I affirm todays resolution, that when in conflict, national security concerns ought to

be valued above personal privacy.

The value is morality because ought implies a moral obligation

First, respect for human worth justifies utilitarianism. Cummiskey:

We must not obscure the issue by characterizing this type of case as the sacrifice of individuals for some abstract social entity. It is not a question of some persons
having to bear the cost for some elusive overall social good. Instead, the question is whether some persons must bear the inescapable cost for the sake of other
persons. Robert Nozick, for example, argues that to use a person in this way does not sufficiently respect and take account of the fact that he is a separate person, that
his is the only life he has. But why is this not equally true of all those whom we do not save through our failure to act? By emphasizing solely
the one who must bear the cost if we act, we fail to sufficiently respect and take account of the
many other separate persons, each with only one life, who will bear the cost of our inaction. In such a
situation, what would a conscientious Kantian agent, an agent motivated by the unconditional value of rational beings, choose? A morally good agent recognizes that the
basis of all particular duties is the principle that rational nature exists as an end in itself. Rational nature as such is the supreme objective end of all conduct. If one truly
believes that all rational beings have an equal value, then the rational solution to such a dilemma involves maximally promoting the lives and liberties of as many
rational beings as possible. In order to avoid this conclusion, the non-consequentialist Kantian needs to justify agent-centered constraints. As we saw in chapter 1,
however, even most Kantian deontologists recognize that agent-centered constraints require a non- value-based rationale. But we have seen that Kants normative
theory is based on an unconditionally valuable end. How can a concern for the value of rational beings lead to a refusal to sacrifice rational beings even when this would
prevent other more extensive losses of rational beings? If the moral law is based on the value of rational beings and their ends, then what is the rationale for prohibiting
a moral agent from maximally promoting these two tiers of value? If I sacrifice some for the sake of others, I do not use them arbitrarily, and I do not deny the
unconditional value of rational beings. Persons may have dignity, that is, an unconditional and incomparable worth that
transcends any market value, but persons also have a fundamental equality that
dictates that some must sometimes give way for the sake of others. The concept of the end-in-itself does
not support the view that we may never force another to bear some cost in order to benefit others.

Second, utilitarianism is the only moral theory available to the government, there is
no other option. Goodin:

My larger argument turns on the proposition that there is something special about the situation of public officials that makes utilitarianism more probable for them than
private individuals. Before proceeding with the large argument, I must therefore say what it is that makes it so special about public officials and their situations that
make it both more necessary and more desirable for them to adopt a more credible form of utilitarianism. Consider, first, the argument from necessity. Public
officials are obliged to make their choices under uncertainty, and uncertainty of a very special sort at
that. All choices public and private alike are made under some degree of uncertainty, of course. But in the nature of things, private individuals will usually have more
complete information on the peculiarities of their own circumstances and on the ramifications that alternative possible choices might have for them. Public officials, in
contrast, [they] are relatively poorly informed as to the effects that their choices will
have on individuals, one by one. What they typically do know are generalities: averages
and aggregates. They know what will happen most often to most people as a result of
their various possible choices, but that is all. That is enough to allow[s] public policy-makers to use the
utilitarian calculus assuming they want to use it at all to chose general rules or conduct.


Thus, the criterion is maximizing expected well-being.

Metadata programs collect information about phone calls
and email transactions like who was contacted and for how
long, but dont give the government insight into the actual
content.
Greenwald 13 writes: Glenn Greenwald [Guardian Columnist on Civil Liberties and
US national Security] How the NSA is still harvesting your online data. The Guardian.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/27/nsa-online-metadata-collection June 27, 2013.
DD A review of top-secret NSA documents suggests that the surveillance agency still collects and sifts through large quantities of
Americans' online data despite the Obama administration's insistence that the program that began under Bush ended in 2011.
Shawn Turner, the Obama administration's director of communications for National Intelligence, told the Guardian that "the
internet metadata collection program authorized by the Fisa court was discontinued in 2011 for operational and resource reasons
and has not been restarted." But the documents indicate that [T]he amount of internet metadata
harvested, viewed, processed and overseen by the Special Source Operations (SSO) directorate inside the NSA
is extensive. While there is no reference to any specific program[,] currently collecting
purely domestic internet metadata in bulk, it is clear that the agency collects and analyzes
significant amounts of data from US communications systems[.] in the
course of monitoring foreign targets. Metadata: [is] [t]he envelope of a phone call or
internet communication. For a phone call [T]his could include[s] the duration of
a phone call, the numbers it was between, and when it happened. For an email it would include the sender and
recipient, [and] time, but not the subject or content. In both cases it could include
location information.
Prioritizing digital privacy above national security would
eliminate these programs.
Fuchs 13 writes: Erin Fuchs [Editor for Law Section of Business Insider], ACLU Sues
Government Over 'Dragnet' Surveillance Of Americans. Business Insider.
http://www.businessinsider.com/aclu-sues-over-prism-2013-6 June 11, 2013. DD The American
Civil Liberties Union filed a scathing lawsuit in an effort to stop the federal government's
tracking of American citizens.
The ACLU's suit comes after bombshell reports revealed that the National Security
Agency[s] was obtaining access to systems of Google and other tech giants to read
Americans' emails. The federal government is also collecting data of Verizon Business Service
Network phone users. These practices violate Americans' right to free speech,
association, and privacy[.], the ACLU says. From its complaint: This lawsuit challenges the
governments dragnet acquisition of Plaintiffs telephone records under Section 215 of the
Patriot Act, 50 U.S.C. 1861. In response to information published by the media, the
government has acknowledged that it is relying on Section 215 to collect [M]etadata
about every phone call made or received by residents of the United States. The practice is akin
to snatching every Americans address bookwith annotations detailing whom we spoke to,
when we talked, for how long, and from where. It gives the government a
comprehensive record of our associations and public movements[.],
revealing a wealth of detail about our familial, political, professional, religious, and intimate
associations. The ACLU is asking a court to stop the government's
tracking of Americans and to purge the information it already has.
This fight could eventually make its way to the Supreme Court,
especially since the ACLU is actually a Verizon customer and arguably has "standing" to bring the
suit, The New York Times' Charles Savage reports.
Terrorists mainly operate through the Internet and rely on
digital networks to be effective, so counterterrorism requires
digital action.
Weimann 05 writes: Gabriel Weimann [Former senior fellow at the United States
Institute of Peace and is now Professor of Communication at Haifa University, Israel.] How
Modern Terrorism Uses the Internet. The Journal of International Security Affairs. 2005. DD
Terrorists, for instance, can learn from the Internet a wide variety of details about
targets such as transportation facilities, nuclear power plants, public
buildings, airports, and ports, and even about counterterrorism measures. Dan Verton, in his
book Black Ice: The Invisible Threat of Cyberterrorism (2003), explains that al-Qaeda cells now operate with the assistance of large
databases containing details of potential targets in the U.S. They use the Internet to collect intelligence on those targets, especially
critical economic nodes, and modern software enables them to study structural weaknesses in facilities as well as predict the
cascading failure effect of attacking certain systems. According to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, speaking on January 15,
2003, an al Qaeda training manual recovered in Afghanistan tells its readers, Using public sources openly and without resorting to
illegal means, it is possible to gather at least 80 percent of all information required about the enemy. The website operated by the
Muslim Hackers Club (a group that U.S. security agencies believe aims to develop software tools with which to launch cyberattacks)
has featured links to U.S. sites that purport to disclose sensitive information such as code names and radio frequencies used by the
U.S. Secret Service. The same website offers tutorials in creating and spreading viruses, devising hacking stratagems, sabotaging
networks, and developing codes. It also provides links to other militant Islamic and terrorist web addresses. Specific targets that al
Qaeda-related websites have discussed include the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta; FedWire, the money-
movement clearing system maintained by the Federal Reserve Board; and facilities controlling the flow of information over the
Internet. Like many other Internet users, terrorists have access not only to maps and diagrams of potential targets but also to
imaging data on those same facilities and networks that may reveal counterterrorist activities at a target site. One captured al Qaeda
computer contained engineering and structural features of a dam, which had been downloaded from the Internet and which would
enable al Qaeda engineers and planners to simulate catastrophic failures. In other captured computers, U.S. investigators found
evidence that al Qaeda operators spent time on sites that offer software and programming instructions for the digital switches that
run power, water, transportation, and communications grids. Numerous tools are available to facilitate such data collection,
including search engines, e-mail distribution lists, and chat rooms and discussion groups. Many websites offer their own search tools
for extracting information from databases on their sites. Word searches of online newspapers and journals can likewise generate
information of use to terrorists; some of this information may also be available in the traditional media, but online searching
capabilities allow terrorists to capture it anonymously and with very little effort or expense. Fundraising Like many other political
organizations, terrorist groups use the Internet to raise funds. Al Qaeda, for instance, has always depended heavily on donations,
and its global fundraising network is built upon a foundation of charities, nongovernmental organizations, and other financial
institutions that use websites and Internet-based chat rooms and forums. The Sunni extremist group Hizb al-Tahrir uses an
integrated web of Internet sites, stretching from Europe to Africa, which asks supporters to assist the effort by giving money and
encouraging others to donate to the cause of jihad. Banking information, including the numbers of accounts into which donations
can be deposited, is provided on a site based in Germany. The fighters in the Russian breakaway republic of Chechnya have likewise
used the Internet to publicize the numbers of bank accounts to which sympathizers can contribute. (One of these Chechen bank
accounts is located in Sacramento, California.) The IRAs website contains a page on which visitors can make credit card donations.
Internet user demographics (culled, for instance, from personal information entered in online questionnaires and order forms) allow
terrorists to identify users with sympathy for a particular cause or issue. These individuals are then asked to make donations,
typically through e-mails sent by a front group (i.e., an organization broadly supportive of the terrorists aims but operating publicly
and legally and usually having no direct ties to the terrorist organization). For instance, money benefiting Hamas has been collected
via the website of a Texas-based charity, the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF). The U.S. government seized
the assets of HLF in December 2001 because of its ties to Hamas. The U.S. government has also frozen the assets of three seemingly
legitimate charities that use the Internet to raise money-the Benevolence International Foundation, the Global Relief Foundation,
and the Al-Haramain Foundation-because of evidence that those charities have funneled money to al Qaeda. In another example, in
January 2004, a federal grand jury in Idaho charged a Saudi graduate student with conspiring to help terrorist organizations wage
jihad by using the Internet to raise funds, field recruits, and locate prospective U.S. targets-military and civilian-in the Middle East.
Sami Omar Hussayen, a doctoral candidate in computer science in a University of Idaho program sponsored - ironically - by the
National Security Agency, was accused of creating websites and an e-mail group that disseminated messages from him and two
radical clerics in Saudi Arabia that supported jihad. Recruitment and Mobilization The Internet can be used not only to solicit
donations from sympathizers but also to recruit and mobilize supporters to play a more active role in support of terrorist activities or
causes. In addition to seeking converts by using the full panoply of website technologies (audio, digital video, etc.) to enhance the
presentation of their message, terrorist organizations capture information about the users who browse their websites. Users who
seem most interested in the organizations cause or well suited to carrying out its work are then contacted. Recruiters may also use
more interactive Internet technology to roam online chat rooms and cybercafes, looking for receptive members of the public,
particularly young people. Electronic bulletin boards and user nets (issue-specific chat rooms and bulletins) can also serve as vehicles
for reaching out to potential recruits. Some would-be recruits, it may be noted, use the Internet to advertise themselves to terrorist
organizations. In 1995, as reported by Verton in Black Ice, Ziyad Khalil enrolled as a computer science major at Columbia College in
Missouri. He also became a Muslim activist on the campus, developing links to several radical groups and operating a website that
supported Hamas. Thanks in large part to his Internet activities, he came to the attention of bin Laden and his lieutenants. Khalil
became al Qaedas procurement officer in the United States, arranging purchases of satellite telephones, computers, and other
electronic surveillance technologies and helping bin Laden communicate with his followers and officers. More typically, however,
terrorist organizations go looking for recruits rather than waiting for them to present themselves. The SITE Institute, a Washington,
D.C.-based terrorism research group that monitors al Qaedas Internet communications, has provided chilling details of a high-tech
recruitment drive launched in 2003 to recruit fighters to travel to Iraq and attack U.S. and coalition forces there. Potential recruits
are bombarded with religious decrees and anti-American propaganda, provided with training manuals on how to be a terrorist, and-
as they are led through a maze of secret chat rooms-given specific instructions on how to make the journey to Iraq. In one
particularly graphic exchange in a secret al Qaeda chat room in early September 2003, an unknown Islamic fanatic with the user
name Redemption Is Close, writes, Brothers, how do I go to Iraq for Jihad? Are there any army camps and is there someone who
commands there? Four days later he gets a reply from Merciless Terrorist. Dear Brother, the road is wide open for you-there are
many groups, go look for someone you trust, join him, he will be the protector of the Iraqi regions and with the help of Allah you will
become one of the Mujahidin. Redemption Is Close then presses for more specific information on how he can wage jihad in Iraq.
Merciless Terrorist sends him a propaganda video and instructs him to download software called Pal Talk, which enables users to
speak to each other on the Internet without fear of being monitored. Many terrorist websites stop short of enlisting recruits for
violent action but they do encourage supporters to show their commitment to the cause in other tangible ways. How can I help the
struggle: A few suggestions, runs a heading on the Kahane Lives website; Action alert: What you can do is a feature on the Shining
Paths website. The power of the Internet to mobilize activists is illustrated by the response to the arrest of Abdullah Ocalan, leader
of the Kurdish terrorist group the PKK. When Turkish forces arrested Ocalan, tens of thousands of Kurds around the world
responded with demonstrations within a matter of hours-thanks to sympathetic websites urging supporters to protest. Networking
Many terrorist groups, among them [like] Hamas and al Qaeda, have
undergone a transformation from strictly hierarchical organizations with
designated leaders to affiliations of semi- independent cells[.] that have no single
commanding hierarchy. Through the use of the Internet, these loosely interconnected
groups are able to maintain contact[.] with one another-and with members of other terrorist groups. In
the future, terrorists are increasingly likely to be organized in a more decentralized
manner, with arrays of transnational groups linked by the Internet[.] and communicating and coordinating
horizontally rather than vertically. Several reasons explain why modern communication technologies, especially computer mediated
communications, are so useful for terrorists in establishing and maintaining networks. First, new technologies have greatly reduced
transmission time, enabling dispersed organizational actors to communicate swiftly and to coordinate effectively. Second, new
technologies have significantly reduced the cost of communication. Third, by integrating computing with communications, they have
substantially increased the variety and complexity of the information that can be shared. The Internet connects not only members of
the same terrorist organizations but also members of different groups. For instance, dozens of sites exist that express support for
terrorism conducted in the name of jihad. These sites and related forums permit terrorists in places such as Chechnya, Palestine,
Indonesia, Afghanistan, Turkey, Iraq, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Lebanon to exchange not only ideas and suggestions but also
practical information about how to build bombs, establish terror cells, and carry out attacks. Sharing Information The World Wide
Web is home to dozens of sites that provide information on how to build chemical and explosive weapons. Many of these sites post
The Terrorists Handbook and The Anarchist Cookbook, two well-known manuals that offer detailed instructions on how to construct
a wide range of bombs. Another manual, The Mujahadeen Poisons Handbook, written by Abdel-Aziz in 1996 and published on the
official Hamas website, details in twenty-three pages how to prepare various homemade poisons, poisonous gases, and other deadly
materials for use in terrorist attacks. A much larger manual, nicknamed The Encyclopedia of Jihad and prepared by al Qaeda, runs
to thousands of pages; distributed through the Internet, it offers detailed instructions on how to establish an underground
organization and execute attacks. One al Qaeda laptop found in Afghanistan had been used to make multiple visits to a French site
run by the Socit Anonyme (a self-described fluctuating group of artists and theoreticians who work specifically on the relations
between critical thinking and artistic practices), which offers a two volume Sabotage Handbook with sections on topics such as
planning an assassination and antisurveillance methods. This kind of information is sought out not just by sophisticated terrorist
organizations but also by disaffected individuals prepared to use terrorist tactics to advance their idiosyncratic agendas. In 1999, for
instance, a young man by the name of David Copeland planted nail bombs in three different areas of London: multiracial Brixton, the
largely Bangladeshi community of Brick Lane, and the gay quarter in Soho. Over the course of three weeks, he killed 3 people and
injured 139. At his trial, he revealed that he had learned his deadly techniques from the Internet, downloading The Terrorists
Handbook and ESTONIAESTONIA. Both titles are still easily accessible. A search for the keywords terrorist and handbook on the
Google search engine found nearly four thousand matches that included references to guidebooks and manuals. One site gives
instructions on how to acquire ammonium nitrate, Copelands first choice of explosive material. In Finland in 2002, a brilliant
chemistry student who called himself RC discussed bomb-making techniques with other enthusiasts on a Finnish Internet website
devoted to bombs and explosives. Sometimes he posted queries on topics such as manufacturing nerve gas at home. Often he
traded information with the sites moderator, whose messages carried a picture of his own face superimposed on Osama bin Ladens
body, complete with turban and beard. Then RC set off a bomb that killed seven people, including himself, in a crowded shopping
mall. The website frequented by RC, known as the Home Chemistry Forum, was shut down by its sponsor, a computer magazine. But
a backup copy was immediately posted again on a read-only basis. Planning and Coordination Terrorists use the
Internet not only to learn how to build bombs but also to plan and coordinate specific
attacks. Al Qaeda operatives relied heavily on the Internet in planning and
coordinating the September 11[.] attacks. Thousands of encrypted messages that had been posted in a
password-protected area of a website were found by federal officials on the computer of arrested al Qaeda terrorist Abu Zubaydah,
who reportedly masterminded the September 11 attacks. The first messages found on Zubaydahs computer were dated May 2001
and the last were sent on September 9, 2001. The frequency of the messages was highest in August 2001. To preserve their
anonymity, the al Qaeda terrorists used the Internet in public places and sent messages via public e-mail. Some of the September 11
hijackers communicated using free web-based e-mail accounts. Hamas activists in the Middle East, for example, use chat rooms to
plan operations and operatives exchange e-mail to coordinate actions across Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, and Israel. Instructions
in the form of maps, photographs, directions, and technical details of how to use explosives are often disguised by means of
steganography, which involves hiding messages inside graphic files. Sometimes, however, instructions are delivered concealed in
only the simplest of codes. Mohammed Attas final message to the other eighteen terrorists who carried out the attacks of 9/11 is
reported to have read: The semester begins in three more weeks. Weve obtained 19 confirmations for studies in the faculty of law,
the faculty of urban planning, the faculty of fine arts, and the faculty of engineering. (The reference to the various faculties was
apparently the code for the buildings targeted in the attacks.) Since 9/11, U.S. security agencies have monitored a number of
websites that they believe are linked to al Qaeda and appear to contain elements of cyberplanning (e.g., directions for operatives,
information for supporters and activists, calls for action, threats, and links to other websites): alneda.com, which, until it was closed
down in 2002, is said by U.S. officials to have contained encrypted information to direct al Qaeda members to more secure sites,
featured international news about al Qaeda, and published a variety of articles, books, and fatwas (the latter typically declaring war
on the United States, Christianity, or Judaism); assam.com, which served as a mouthpiece for jihad in Afghanistan, Chechnya, and
Palestine; almuhrajiroun.com, which in the late 1990s and early 2000s urged sympathizers to assassinate Pakistani president Pervez
Musharraf; qassam.net, a site that U.S. officials claim is linked not only to al Qaeda but also to Hamas; jihadunspun.net, which
offered a thirty-six-minute video of Osama bin Laden lecturing, preaching, and making threats; 7hj.7hj.com, which aimed to teach
visitors how to hack into Internet networks and how to infect government and corporate websites with worms and viruses;
aloswa.org, which featured quotations from bin Laden and religious legal rulings justifying the attacks of 9/11 and other assaults on
the West; drasat.com, run (some experts suspect) by a fictional institution called the Islamic Studies and Research Center and
reported to be the most credible of dozens of Islamist sites posting al Qaeda news; and jehad.net, alsaha.com, and islammemo.com,
which are alleged to have posted al Qaeda statements as well as calls for action and directions for operatives.
*This means the aff always has a risk of offense unless the
neg shows a comparative alternative capable of addressing
terrorists networks on the Internet, since terrorists derive
their power to threaten security through Internet
communications.
Further, intelligence is especially important in stopping
terrorists from launching catastrophic attacks.
Karmon 02 writes: Ely Karmon [Senior Research Scholar at the Institute for Counter-
Terrorism at The Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya. Political Science PhD from Haifa University]
The Role of Intelligence in Counter Terrorism. The Korean Journal of Defense Analysis, Vol. XIV,
No. 1, Spring 2002. DD In light of the above threats and trends, what will be the task of the security and intelligence
services, and how can they better cover the large array of terrorist groups and organizations? The threat of large-
scale[,] acts of terror and the potential of nonconventional terrorism will enhance
the need to prevent terrorist schemes and give warning before such acts happen.
In the case of chemical or nuclear terrorism without warning, even the first-
responder teams could be destroyed before they act. In case of biological threat,
the early warning could at least permit the immunization of the endangered population. The existence of small groups and cells of
highly motivated religious extremists, right-wing fanatics, unpredictable esoteric or millenarian cults, which in many senses act
anarchically, means that the work of penetration and infiltration of these groups is highly difficult. Thus, the use of human sources,
or humint, should be expanded and perfected; the counter-terrorism expertise, the cultural knowledge and the language
aptitudes of humint officers should be improved. Penetration of composite, multi-national groups, like the ones formed by Sheikh
Omar Abdel Rahman in the US and Osama bin Laden, as well as cults, such as Aum Shinrikyo or Koresh, presents an especially
formidable challenge. The inconclusive results of the US cruise missile strikes against bin Ladens camps in Afghanistan are only a
fresh example of the importance of good human sources in the heart of terrorist organizations. As migration, illegal immigration and
globalization become part and parcel of the international environment, leaders and militants of terrorist organizations exhibit a
tendency to transfer their activities, mainly logistics and funding, to the developed Western nations. From these countries, they
coordinate terrorist or guerrilla activity against the regime against which they are fighting. For example, the Tamil LTTE has an
extensive infrastructure abroad, as do the Islamist Egyptian, Saudi and Algerian emirs. It is therefore important to monitor the
contacts between the battle areas and the countries serving as base for these activities, mainly Europe and North America. It is
important that intelligence services also cover the so- called gray zones and do not permit the formation of blind spots in the overall
intelligence picture, such as Afghanistan and Somalia. Intelligence holes in such places would permit terrorist groups to find safe
haven there, from which to develop and proliferate to the outside world. Open sources are important in providing context, as well as
warnings. Terrorist organizations have ideological programs, and they need to explain to their sympathizers and the public at large
their goals and targets. In the age of the internet[,] and open media, there is a need for
careful examination and analysis of all their [the terrorists] available
materials. Often, intelligence agencies dealing with terrorism neglect the importance of this kind of information. It is
perhaps the duty of academia and university researchers to deal with and to advance the knowledge of terrorist ideologies,
doctrines and strategies. The internet will increasingly become the place where of
the virtual clandestine activity takes place. For instance, a radical right-wing group, the Thule Netz in Germany, uses sophisticated
ciphering and has many levels of encoding before reaching the highest echelons of their network. The Islamist groups use
the net for funding, recruiting, as well as passing operational information and
orders. One of the problems with which the security services will have to deal will be the encoding of communications
between militants of terrorist cells and groups. The US administration has not succeeded in preventing the proliferation to
clandestine organizations the PGP system of encryption. In this field it is important to invest technological efforts, to develop
cooperation with the private sector and to enhance the cooperation between the technologically advanced countries. As for cyber-
terrorism, a completely new approach is needed from the security and intelligence services, as well as the development of new
doctrines. As regards the proliferation of non-conventional weapons, particularly to the extent that it may touch terrorism and affect
the security of whole countries, the next decade will certainly present the intelligence agencies with the most formidable task.
The challenge in this case is two-fold: on the one hand the necessity of penetrating and monitoring the
activities of the various groups and organizations in their attempts to
acquire or use [WMD.] these weapons. On the other hand, [T]here is a need to
identify, monitor and neutralize the providers of raw materials, technology
and know-how used in the preparation of such weapons. This mission is linked
to the overall task of preventing the proliferation of WMD to rogue states, but in many senses is more intricate. In the fields of
structure, organization and coordination of intelligence and security agencies in those countries threatened by terrorism, there is
much that needs improving and modernizing. The fight against terrorism will require higher national priorities, more human and
financial resources, and better-trained and more cosmopolitan personnel, all of which may be at the expense of the more
conventional military tasks. The vast amount of material that modern means of communication put in
the hands of the terrorist organizations will require that security
services process digital informationoften in a wide variety of languages and sometimes in real
time or very short time. For example, the Chechen militants use some six websites in fifteen languages; while the
Turkish authorities, during the pursuit of Turkish Hizbullah militants last year, found a number of computers and CD-ROMs
containing the names of tens of thousands of activists or sympathizers. This implies the need to train and maintain an important
pool of capable and highly professional intelligence officers. In many Western countries, the law enforcement community is neither
fully exploiting the growing amount of information collected in the course of terrorism investigations, nor distributing that
information effectively to analysts and policymakers. Law enforcement agencies are traditionally reluctant to share information
outside of their circles, so as not to jeopardize any potential prosecution. In some countries laws limit the sharing of law
enforcement information, such as grand jury or criminal wiretap information, with the intelligence community. It is therefore
necessary, within each countrys legal and constitutional limitations, to adapt laws and procedures to the special task of fighting
terrorism. The trend of globalization, the internationalization of terrorist networks, and the existence of sponsor states or
extraterritorial safe havens, could necessitate the intervention of military special forces, including the United Nations, NATO or
European military units, as in Kosovo, the Middle East or Africa. These forces will need more intelligence concerning terrorist or
guerrilla forces and activities. They will have to adapt to the new missions, developing their own intelligence capabilities and
improve the coordination with the civil law enforcement agencies involved in the every day fight against terrorism.
*Thus, frame the solvency debate as a comparison of policy
options that collects the best intelligence, since thats the
optimal way to combat terrorism. If the neg fails to show a
competing alternative, s/he fails to provide intelligence
necessary in preventing the worst cases of terrorism, like
WMD use.
Next, metadata is the only feasible intelligence collection
program capable of
intercepting terrorist threats. All other alts fail.
Thiessen 13 writes: Marc Thiessen [Fellow at American Enterprise Institute; head
speech writer for Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld+, Big Brother isnt Watching You.
Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/marc-thiessen- leaks-not-the-nsa-
programs-deserve-condemnation/2013/06/10/e91d09ac-d1c9-11e2-a73e-
826d299ff459_story.html?hpid=z4 June 10, 2013. DD
Why does the NSA need[s] to collect all that data? One former national security official
explained it to me this way: If you want to connect the dots and stop the next attack, you need to have a
field of dots. That is what the NSA is collecting. But it doesnt dip into that field unless [When] it
comes up with a new dot for example, a new terrorist phone number[,] found
on a cellphone captured in a raid. [i]t will then plug that new dot into the field
of dots to find out which [other] dots are connected to the new
number. If you are not communicating with that terrorist, your dot is not touched. But [T]he NSA
needs to have the entire field of dots so it can unravel the [terrorist]
network[.] connected to that terrorist. In the case of the PRISM program, the NSA is targeting foreign
nationals, not U.S. citizens, and not even individuals in the United States. And all of this collection is being done with a
warrant, issued by a federal judge, under authorities approved by Congress. Moreover, what has been revealed are
the outward-facing authorities of the NSA activities what records the phone and Internet service providers are
required to provide to the government. The leaks do not describe the many inward-facing restrictions directed by
the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to the government that describe the conditions and limitations on when
and how the data can be accessed and how they can used. Lets pray those restrictions are not revealed the
terrorists would love to learn what they are. If the critics dont think the NSA should be collecting this information,
perhaps they would like to explain just how they would have us stop new terrorist attacks. Terrorists dont
have armies or navies we can track with satellites. There are only three
ways we can get information to prevent terroris[m:]t attacks: The first is
interrogation[,] getting the terrorists to tell us their plans. [b]ut thanks to Barack
Obama, we dont do that anymore. The second is penetration, either by
infiltrating agents into al- Qaeda or by recruiting operatives from within the enemys ranks. This [which] is
incredibly hard and it got much harder, thanks to the leak exposing
a double agent, recruited in London by British intelligence, who had penetrated al- Qaeda in the Arabian
Peninsula and helped us break up a new underwear bomb plot in Yemen forcing the extraction of
the agent. That leaves signals intelligence monitoring the enemys phone
calls and Internet communications as our source of intelligence to
stop terrorist plots. Now the same critics who demanded Obama end CIA interrogations are outraged
that he is using signals intelligence to track the terrorists. Well, without interrogations or signals intelligence, how
exactly is he supposed to protect the country? Unfortunately, some on the right are joining the cacophony of
condemnation from the New York Times and MSNBC. The programs exposed in these leaks did not begin on Barack
Obamas watch. When Obama continues a Bush- era counterterrorism policy, it is not an outrage it is a victory. And
when those programs are exposed by leaks, it is not whistleblowing its a felony.
*Thus, even if there are flaws with metadata collection, its
the only possible method of getting information about
terrorist organizations, as interrogation and infiltration are
currently untenable. Thus, even if affirming isnt perfect, its
always comparatively better since a lack of intelligence in
the neg world makes counterterrorism a shot in the dark.
Further, metadata allows the government to predict future
attacks, gaining information on suspects without even
monitoring the content of their information.
Hines 13 writes: Pierre Hines *Defense Council Member+, Heres How Metadata on
Billions of Phone Calls Predicts terrorist Attacks. Truman National Security Project.
http://trumanproject.org/doctrine-blog/heres-how-metadata-on-billions-of-phone-calls-
predicts-terrorist-attacks/ June 19, 2013. DD
Yesterday, when NSA Director General Keith Alexander testified before the House Committee on Intelligence, he declared that the
NSAs surveillance programs have provided critical leads to help prevent over 50 potential terrorist events. FBI Deputy Director
Sean Boyce elaborated by describing four instances when the NSAs surveillance programs have had an impact: (1) when an
intercepted email from a terrorist in Pakistan led to foiling a plan to bomb of the New York subway system; (2) when NSAs programs
helped prevent a plot to bomb the New York Stock Exchange; (3) when intelligence led to the arrest of a U.S. citizen who planned to
bomb the Danish Newspaper office that published cartoon depictions of the Prophet Muhammad; and (4) when the NSAs programs
triggered reopening the 9/11 investigation. So what are the practical applications of internet and phone records gathered from two
NSA programs? And how can metadata actually prevent terrorist attacks? Metadata does not give the NSA and intelligence
community access to the content of internet and phone communications. Instead, metadata is more like the transactional
information cell phone customers would normally see on their billing statementsmetadata can indicate when a call, email, or
online chat began and how long the communication lasted. Section 215 of the Patriot Act provides the legal authority to obtain
business records from phone companies. Meanwhile, the NSA uses Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to
authorize its PRISM program. AccordingtothefiguresprovidedbyGen.Alexander,
[Metadata]intelligencegatheredbasedonSection702authority contributedinover 90% of
the 50 [terrorism] cases. One of major benefits of metadata is that it provides hindsightit gives intelligence
analysts a retrospective view of a sequence of events. As Deputy Director Boyce discussed, the ability to analyze previous
communications allowed the FBI to reopen the 9/11 investigation and determine who was linked to that attack. It is important to
recognize that terrorist attacks are not orchestrated overnight; they take months or years to plan. Therefore, [I]f the
intelligence community only catches wind of an attack halfway into the
terrorists planning[,] cycle, or even after a terrorist attack has taken place, metadata might be
the source of information that captures the sequence of events leading
up to an attack. Once a terrorist suspect has been identified[,] or once an attack
has taken place, intelligence analysts can use powerful software to sift[s] through metadata
to determine which numbers, IP addresses, or individuals are
associated with [him] the suspect. Moreover, phone numbers and IP addresses sometimes serve as a proxy for
[and] the general location of where the planning[.] has taken place. This ability to narrow
down the location of terrorists can help determine whether the intelligence community is dealing with a domestic or international
threat. Even more useful than hindsight is a crystal ball that gives the intelligence community a look into the future. Simply knowing
how many individuals are in a chat room, how many individuals have contacted a particular phone user, or how many individuals are
on an email chain could serve as an indicator of how many terrorists are involved in a plot. Furthermore, knowing when a suspect
communicates can help identify his patterns of behavior. For instance, [M]etadata can help establish
whether a suspect communicates sporadically or on a set pattern[.] (e.g., making a
call every Saturday at 2 p.m.). Any deviation from that pattern could indicate that
the plan changed at a certain point; any phone number or email address used consistently and then not at all could indicate that a
suspect has stopped communicating with an associate. Additionally, a [A] rapid increase in
communication could indicate that an attack is about to happen.
Metadata can provide all of this information without ever exposing the
content of a phone call or email. If the metadata reveals the suspect is engaged in terrorist activities, then
obtaining a warrant would allow intelligence officials to actually monitor the content of the suspects communication. In Gen.
Alexanders words, These programs have protected our country and allies . . . *t+hese programs have been approved by the
administration, Congress, and the courts. Now, Americans will have to decide whether they agree. principal only
*This has several implications:
*First: solvency deficits about terrorists using encryption are
non-responsive, since metadata doesnt need the content of
communications in order to effectively gain intelligence. It
just needs to see basic patterns of communication.
*Second: I outweigh all alts on timeframe. Metadata is the
only way to identify disruptions in digital activity and gain
intelligence on imminent terrorist attacks. Timeframe is the
strongest determinant of probability, since it means theres
little time for external variables to mess up the prediction.
*Third: this takes out negs about privacys importance.
Theres no government abuse since most of the time we
dont even expose the content of phone calls or emails.
Next, metadata empirically disrupts terrorism plots.
Ratnam 13 writes: Gopal Ratnam *Bloomberg Reporter+, NSAs Alexander Says Secret
Programs Stopped Terror Plots. Bloomberg News. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-
27/nsa-s-alexander-says-secret-programs-stopped-terror-plots.html June 27, 2013. DD Two
secret U.S. programs used to track telephone calls and monitor Internet use, which were exposed by Edward
Snowden, helped stop terror plots around the world, the head of the National Security Agency
said. The agency provided Congress with 54 cases in which these [surveillance]
programs helped disrupt terror plots[.] in the U.S. and throughout the world, Army
General Keith Alexander said today at a conference in Baltimore. Action to stop potential attacks involved other U.S.
agencies, such as the Central Intelligence Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Pentagon and the
Department of Homeland Security, he said. Defending the surveillance programs that Snowden revealed to
newspapers, Alexander provided a regional breakdown, saying 25 terrorist plans had been disrupted in Europe, 11 in
Asia and five in Africa. Forty-two instances involved what Alexander called disruptive plots, and 12 were related to
supporting terrorism. Arrests were made in 50 cases, Alexander said. Snowden, 30, a former employee of Booz Allen
Hamilton Holding Corp. (BAH), provided the Guardian and the Washington Post details of U.S. surveillance programs
that involved collecting data on calls from U.S. phone companies and monitoring Internet activity involving foreigners
believed to be located outside the U.S. and plotting terrorist attacks. Snowden, who fled the U.S. to Hong Kong on
May 20, is at a Moscow airport, according to Russian officials, and has been seeking asylum in Ecuador or another
country. In 12 of 54 cases Alexander cited, he said the collection of phone data aided the FBI. In 53 of 54
cases, collecting Internet data provided the initial tip,[.] he said. Alexander
spoke at a conference organized by AFCEA International, a Fairfax, Virginia-based trade group whose members
include information technology companies and government contractors. The leaks have damaged the ability to collect
information on terror groups, Alexander said, without providing details. Every time a capability is revealed we lose
our ability to track targets, he said.
An overwhelming majority of defense and foreign policy
experts outside the NSA also agree that surveillance is an
effective and necessary counterterrorism tool.
Sorcher 13 writes: Sara Sorcher [National Security Staff Writer for National Journal],
Insiders: NSA's Communications Surveillance Good Way to Target Terrorists. National Journal.
[Methodology: survey of 100 defense and foreign policy experts]
http://www.nationaljournal.com/nationalsecurity/insiders-nsa-s-communications-surveillance-
good-way-to-target-terrorists- 20130624 June 24, 2013. DD
The National Security Agency's [NSAs] surveillance programs are effective
tools for seeking out terrorists, according to 85.5 percent of National
Journal's National Security Insiders." In the digital age, when every
individual's digital trail increases year by year, there is no faster way
to draw a picture of a network, or a conspiracy, than by piecing together
different data streams,[.]" one Insider said. "This capability, in years to come, won't
be a nice-to-have; it'll be critical." Another Insider said that the NSA must have the tools
necessary to root out terrorists or another 9/11 becomes not just possible, but certain. "If we
eliminate the online- and phone- surveillance programs and a dirty bomb explodes in an
American city, we have only ourselves to blame," the Insider said. "The days of gentlemen not
reading other gentlemen's mail are over." And the problem of needles in a
haystack isnt applicable to terrorism surveillance, since its
possible to use metadata as a starting point for narrowing
down searches.
Bialik 13 writes: Carl Bialik [Senior Special Writer for The Wall Street Journal], Ethics
Aside, Is NSA's Spy Tool Efficient? The Wall Street Journal.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324049504578543542258054884.html June
14, 2013. DD Others, though, noted a key difference between terrorism and, say, a needle in a
haystack: Terrorists tend to talk to each other in a way that needles [in a
haystack] don't. So [B]y analyzing a network of communications, the
NSA could be ferreting out clues[.] from more than just the messages' particulars.
Some [S]tatisticians suggested the NSA likely also is combin[es]ing other
evidence and signals with monitored communications to refine its hunt.
"There is some [P]rior information about who is a terrorist or where he or she
is coming from that they could [is] use[d] to increase their chances[.]," said
Christopher H. Schmid, a biostatistician at Brown University's Center for Evidence- Based
Medicine. "You start out with little idea what is going on, but by gathering more information you
can refine your diagnosis." Tom Wallace, an analyst at the Center for Advanced Defense Studies,
a Washington, D.C., think tank, offered hypothetical numbers to illustrate how even a one-in-
10,000 finding could be helpful. "An analyst's knowledge of the region or field being studied
could immediately narrow it down to 5,000," he said. Imagery analysis and a tip from an ally
could bring it down to, say, 500. "Obviously all these numbers are made up, but hopefully they
illustrate how statistical analysis is one element of the tool kit, not a magic wand," Mr. Wallace
said.
Privacy regulations like probable cause warrants on
surveillance seriously reduce effectiveness and increase the
risk of terrorism.
Breglio 03 writes: Nola Breglio [Yale Law], Leaving FISA behind: The Need to Return to
Warrantless Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance. The Yale Law Journal. 2003. DD The USA PATRIOT Act amendments were aimed in part at
significantly expanding the government's capacity to effectively investigate and prosecute terrorists under FISA.'38
But in attempting to strengthen FISA, Congress instead transformed it into a slightly watered-down version of Title III
that is, frankly, a conceptual mess. FISA allows warrants to be granted in a hermetically sealed, secret context with a
reduced standard of probable cause.139 At the same time, despite the government's perfect record, obtaining a FISA
warrant is not a piece of cake, largely because of the rigorous process of review that FISA applications are subjected
to by DOJ officials.140 Once obtained, FISA warrants can now be used primarily for criminal investigations, as long as
a token amount of intelligence surveillance also takes place. The criminal investigations that result can be nearly as
sophisticated as those authorized under Title III.141 The FISA system that we now have is at the same time too strict
and too relaxed. The FISC's secret procedures and altered constitutional standards no longer appear legitimate in light
of the avowedly criminal investigations that agents will pursue with FISA warrants. Perhaps if the amended FISA
provided extraordinarily effective and rapid ways to crack down on terrorism, we might be more willing to accept its
dubious Fourth Amendment constitutionality. But as it stands, many of the pre-USA PATRIOT Act bureaucratic
obstacles remain. Since the Supreme Court has declined to consider the FISA Court of Review decision, at least for the
time being,'42 an institutional response to this constitutional dilemma should be developed. The best course of
action, which the Court of Review hinted at near the end of its opinion, is to abandon FISA entirely and return to the
days when foreign intelligence surveillance was conducted without warrants and simply subjected to general Fourth
Amendment reasonableness principles. This, after all, was the practice America followed for the first fifty years that
surveillance technology existed. A. Case or Controversy? At the outset of the discussion of how to reconceptualize
foreign intelligence surveillance, it is important to note the fundamental differences between surveillance and
garden-variety search and seizure. While search warrants are ordinarily procured after
a crime has been committed, surveillance is intended to intercept
and prevent crimes while they are in the planning (or even preplanning) stages.
Search warrants are initially ex parte, but ultimately discoverable once executed; not so for [S]urveillance
orders, which by their very nature must be kept concealed until
surveillance has ceased.143 The special nature of surveillance is relevant to the debate over the
propriety of the USA PATRIOT Act amendments in general: By breaking down the wall between intelligence and
criminal investigations, Congress conflated two very different processes that arguably should retain their own
procedures. But the dichotomy between surveillance and searches has greater implications. As Professor Telford
Taylor has argued, perhaps surveillance applications should never be considered in any sort of Article III courts, as
they are nonadversary steps in the investigative process, inappropriate for judicial disposition. According to this
argument, since no case or controversy exists at this stage, courts have no business passing on the legitimacy of
surveillance operations until a genuine adversarial dispute is at hand. Taylor suggests that until that point, "[t]he
authorization of the judge.., is not an effective screen, and may serve as window-dressing, to relieve the law
enforcement official of responsibility for a decision which should be his to make."'44 Under this view, both FISA and
Title III warrant procedures are illegitimate assertions of the judicial power in a permanently nonadversarial context.
They bury accountability for improper investigations in judicial mystique, which is unconstitutionally applied in the
surveillance context when no case or controversy has yet arisen. This is especially true in the FISA setting, where the
entire process takes place in secret, and the probable cause standard is greatly attenuated. The solution, Taylor
suggests, is to assign scrutiny of and accountability for surveillance operations primarily to the executive branch-"to
concentrate rather than to diffuse responsibility."'45 This of course was the policy the nation followed before Katz,
Keith, and Title III transformed the national surveillance landscape. And in the wake of Keith, before FISA was
enacted, it appeared that the courts would have no choice but to formulate a workable regime of warrantless foreign
intelligence surveillance. The Fourth Circuit took the first stab by articulating the Truong primary purpose test to
attempt to confine warrantless investigations to the intelligence context. The D.C. Circuit focused on a way to police
abuse of executive discretion. In United States v. Ehrlichman, a case that concerned the criminal liability of those who
orchestrated the Watergate break-ins, the court warned: "The danger of leaving delicate decisions of propriety and
probable cause to those actually assigned to ferret out 'national security' information is patent, and is indeed
illustrated by the intrusion undertaken in this case ....,146 For a regime featuring national security surveillance
authorized by the executive branch to be constitutionally acceptable, the Ehrlichman court counseled: "[T]he
personal authorization of the President-or his alter ego for these matters, the Attorney General-is necessary to fix
accountability and centralize responsibility for insuring the least intrusive surveillance necessary and preventing
zealous officials from misusing the President's prerogative."'47 As we have seen, however, instead of adopting the
procedure the Ehrlichman court recommended, Congress took action on its own and passed FISA. In so doing,
Congress may have neglected to consider the inappropriateness-and possible unconstitutionality-of judicial
intervention at the surveillance stage. In addition to these constitutional concerns, some have argued that the
surveillance mechanism is poorly suited to the warrant framework. Professor Akhil Amar has pointed out yet another
fundamental difference between searches and surveillance: Search warrants are executed in order to
find specific evidence of criminal activity. Surveillance casts a broad
net[.] that often yields information that is much more mundane-information that is often voluntarily, if
unknowingly, provided by targets.148 This is the very same distinction that the Supreme Court made in Olmstead v.
United States, when it distinguished wiretapping from forcible search and seizure. 49 Thus it is possible that the Court
got it right the first time it considered the issue of electronic surveillance, in Olmstead. The unique
nature of surveillance, as a nonadversarial element of an investigation, may make it
inappropriate for the judicial setting in the first place. As we have seen, FISA is
in a state of conceptual and constitutional confusion; the statute is sorely in need of reform. In response to this need,
several alternative regimes for foreign intelligence surveillance begin to take shape.
The impact to terrorism is mass death and destruction.
Wilkinson and Hartwig 10 write:
Despite the differing viewpoints, the overall consensus appears to be that terrorism
risk is an ongoing[,] and in some cases growing threat. Here are some of the most recent
projections and predictions on the terrorism threat: Transit System Threat[s]: Following the March 29, 2010
[like] attacks by suicide bombers on the Moscow subway that killed
39 people[.], New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced that the New York City Police Department (NYPD) has
stepped up its patrol of the subways. We will learn from the terrible tragedy in Moscow, and we will continue to do everything
possible to protect our transit system and our entire city from the threat of terrorism, Bloomberg said. Cyber Terrorism: FBI
director Robert Mueller says [T]he threat of cyber terrorism is real and rapidly expanding and warns
that militant groups, foreign states and criminal organizations pose[s] a growing threat to U.S.
security as they [terrorists] target government and private computer
networks.3 Speaking at an Internet security conference in March 2010, Mueller said militant groups like al Qaeda had
primarily used the Internet to recruit members and plan attacks, but they have shown a clear interest in combining physical attacks
with cyber attacks. Muellers comments follow a number of recent international Internet security incidents including an attack in
January 2010 on computer networks at Google and around 30 other U.S. corporations that is believed to have originated in China.
Maritime Threat: On March 3, 2010, the Singapore navy warns that a terrorist group may be planning attacks on oil tankers in the
Strait of Malacca, one of the worlds busiest shipping lanes. An advisory issued by the Singapore navy Information Fusion Centre
(IFC) recommends that ships should strengthen their on-board security measures and adopt community reporting to increase
awareness and strengthen the safety of all seafarers. Country Risk: A global ranking of 196 countries by risk analyst Maplecroft
published in February 2010 rates Iraq as the country most at risk for terrorist attacks for the second year running, followed by
Afghanistan, Pakistan and Somalia. Other extreme risk nations are Lebanon, India, Algeria, Colombia and Thailand. Economic
Threat: The World Economic Forum Global Risk Report 2010 reports that international terrorists continue to mount sizeable attacks,
causing significant economic and human losses. Drivers of increasing risk include: instability on the Indian sub-continent, particularly
Indo-Pakistani relations but also indigenous movements such as Naxalites; the level of political radicalization from the economic
crisis; weak governance in parts of Africa provides alternative retreat positions to Afghanistan and Pakistan. Weapons of Mass
Destruction (WMD): James Jones, White House national security adviser, tells USA Today4 : Of all the things that could be the
nightmare scenario, whats [T]he biggest nightmare scenario [is]? Thirty years ago, one of my
predecessors would have said nuclear war with Russia. Today, as Im in this chair, I can tell you its proliferation, the
acquisition of [WMD] a weapon of mass destruction by a terrorist organization.
Regional Terrorism Threat: Aons 2009 Terrorism Threat Map shows a more settled outlook for North America, Europe and Australia
and attributes this to better counter-terrorism capability. However, it warns that the global recession could lead to a new generation
of terrorists emerging from disaffected communities in a re-emergence of class-based politics. With the election of a more liberal
President in the United States, uplift in activity from domestic far right and militia groups is possible, according to Aon. The map also
shows a trend towards fewer terrorist attacks in the Middle East but increased activity in Pakistan, India and Afghanistan, with
Thailand and Nepal showing higher levels of activity. Insured Loss Estimates: In July 2008, risk modeling firm Risk Management
Solutions (RMS), put potential insured losses from a terrorist attack in the
[US] United States at $1.6 billion, an increase of 8 percent on the previous year. RMS says terrorism targets are
more likely to be in the commercial or private sector, such as sports stadiums, now that governments counter-terrorism efforts
have been stepped up.
Terrorist attacks risk escalating into nuclear war with nations
like Russia and China and extinction.
Ayson 10 writes: Robert Ayson, Professor of Strategic Studies and Director of the
Centre for Strategic Studies: New Zealand at the Victoria University of Wellington, 2010 (After a
Terrorist Nuclear Attack: Envisaging Catalytic Effects, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, Volume
33, Issue 7, July But these two nuclear worldsa non-state actor nuclear attack and a
catastrophic interstate nuclear exchangeare not necessarily separable. It is just possible that
some sort of terrorist attack, and especially an act of nuclear terrorism, could
precipitate a chain of events leading to a massive exchange of
nuclear weapons between two or more of the states that possess them. In this context,
todays and tomorrows terrorist groups might assume the place allotted during the early Cold
War years to new state possessors of small nuclear arsenals who were seen as raising the risks
of a catalytic nuclear war between the superpowers started by third parties. These risks were
considered in the late 1950s and early 1960s as concerns grew about nuclear proliferation, the
so-called n+1 problem It may require a considerable amount of imagination to depict an
especially plausible situation where an act of nuclear terrorism could lead to such a massive
inter-state nuclear war. For example, in the event of a terrorist nuclear attack on the United
States, it might well be wondered just how Russia and/or China could plausibly be brought into
the picture, not least because they seem unlikely to be fingered as the most obvious state
sponsors or encouragers of terrorist groups. They would seem far too responsible to be involved
in supporting that sort of terrorist behavior that could just as easily threaten them as well. Some
possibilities, however remote, do suggest themselves. For example, how might the United
States react if it was thought or discovered that the fissile material used in the act of nuclear
terrorism had come from Russian stocks,40 and if for some reason Moscow denied any
responsibility for nuclear laxity? The correct attribution of that nuclear material to a particular
country might not be a case of science fiction given the observation by Michael May et al. that
while the debris resulting from a nuclear explosion would be spread over a wide area in tiny
fragments, its radioactivity makes it detectable, identifiable and collectable, and a wealth of
information can be obtained from its analysis: the efficiency of the explosion, the materials used
and, most important ... some indication of where the nuclear material came
from.41Alternatively, if the act of nuclear terrorism came as a complete surprise, and American
officials refused to believe that a terrorist group was fully responsible (or responsible at all)
[S]uspicion would shift immediately to state possessors. Ruling out
Western ally countries like the United Kingdom and France, and probably Israel and India as
well, authorities in Washington would be left with a very short list consisting of North Korea,
perhaps Iran if its program continues, and possibly Pakistan. But at what stage would Russia and
China be definitely ruled out in this high stakes game of nuclear Cluedo?In particular, [I]f the
act of nuclear terrorism occurred against a backdrop of existing
tension in Washingtons relations with Russia and/or China, and at a
time when threats had already been traded between these major
powers, would officials and political leaders not be tempted to
assume the worst? Of course, the chances of this occurring would only seem to increase
if the United States was already involved in some sort of limited armed conflict with Russia
and/or China, or if they were confronting each other from a distance in a proxy war, as unlikely
as these developments may seem at the present time. The reverse might well apply too: should
a nuclear terrorist attack occur in Russia or China during a period of heightened tension or even
limited conflict with the United States, could Moscow and Beijing resist the pressures that might
rise domestically to consider the United States as a possible perpetrator or encourager of the
attack? Washingtons early response to a terrorist nuclear attack on its
own soil might also raise the possibility of an unwanted (and nuclear aided)
confrontation with Russia and/or China. For example, in the noise and
confusion during the immediate aftermath of the terrorist nuclear attack, the
U.S. president might be expected to place the countrys armed forces, including its nuclear
arsenal, on a higher stage of alert. In such a tense environment, when careful planning runs up
against the friction of reality, it is just possible that Moscow and/or China might mistakenly read
this as a sign of U.S. intentions to use force (and possibly nuclear force) against them. In that
situation, the temptations to preempt such actions might grow, although it must be admitted
that any preemption would probably still meet with a devastating response.As part of its initial
response to the act of nuclear terrorism (as discussed earlier) Washington might decide to order
a significant conventional (or nuclear) retaliatory or disarming attack against the leadership of
the terrorist group and/or states seen to support that group. Depending on the identity and
especially the location of these targets, Russia and/or China might interpret such action as being
far too close for their comfort, and potentially as an infringement on their spheres of influence
and even on their sovereignty. One far- fetched but perhaps not impossible scenario might stem
from a judgment in Washington that some of the main aiders and abetters of the terrorist action
resided somewhere such as Chechnya, perhaps in connection with what Allison claims is the
Chechen insurgents ... long-standing interest in all things nuclear.42 American pressure on
that part of the world would almost certainly raise alarms in Moscow that might require a
degree of advanced consultation from Washington that the latter found itself unable or
unwilling to provide. There is also the question of how other nuclear-armed states
respond to the act of nuclear terrorism[.] on another member of that special club. It
could reasonably be expected that following a nuclear terrorist attack on the United States, both
Russia and China would extend immediate sympathy and support to Washington and would
work alongside the United States in the Security Council. But there is just a chance, albeit a slim
one, where the support of Russia and/or China is less automatic in some cases than in others.
For example, what would happen if the United States wished to discuss its right to retaliate
against groups based in their territory? If, for some reason, Washington found the responses of
Russia and China deeply underwhelming, (neither for us or against us) might it also suspect
that they secretly were in cahoots with the group, increasing (again perhaps ever so slightly) the
chances of a major exchange.