Terrorists’ Political Agenda Revealed

International terrorists learned a valuable lesson in Spain back in March: Elections can be altered if the right amount of force is applied at the right time.

For those who don’t remember this incident, terrorists synchronously detonated 10 bombs that killed nearly 200 train passengers. The government initially blamed the attack on the ETA (a Spain-based terrorist organization known for similar, though smaller, attacks). Many accused the then-current Spanish administration of covering up the real culprit, which turned out to be a multinational organization retaliating against Spain’s support of the war in Iraq.

Jose Maria Aznar, the Spanish prime minister, was heavily favored to win the upcoming election. After the new information and the related accusations became public, popular support raised up the socialist challenger, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, as the new prime minister of Spain. Of note is that one of Zapatero’s primary campaign platforms was the removal of Spanish troops from Iraq.

Enemies of the United States do not want George W. Bush in office. Why? Bush will take any required steps to defend our nation first, then deal with the political fallout later. Kerry, by his own admission of applying a “global test” before doing anything of an international nature, would forestall any action, possibly permanently. And forestalled action is exactly in the best interest of our enemies.

For some months now the CIA and FBI have been warning that al Qaeda has plans to disrupt our elections on November 2nd. The warnings have been very vague. We don’t yet know if WMDs are involved, we don’t know where the terrorists might be looking, we don’t know exactly when an attack might take place, and we don’t know who will be implementing an attack. All we know is that they might be planning an attack. This is similar to what happened shortly before 9/11/2001.

Whether or not an attack successfully takes place, our current administration will face accusations by its liberal Democratic enemies. If no attack takes place, all the rumors and warnings of possible election-time attacks will have been “scaremongering” to drive people to vote for Bush. If an attack does take place, Bush will be at fault for not protecting the American public from terrorists.

The unanswered and most important question is, how would an attack affect undecided voters? I specify “undecided” because those already aligned with a particular candidate would probably take any attack as affirmation of their support. Will an attack make the undecided voters realize the need for sound, strong policies and the ability for quick action, or will voters be convinced that Bush’s policies are the cause of the attacks?

Despite the unknown quantity of the election effect, the possibility of affecting an election has got to weigh heavily upon the minds of terrorists. It is such a drastic way to influence the most powerful nation on earth. The referenced article indicates that the will is there. Let us hope that the ability is not.