Democracy at War

On September 11, 2001, Al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked four United States civilian passenger airliners crashing two airplanes into the World Trade Center in New York, one airplane into the Pentagon in Washington D.C., and the fourth, initially aiming for the United States Capitol, crashed in a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, leading to the death of nearly three thousand innocent victims. This horrific incident would change America forever. In a desperate attempt to regain stability and order, America had to choose between two of its most revered values: freedom and safety. The following will examine America’s initial response and course of action in retaliation to September 11^th and the consequences that these decisions have on the nation today.

Initially, the tragedy revitalized a strong sense of patriotism that was nourished by a shared pain and sense of solidarity. In addition, this devastating and unforeseen attack shook American’s sense of safety and stability and induced a nation wide feeling of fear.  As a result of this underlying uneasiness and insecurity, Americans resorted to a protective mindset and eagerly endorsed any measures aimed at ensuring national security, even at the expensive of sacrificing other rights. Americans felt they were faced with two options: surrender a few rights now in order to triumph over terrorism and preserve the future establishment of this free country or insist upon maintaining one’s privileges now and risk succumbing to the enemy and ending liberty all together. Thus, the majority of citizens supported the U.S. government’s mass surveillance operation as its principal tactic for harboring national security. In order to target terrorist threats, the government insisted on wire-tapping different communication forums in order to listen into conversations and follow its targets. In http://tjcenter.org/bush-democrats-spar-over-telecom-immunity-provisions-in-surveillance-bill/ President George W. Bush emphasized the importance of government surveillance. Bush urged, "To put it bluntly, if the enemy is calling into America, we really need to know what they’re saying, and we need to know what they’re thinking, and we need to know who they’re talking to". The government administered the power to wiretap phone conversation in order to track and impede terrorist efforts. Fearing that their lives were at stake, Americans compromised their privacy and personal freedoms for the greater good of the nation. Thus, in an effort to prevent further radical fanatic assailments, the government implemented a national surveillance system to watch over the civilians and anticipate acts of violence, enabling police or militia forces to forestall the attack.

Over the past decade, the government has progressively exceeded its boundaries in executing its investigative authority by invading the privacy of innocent citizens, publishing clandestinely attained personal content, and blatantly overlooking the checks and balance system. Originally the surveillance aimed specifically at a concentration of suspected terrorists, however it continually augmented its focus to include an inordinate amount of persons of interest. Many of those enlisted on the government’s watch list results from an incidental association to another suspect (https://www.aclu.org/mapping-fbi-uncovering-abusive-surveillance-and-racial-profiling).  Through this unfounded and groundless enlisting method, many innocent citizens’ private lives are unnecessarily invaded and impeded. In addition, with the surmountable collection of sensitive data, the government can assemble colossal reports about innocent people. Furthermore, according to https://www.aclu.org/national-security/surveillance-privacy, the personal archives that are recorded unbeknownst to the suspect are not imperviously stored, but are published into a database accessible to numerous enterprises. “The data sits indefinitely in government databases, and the names of many innocent Americans end up on bloated and inaccurate watch lists that affect whether we can fly on commercial airlines, whether we can renew our passports…and even whether we can open bank accounts”. These surreptitiously documented personal records are not kept confidential. Rather this often-erroneous information is ineradicably released to various establishments and is encumbering to the victims they subjugate.  While the government readily discloses information gathered regarding civilians’ private interactions, it’s own proceedings are sanctioned as classified.  The Patriot Act vastly expanded the government’s warrant to spy on its own citizens, while simultaneously reducing checks and balances on those powers like judicial oversight, public accountability, and the ability to challenge government searches in court (https://www.aclu.org/time-rein-surveillance-state-0). The Patriot Act has sanctioned espionage to occur covertly, with slight disclosure or regulation of the undercover operation by the courts, congress, or by the public.

After September 11^th, Americans feared for their lives, and as a result they acted hastily forgoing their rights and liberties and passing off responsibility and control to the government. It is easy in retrospect to critique the citizens for so readily abandoning their freedoms, however, the truth of the matter is that while private rights are essential for democracy, they can often be detrimental to war efforts. While war is characterized by the physical enforcement that often demands for national coercion, hasty decisions, and the sacrifice of private needs for the benefit of the nation’s mission, democracy features oral debate, thought out reasoning, free speech and the protection of opposing perspectives.  Thus a nation at war is by nature adverse to free democracy. Therefore the struggle between restricting or allowing liberties during times of war seems to be inherent and insolvable for a democratic nation pursuing combat. Rather than criticizing and condemning the choices made in the aftermath of the September 11^th, a more profitable approach might entail reflecting on the reason for America’s prompt decisions.  Feeling threatened and endangered caused Americans to act rashly in an effort to quickly appease their uneasiness. It is essential for Americans to understand this, so that in future situations where America has the ability to use intimidation as a persuading force, we will remember the undesirable long-term effects of such actions.