To the Editor:
Re “Year of Plots: A 2nd Prism” (news analysis, front page, Jan. 13):
Far from having “more fervor than skill,” someone in the terrorists’ hierarchy had enough skill to ensure that their designated terrorist spread terror—and that the “riveting message for Americans: Be afraid” was widely and frequently broadcast.
I do not think that the Qaeda sponsors of the accused underwear bomber cared how incompetent he was. All he needed to do to accomplish their goal was to make at least an attempt to set off a bomb to ensure a large amount of publicity. Their goal—part of a program to wear us down, mentally and financially—was simply to panic us enough to get us spending more and more time and money on ever greater security measures at home and military ventures abroad.
At this they have certainly succeeded. As recent history shows, creating chaos and expense for us at home advances the cause of Al Qaeda as much as or more than any military success it might have on its home ground.
Underwear bombs are another of the simple and inexpensive devices (box-cutters and improvised explosive devices among them) through which Muslim extremists are waging, and maybe winning, their war against us “infidels.”
Donald MacDonald
Sydney, Nova Scotia, Jan. 13, 2010
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 