theory, democracy should have been strengthened in the crucible of war, but, after World War II, rebuilding society brought with it a new set of challenges, especially the absorption of migrants and rapid changes in the economy and industry. These resulted in societal challenges, such as migration policy, multiculturalism, civil rights, feminism and, more recently, political correctness. Australian democracy is still dealing with many of these issues. (With respect to the problem posed by a critical mass of Islamic migrants in our community, see a recent article by social scientist Dr C.J. Ward). (14)

It is certainly true that we may vehemently disagree with the views of various persons and groups in relation to the Iraq war, terrorism and related legislation, not to mention their support for causes celebres, such as convicted terrorist supporter David Hicks, just as we may find the unctuous morality of certain broadcasters and journalists sickening. However, it is important to remind ourselves that freedom of speech is a given right.

Australia's involvement in the US-led war in Iraq continues to be vigorously debated. Iraq has not produced the same sound and fury as the earlier Vietnam conflict, probably because conscription has not been introduced and, secondly, because Australia has been extremely fortunate in that its loss of life has been minimal and not related directly to enemy action. However, one bloody fire-fight in Afghanistan or Iraq, with heavy casualties, would change the nature of the situation overnight and, to a certain extent, the degree of change could be seen as reflecting the inability of government and opposition alike to convince the Australian public that we are at war. Furthermore, this conflict is likely to be long-lasting and divisive, because this country is home to a significant number of Muslims. As we well know, racial hatred already simmers beneath the surface, and could quite conceivably become more manifest than the Cronulla beach riots of December 2005.

Opposition to Australia's Iraq commitment generally emanates from the left of Australian politics, and in some respects is part of the "hate Howard, hate Bush" mentality, which has increased ever since President George W. Bush's 2002 declaration of the war on terror and the ensuing military action. However, dissent is not the province of the left alone, and covers the whole political spectrum. Until the government changes or is convinced otherwise, our troops will continue to be deployed overseas.

However, what do we make of those people who apparently hate the Australian and American government policies to such an extent that they actively support the forces ranged against them? This, I suggest, is where dissent crosses the line to become treason, and it appears that Australian law is ill-equipped, or poorly-worded, to meet this current challenge. There is no excuse for not amending the Crimes Act accordingly.

We must expect, and to a certain extent understand, the fact that members of the legal profession will defend the likes of David Hicks, Jack Thomas and Faheem Khalid Lodhi. It is the right of the accused to have competent legal defence in a court of law. While it is indisputable that some legal figures will be prepared to take any case to heighten their profile, causing a certain amount of grinding of teeth among the authorities, it places the onus on the Commonwealth Government to present a strong case for the prosecution.

Certain prominent politicians, both serving and former, have jumped on the bandwagon, especially relating to the delayed trial of David Hicks. Former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser launched an attack on the Howard Government's treatment of asylum-seekers and Muslim Australians, predicting a rather ugly election later this year. In passing, Mr Fraser described the treatment of David Hicks in terms of "the willingness of two allegedly democratic governments prepared to throw every legal principle out the window and establish a process that we would expect of tyrannical regimes". (15) (My personal view is that David Hicks deserved his day in court much earlier, and that the delay has done little to dignify either the law or validate the war against terror).

Less understandable in some respects, but typical for the times, is the number of support groups that spring up to defend the "rights" of terror suspects who face prosecution. The legality of such support is questionable only when the law is broken. And to date, it would appear that no transgression has occurred. However, support groups have certainly sprung up for Faheem Khalid Lodhi, Jack Thomas and David Hicks. It is a stone-cold certainty that similar support will arise as those arrested in Operation Pendennis receive trial publicity.

As anticipated, the revolutionary Trotskyite group, the International Socialists, whose red banners can be seen at any anti-American or anti-Howard demonstration, are at the forefront of this. As they are sworn to overthrow capitalism, there is no contradiction in their actions. Following closely behind are the disparate Green Left, some Green Party politicians and a range of individuals from across the political spectrum.

For example, a sample of support groups for David Hicks includes: Activist Rights Legal Information and Resources, Australian Muslim Civil Rights Advocacy Network, Civil Rights Network, Fair Go for David, Federation of Community Legal Centres (Victoria), Liberty Victoria and the NSW Council for Civil Liberties.

All have internet sites and, while our law is based on the principle of "innocent until proven guilty", the rhetoric on these sites demonstrates what one might term a "provocative innocence (of the individual) and indisputable guilt of the authorities". Such evidence as there is, even when presented in court, is routinely taken to be false--a clear case of cognitive dissonance. Similar support sites have existed for "Jihad Jack" Thomas and Faheem Khalid Lodhi (16) and through the Green Left writing of Colin Mitchell. The electronic media, especially the ABC, have shown various degrees of scepticism about the strength of the cases against these individuals.

Quite clearly, the West has lost both the war in Iraq and its way in the misnamed war on terror. With the benefit of hindsight, the White House, rather than referring to the Axis of Evil and singling out Saddam Hussein for military action, would have done better to designate Islamic fundamentalists engaged in acts of violence for what they are--terrorists. There can be no quibbling about that point.

Most disturbing, however, is the failure of the Australian Government to ram home the message that Australia is under grave threat from forces that are hostile to our way of life. That message needs to be reinforced with a thorough overhaul of our legal system so that our government can deport terror suspects and their sympathisers to destinations where they might feel more at home.

So far, we have been lucky, extremely lucky, in terms of detecting and preventing terrorist acts. However, 2007 is an election year and what better time for Australia's enemies to make a point? Clearly, the government has signally failed to ensure the population is aware of this state of war. What will be the cost of that failure?

1. "PM's vow: we'll get the bastards", Sydney Morning Herald, 21 October 2002.

2. "The Convert", Four Corners (ABC television), 27 February 2006.

3. "Jacke Roche: The naive militant", BBC News Online, 1 June 2004; "Before 9/11, one warning went unheard", Los Angeles Times, 7 June 2004.

4. Ministry of Defence, Public Security, Law and Order (Sri Lanka), 1 May 2007. URL: http://www.defence.lk/new.asp?fname=20070501_03

5. The Australian, 6 October 2006.

6. "Current threat level", Homeland Security (Washington DC). URL: http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/homeland/index.html

7. "Current threat level", Home Office (United Kingdom). URL: http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/security/current-threat-level

8. "Al-Qaeda 'planning big British attack'", The Sunday Times (London), 22 April 2007.

9. Adrian Morgan, "UK's MI5: Infiltrated by Islamists and Renegades?", The Family Security Foundation, Inc., 1 May 2007.

10. See: The Telegraph, 1 May 2007; and Nigel Morris, "The Big Question: Could MI5 have done more to prevent July 7, and do we need an inquiry?", The Independent, 2 May 2007.

11. Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller, "The International Terrorist Threat to the UK", speech by the Director-General of the Security Service (MI5) at Queen Mary's College, London, 9 November 2006. URL: http://www.mi5.gov.uk/print/Page568.html

12. "Interview with Sidney Jones", Four Corners (ABC television), 3 November 2003.

13. "JI still confounding terror experts, despite arrests", The Australian, 6 April 2007.

14. Christopher J. Ward, "Sheik's outburst--more than once is enough!", News Weekly (Melbourne), 3 February 2007.

15. "After Tampa, the Muslim election," The Canberra Times, 1 May 2007.

16. See: [e-mail] and http://leftwrites.net