Ex D.N.I. Blair: The Hippies Were Right (Again)

By Steve Hynd

A great piece from Noah over at Danger Room:

Ground the U.S. drone war in Pakistan. Rethink the idea of spending billions of dollars to pursue al-Qaida. Forget chasing terrorists in Yemen and Somalia, unless the local governments are willing to join in the hunt.

Those aren�t the words of some human rights activist, or some far-left Congressman. They�re from retired admiral and former Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair � the man who was, until recently, nominally in charge of the entire American effort to find, track, and take out terrorists. Now, he�s calling for that campaign to be reconsidered, and possibly even junked.

Starting with the drone attacks. Yes, they take out some mid-level terrorists, Blair said. But they�re not strategically effective. If the drones stopped flying tomorrow, Blair told the audience at the Aspen Security Forum, �it�s not going to lower the threat to the U.S.� Al-Qaida and its allies have proven �it can sustain its level of resistance to an air-only campaign,� he said.

It�s one of many reasons why it�s a mistake to �have that campaign dominate our overall relations� with countries like Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia. �Because we�re alienating the countries concerned, because we�re treating countries just as places where we go attack groups that threaten us, we are threatening the prospects of long-term reform,� Blair said.

...The reconsideration of our relationship with these countries is only the start of the overhaul Blair has in mind, however. He noted that the U.S. intelligence and homeland security communities are spending about $80 billion a year, outside of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Yet al-Qaida and its affiliates only have about 4,000 members worldwide. That�s $20 million per terrorist per year, Blair pointed out.

�You think � woah, $20 million. Is that proportionate?� he asked. �So I think we need to relook at the strategy to get the money in the right places.�

Blair mentioned that 17 Americans have been killed on U.S. soil by terrorists since 9/11 � 14 of them in the Ft. Hood massacre. Meanwhile, auto accidents, murders and rapes combine have killed an estimated 1.5 million people in the past decade. �What is it that justifies this amount of money on this narrow problem?� he asked.

Blair purposely let his own question go unanswered.

Now that's real talk.