A Bomb in Times Square

Public safety officers and Homeland Security officials have an almost impossible task at hand when dealing with an attempted act of terrorism such as the discovery Saturday night of an undetonated car bomb in New York City.

On one hand, authorities don't want to needlessly frighten the public. That is understandable. So the natural tendency is to downplay the terrorist threat by dismissing the plot as "amateurish" or as the act of a lone individual with no known international affiliation. Making the rounds of the Sunday morning talk shows, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano described the failed bombing as not very "sophisticated" and dismissed it as a "one-off." We interpret that to mean something comparable to an isolated incident and not part of a larger plan of widespread destruction. Also, interestingly, the White House won't even use the word "terrorism" to describe the car bomb.

That's nonsense. What else should we call it? This act was, after all, intended to terrorize an entire city, no matter who was trying to do it.

There is something to be said for government not frightening the public needlessly. Yet, at the same time, officials have to be careful not to treat the American people like children who have to be kept in the dark as to the deadly and relentless nature of those who still threaten us.

Avoiding a public panic is admirable. But not if it comes at the expense of lulling the public into a false sense of security.

After all, a weapon doesn't have to be terribly sophisticated to destroy property, kill innocents, create havoc and scar a city. Let's not forget that the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks involved nothing more extravagant than terrorists wielding box cutters and jetliners turned into missiles.

In this case, a 1993 Nissan Pathfinder was rigged to blow up in the middle of Times Square. Inside the SUV was an almost primitive but nonetheless lethal arsenal — gasoline, fireworks, alarm clocks, propane tanks, etc. The only apparent reason the bomb didn't go off as planned was that the fuse accidentally set fire to the vehicle's interior. The smoke drew the attention of a street vendor who wisely alerted a police officer.

In short, we got lucky. Again. Just as with the failed Christmas Day bombing of an airliner, what saved the day here was the combination of observant bystanders and quick thinking. We should be grateful for that, and we must continue to be just as watchful in the days and months ahead.

However, what we cannot afford to do — not ever — is to let our guard down by clinging to the naive assumption that the threat we face is so unsophisticated as to be considered all but harmless.

That is not so. And let's hope that we never find out just how faulty that assumption really is. It's the moment that we underestimate our enemies that they are the most dangerous and we the most vulnerable.

REPRINTED FROM THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE.

DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS.COM