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The US reaction was not smart, but in fairness 9/11 was a big deal because it forced a recalibration of the tail risk from a terrorist attack - a whole bunch of

by czr80 13y ago

The US reaction was not smart, but in fairness 9/11 was a big deal because it forced a recalibration of the tail risk from a terrorist attack - a whole bunch of scenarios (dirty bomb, chem or bio attack) that require complex planning and resources are much easier to believe post-911.

mikeash 13y ago
That strikes me as more of the same overreaction. 9/11 didn't really demonstrate complex planning and resources. It took a bit of cash, not a lot, and 20 people. The scale was big, but it wasn't exactly complex. The main difficulties of the other attacks you mention are obtaining the materials and getting them into the US, and ability at neither was demonstrated by 9/11. The mention of a dirty bomb rather reinforces my point, I think. A dirty bomb isn't much more destructive than a regular bomb. Yet, we consider it to be a vastly greater threat. Why? Because we'd vastly overreact to it. Why? Because we consider it to be a huge threat. And so on in circles.
- czr80 13y ago
  Before 9/11 the idea that terrorists could destroy two skyscrapers by simultaneously coordinating multiple hijackings was ridiculous - a B-movie plot or paranoid fantasy. Today, not so much. What ridiculous fantasy will be true in 10 years time? Again, none of this means that the reactions were smart - but the idea that there needs to be some reaction is not a priori stupid, and to try to characterize it as such weakens your argument (imho).
  - mikeash 13y ago
    The basic scenario wasn't really outlandish. The general idea was featured in a bestselling novel about a decade prior, and an actual real-life terrorist hijacking (thwarted) that same year. And of course the concept of destroying valuable stuff by crashing airplanes into it on purpose dates back much farther. Yes, despite all that it was unexpected. However, I have no sympathy for your "what ridiculous fantasy will be true in 10 years time?" argument. It's a complete non sequitur. There was a failure of imagination before in which terrorists were more capable than we thought, therefore we're doing the same thing now? I would argue that currently the exact opposite is happening. 9/11 seems to be the peak of their capabilities. Now, while we're imagining apocalyptic scenarios in which terrorists destroy entire cities, their actual capabilities seem to be limited to badly-constructed IEDs. The point is that there was precedent for 9/11, even if people didn't realize it. There is no precedent for the sort of vastly worse attack you posit, nor is there any other reason to think that such a thing could be carried out in a way that makes it vastly worse than previous attacks. (The Aum Shinrikyo nerve gas attack does provide precedent for terrorist attacks involving chemical weapons, but it also demonstrates that such attacks aren't really all that severe. Again, they are worse because we react to them more strongly, and we react to them more strongly because they are worse.) I'm not saying that all reaction would be stupid, only that it should be proportional. A normal human body does react to a bee sting, but it does so appropriately, by eliminating the poison and handling foreign substances. Likewise, a sane reaction to 9/11 involving tracking down those responsible and bringing them to justice would have been wise. What's stupid is not any reaction, but a massive overreaction, and then justifying the overreaction by pointing to the massive damage done, when that damage was mostly done by the overreaction.
    - czr80 13y ago
      Let me say that I think we largely agree, and that I'm deeply sympathetic to your immune system analogy. The US over-reacted, badly, and many, many innocent people were killed because of that. And arguably we are all less safe now, precisely because of that over-reaction. I have been extremely critical of that reaction in the past, along much of the same lines you state. I haven't changed my mind on that, but I have also come to realise that it's actually really hard to calibrate risk in this situation - in the case of car accidents or lightning strikes, say, we can forecast expected outcomes very accurately, and the variance of those outcomes is relatively low. The threat model for an intelligent opponent is very different - history is a poor guide and the variance of potential outcomes is very high.

by czr80 13y ago

mikeash 13y ago

That strikes me as more of the same overreaction. 9/11 didn't really demonstrate complex planning and resources. It took a bit of cash, not a lot, and 20 people. The scale was big, but it wasn't exactly complex. The main difficulties of the other attacks you mention are obtaining the materials and getting them into the US, and ability at neither was demonstrated by 9/11. The mention of a dirty bomb rather reinforces my point, I think. A dirty bomb isn't much more destructive than a regular bomb. Yet, we consider it to be a vastly greater threat. Why? Because we'd vastly overreact to it. Why? Because we consider it to be a huge threat. And so on in circles.

czr80 13y ago
Before 9/11 the idea that terrorists could destroy two skyscrapers by simultaneously coordinating multiple hijackings was ridiculous - a B-movie plot or paranoid fantasy. Today, not so much. What ridiculous fantasy will be true in 10 years time? Again, none of this means that the reactions were smart - but the idea that there needs to be some reaction is not a priori stupid, and to try to characterize it as such weakens your argument (imho).
- mikeash 13y ago
  The basic scenario wasn't really outlandish. The general idea was featured in a bestselling novel about a decade prior, and an actual real-life terrorist hijacking (thwarted) that same year. And of course the concept of destroying valuable stuff by crashing airplanes into it on purpose dates back much farther. Yes, despite all that it was unexpected. However, I have no sympathy for your "what ridiculous fantasy will be true in 10 years time?" argument. It's a complete non sequitur. There was a failure of imagination before in which terrorists were more capable than we thought, therefore we're doing the same thing now? I would argue that currently the exact opposite is happening. 9/11 seems to be the peak of their capabilities. Now, while we're imagining apocalyptic scenarios in which terrorists destroy entire cities, their actual capabilities seem to be limited to badly-constructed IEDs. The point is that there was precedent for 9/11, even if people didn't realize it. There is no precedent for the sort of vastly worse attack you posit, nor is there any other reason to think that such a thing could be carried out in a way that makes it vastly worse than previous attacks. (The Aum Shinrikyo nerve gas attack does provide precedent for terrorist attacks involving chemical weapons, but it also demonstrates that such attacks aren't really all that severe. Again, they are worse because we react to them more strongly, and we react to them more strongly because they are worse.) I'm not saying that all reaction would be stupid, only that it should be proportional. A normal human body does react to a bee sting, but it does so appropriately, by eliminating the poison and handling foreign substances. Likewise, a sane reaction to 9/11 involving tracking down those responsible and bringing them to justice would have been wise. What's stupid is not any reaction, but a massive overreaction, and then justifying the overreaction by pointing to the massive damage done, when that damage was mostly done by the overreaction.
  - czr80 13y ago
    Let me say that I think we largely agree, and that I'm deeply sympathetic to your immune system analogy. The US over-reacted, badly, and many, many innocent people were killed because of that. And arguably we are all less safe now, precisely because of that over-reaction. I have been extremely critical of that reaction in the past, along much of the same lines you state. I haven't changed my mind on that, but I have also come to realise that it's actually really hard to calibrate risk in this situation - in the case of car accidents or lightning strikes, say, we can forecast expected outcomes very accurately, and the variance of those outcomes is relatively low. The threat model for an intelligent opponent is very different - history is a poor guide and the variance of potential outcomes is very high.