Tackling terrorism: Obama still dithers as the violence escalates

Islamists were responsible for 80 percent of 17,958 deaths from terrorism worldwide in 2013, according to the Global Terrorism Index of the Institute for Economics and Peace, an Australian think tank. Deaths from terrorism have risen 500 percent since 9/?11/?2001, with the major players being the so-called Islamic State in the Middle East, Boko Haram in Africa and al-Qaida.

Islamists kill someone somewhere every five hours, on average, says the Religion of Peace website.

Nearly all terror attacks in the United States since 9/?11 have been committed by “lone wolves,” but this may change. “Sleeper cells” like the one that attacked the French magazine Charlie Hebdo are here, according to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., a former chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee. The Islamic State has sleeper cells in America, said former CIA officer Bob Baer. So does Iran, said a former CIA operative who goes by the name Reza Kahlili.

“Another 9/?11 is imminent unless we act decisively, and quickly,” former U.S. Central Command adviser Ali Khedery warned President Barack Obama in a letter in August.

Nearly two thirds of 48,000 incidents in the Global Terrorism Index happened while Mr. Obama has been president. Terror attacks rose sharply during the insurgency in Iraq, fell after it was crushed by the troop surge, skyrocketed since 2011. Deaths from terrorism jumped 41 percent in 2012, 61 percent in 2013.

The spike coincides with the president’s feckless efforts in the face of radical Islamists, such as his dithering over the civil war in Syria and piddling response to the threat posed by the Islamic State. The terror threat — diminishing when Mr. Obama was elected — is rising faster than the capacity of security agencies to cope with it, some experts fear.

The president’s bizarre refusal to call Islamist terrorists Islamic “is getting a lot of people killed,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. His bungling in Iraq and Syria makes another 9/?11 attack “inevitable,” Sen. Graham said.

If Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan’s Islamist rants hadn’t been ignored, the Fort Hood massacre (which the administration logged as “workplace violence”) wouldn’t have happened.

“Lone wolf” terrorists tend to be immigrants from terror-supporting countries, or converts to Islam with criminal records and/?or histories of mental illness.

The number of Muslims in the United States has more than doubled since 9/?11. Many (like the Boston Marathon bombers) have been admitted without sufficient regard for their willingness to obey our laws.

The Visa Waiver Program, which permits millions to enter the United States with little or no screening, is “America’s Achilles Heel,” Sen. Feinstein said. Lax border security opens another gateway to jihadists. The Border Patrol caught 474 aliens from terror-supporting countries during the last fiscal year.

Intelligence and defense officials told Fox News that nearly a third of detainees released from Gitmo have returned or are suspected of having returned to terrorism, but Mr. Obama plans to release more.

Islamists recruit mostly in mosques, but the president won’t let the FBI routinely surveil them. Agents must get high-level approval.

Many liberals give to Islam a deference they accord no other religion, which is odd, since so many radical adherents commit genocide, torture gays, treat women as chattels.

To defeat an enemy, the first, indispensable step is to know him, said Sun Tzu, after 2,500 years still considered the greatest strategist of all time.

Mr. Obama’s refusal to be more forthright in acknowledging that Islamists are motivated by a (warped) view of their religious duty makes it all but impossible to defeat them, wrote Katharine Gorka of the Council on Global Security. “Until the U.S. begins to acknowledge and address the ideology, we will not be able to challenge (their) ability to recruit, motivate and inspire those who wish to kill us,” she said.

What many liberals fear most after an Islamist atrocity is a “backlash” against “innocent Muslims.”

Atrocities mount, but no major backlash yet in the United States. If there’s another 9/?11, surely there shall be one. But innocent Muslims needn’t worry. The backlash will be against a president, his party and a liberal elite who wouldn’t protect Americans from the guilty ones.

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JWR contributor Jack Kelly, a former Marine and Green Beret, was a deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force in the Reagan administration.