Terrorism talk of conference > Speakers bring perspective to Camden audiences

CAMDEN — One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter. “It all depends whose side you are on,” said David E. Long, one of the Sunday speakers at the 10th annual Camden Conference.

The weekend conference drew capacity crowds to the Camden Opera House and Camden Congregational Church.

Long has been working for more than three decades on the worldwide problem of terrorism. It is hard to overstate the problem, since more ambassadors and foreign service officials have been killed in the line of duty as a result of terrorist activities than generals or admirals since the end of World War II.

“Terrorism can never be prevented. We can only manage it,” Long said.

The annual conference opened Friday night with a keynote address by Robert B. Zoellick, who called for continued openness and cooperation by the United States, now that it is the sole superpower.

Zoellick served in the Reagan and Bush administrations and now is the executive vice president of the Federal National Mortgage Assoc., or Fannie Mae, one of the largest lending institutions in the world.

On Sunday Long said the nation continues to struggle with a cohesive anti-terrorism policy. Many successful tactics, including negotiating techniques, have been adopted from the New York City Police Department program of domestic abuse.

Long said development of a national policy is often complicated by false perceptions, such as that terrorism is a characteristic of the Middle East. Terrorism is not limited to the Middle East. There is much more terrorist activity in South America than in the Middle East, he said.

A train explosion in Peru which injured several Americans never made it into the evening news. “If that happened in the Mideast, it would have been front-page news in The New York Times. But Latin American terrorism is not news,” Long said.

Terrorist activity in Sri Lanka has killed more than 30,000 people, but it never makes the front page, he said.

Terrorists are neither demonic nor demented. A terrorist, in order to be successful, must be highly rational and capable of mastering intricate technology, Long said. “We may question their rationale, but most are very moralistic” and feel their cause outweighs damage done to victims, he said.

Normally, terrorists are not poor or downtrodden, but middle class and well educated. Under the right circumstances anyone could become a terrorist. “If everybody in your family was horribly murdered, emasculated, and you knew who did it and you knew that nobody would ever do anything about it, wouldn’t you feel a twinge about wanting to do something?”

Terrorism, while a serious worldwide problem, does not kill thousands of innocent people each year, Long said. “You are more likely to die of snake bite than you are from a terrorist,” he said.

Low-tech, not high-tech, terrorism is more likely to be the major future problem. Long said, “All you have to do is go to the feed store and RadioShack. If you know what you are doing you can blow this opera house up for less than 100 bucks. Anyone with a degree in chemistry and a buddy with a degree in electronics, or even a television repair person, could blow this place up with nitrates and a few devices from RadioShack.”

The roots of many terrorist organizations, ironically, lie in the ardent peace movement of the 1960s, Long said. Americans did not become completely aware of terrorism until the massacre of athletes at the Munich Olympics in 1972. That spurred the Nixon administration to form the first terrorism task force. The U.S. effort is far from perfect, but does a better job than most countries in interagency cooperation, he said.

The World Trade Center bombing followed by the Oklahoma City explosion have killed the popular conception that “it can’t happen here,” Long said. “The task ahead is to try to maintain the attitude that terrorism is all of our problems. We have to work together in all areas in all countries.”

Answering questions, Long denied that the U.S. actively sponsored terrorism through Mafia activities in Cuba or at the School of the Americas in Fort Benning, Ga. The United States operates under a rule of law, and in his 30 years’ experience, Long said, he has been unaware of any premeditated effort to violate the law. He called the activities of Oliver North “questionable.”

One questioner suggested that the bombers of the World Trade Center were trained by the CIA during the war in Afghanistan. The problem in Afghanistan started with poor British policy and the war there played a major part in bringing down the Soviet Union, Long said. “You could argue that the war was a good thing,” he said.

If the United States stopped selling arms in the Middle East, incidents like the World Trade Center bombing would stop, suggested another. Long said, “There are no simple problems and no simple solutions to complex problems.”

On Friday night Zoellick talked of the U.S. role in the new world order. Now that the Cold War has ended, many Americans are perplexed with their role, Zoellick said. As usual, Americans are torn between their rationalism and idealism. “Our task is to find a blend of both,” he said. New economic agreements could be the “glue that holds the world together,” he said.

It is true that the United States cannot solve all of the world’s problems, Zoellick said. But there are few major problems which can be solved without the participation of the United States, he said.

A blend of idealism and realism runs through the nation’s history. Thomas Jefferson was an outspoken supporter of ethics of individuals and states and peace through democratic institutions, but he did not hesitate to purchase neighboring land such as Louisiana to fulfill the nation’s destiny, Zoellick said.

In the modern world, a realist would ask if idealism can still function. Zoellick challenged Americans to develop a new definition of national interest, while avoiding the practice of dividing counties into friends and enemies. Instead, Americans should seek to underline common interests and goals with other countries, he said.

The Soviet Union was a great military power which succeeded in educating vast numbers of scientists and developed huge economies of scale, but failed because it did not adapt to modern times, he said. The United States must adopt a policy of integrating Russia and China into the world economic system, or develop a capable shield against the two powers, if economic programs do not work.

He compared the ascendant power of China to Germany in the last century. That power must be harnessed within the international economy, or the world must face the consequences, he said.

The weekend conference was dedicated to former Maine Sens. Edmund S. Muskie and Margaret Chase Smith.