A sense of justice has been satisfied, but are we safer?

Exterior shot of the bin Laden compound in Abbotabad, Pakistan.

By Sharon Schmickle
Monday, May 2, 2011
MinnPost

LONDON — President Obama’s stunning announcement that U.S. Special Forces had killed Osama bin Laden leaves open the question of how much this strike at the head of al-Qaida damages the international terrorist organization.

A more basic but critical question is whether we are safer today than we were before the American assault force dropped from helicopters onto a mansion near Islamabad, Pakistan, to kill the world’s most wanted fugitive.

Tom Maertens of Mankato was deputy coordinator for counter-terrorism in the U.S. State Department during the time of the 9/11 attacks. I asked him the question of whether bin Laden’s killing makes us more or less safe.

“I don’t think anybody knows for sure,” Maertens said. “There were threats earlier that if bin Laden was killed there was a plan in place to conduct retaliation against anybody that might have been involved.”

(snip)

"There is little doubt that extremists somewhere — al Qaeda or others — will attempt revenge," said Maertens. "In fact, there were something like eight failed attacks on the U.S. last year that were disrupted by law enforcement/intelligence agency efforts. One day, one of these attacks will succeed and will be portrayed as revenge for Osama bin Laden's death, but Islamic extremists have never really stopped their plotting; it is just that we are now more alert and better prepared."

(snip)

Maertens summed the effects this way: "The event is important in many different ways, including for example, the relief the Saudis must be feeling at Osama bin Laden's demise, perhaps compensation for their bruised feelings at the way we so readily abandoned our ally Mubarak. Power and influence are dependent on many factors. Military forces are one of those factors; the manner and effectiveness in which we use those forces determine how other countries and non-governmental actors view the U.S. We are standing taller in world opinion today than we were yesterday."

(Original here.)