U.S. security expert says real threat from terrorism, nuclear weapons

The greatest threat to U.S. security isn’t Iraq, according to Terrance Kelly, senior… The greatest threat to U.S. security isn’t Iraq, according to Terrance Kelly, senior researcher for the Pittsburgh office of the RAND Corporation.

“The things that really can affect the vital security policy of the United States belong to [the] nexus between terrorism and weapons of mass destruction,” Kelly told students and faculty Wednesday at his lecture, “American Security Framework and the Iraq War.”

“Terrorism has been changing for about a decade,” Kelly said, but the transformation only became apparent with the events of Sept. 11, 2001.

According to Kelly, conventional acts of terrorism are generally carried out locally and motivated by political and nationalist incentives. Increasingly, terrorist organizations have become borderless global entities with the characteristics of nation-state. These groups, however, pose new problems for diplomats and policy-makers, he said.

“In many cases, you cannot deal with them,” Kelly said.

“The Soviet Union was an existential threat to the United States,” Kelly said, but since its collapse no country has posed a similar threat, including Iraq.

Instead, Kelly said it’s non-state groups like al Qaeda whose possession of weapons of mass destruction would seriously threaten the United States’ future as a democracy.

“There is no doubt that al Qaeda and other terrorist groups will use weapons of mass destruction,” such as nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, Kelly said. “There’s not a reasonable government that believes they won’t.”

According to Kelly, the threats posed by organizations like al Qaeda are exacerbated by the fact that conventional “just war” theory is difficult to apply when a security threat is not a specific nation, but a borderless, non-state actor.

“We can’t look at Iraq in isolation, or even at the Middle East in isolation,” Kelly said. “There’s no black and white solution to this.”

Questioned about the Bush administration’s current steps to address security threats, Kelly emphasized the need to be patient.

“Much of the war is unknowable,” Kelly said, since many of the United States’ operations are covert. He added that from his research and his experience as the former Senior National Security officer for the White House, he believed that the war is justifiable, but not necessarily wise or wisely timed.

However, Kelly added, the effects of the war may not become apparent until after its conclusion.

“It’s possible that four or five years from now we might be stronger for this,” Kelly said. “Be patient. Don’t rush to judgment. Keep an open mind.”