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Terrorism solution proposed

| July 13, 2004 12:00 AM

Editor,

In the July 1 Lake County Leader, my letter took our administration to task about their approach to solving terrorism, and said, in part, "The required limitations in word count in this letter prevent me from writing out my solutions to international terrorism, but I have one worked out…"

I will try to succinctly write this down.

What is terrorism?

How is it born?

What can the world do about cutting off its source of supply -money and recruits?

International terrorism is a movement without borders. Terrorism is born in the hearts and minds of radical extremists with diabolical objectives. The leadership is in the hands of extremist religious ideologues. At the heart of the recruiting process are prevalent economic and psychological realities of hunger, poverty, unemployment, hate, fear, and religious fanaticism.

Fighting terrorism requires an international cooperative effort.

Military invasions of target-nations and regime toppling will not stop terrorism.

We must, as an International Cooperative Coalition of Nations (ICCN) look for a better way. We need to put our resources to better use. We need to gather the best international political, economic, diplomatic and educational minds forming an International Terrorism Elimination Body (ITEB).

We need a special International Terrorist Intelligence Gathering Agency (ITIGA).

We need a strategic International Terrorist Camp Infiltration Operation (ITCIO). We need small international military units trained for immediate follow-up on good intelligence information about terrorist movements and attack plans. We need the ICCN, ITEB, ITIGA and ITCIO all involved in bringing pressure to bear on countries where terrorism is a natural breeding ground (Saudi Arabia, for example). The United States needs to be fully involved in this international effort.

We need this approach to eliminate one of the world's most disruptive and horrible threats, international terrorism.

If we do this, as an international cooperative work, we will find world leaders and their people coming together in what should always be a goal of conquering this common threat, and do it through a well organized campaign which avoids the devastating loss of young American lives. An uncommon enemy requires an uncommon response.

Bob McClellan

Polson