The only thing we have to fear
In an Age of Terror, Safety Is Relative
By GREGG EASTERBROOK
Published: June 27, 2004
WASHINGTON — On the subway a few weeks after the Madrid bombings, I noticed a parcel under a seat. I asked other passengers, but no one claimed the object. I looked inside the parcel and saw some papers and an elaborately wrapped object the size of a grapefruit. The train pulled into Metro Center, the main station of the Washington subway. I contemplated that I might be about to pick up a bomb, but then I'd already been stupid enough to look inside, so I carried out the package, put it on a bench and told the station manager. Officers appeared quickly, though trains continued running and people kept milling past.
When I first saw the package, should I have used the emergency intercom to alert the motorman? Should he have stopped the train and evacuated everyone? When I alerted the manager, should she have closed the station, bringing the entire system to a halt? Had it turned out to be a bomb, pundits second-guessing the disaster that followed might have said the station manager and I were fools for not pushing the panic button. But what if a trainload of frantic people had been evacuated into a dark tunnel with a high-voltage rail, all because of an elaborately wrapped grapefruit?
This is an example of the practical limits to security in the post-9/11 world. With the introduction of sophisticated airport inspections, bomb-screening of checked bags, security stops at building entrances, better passport controls, "smart borders" with improved computers and identity scanners, and hundreds of radiation and bioweapon detectors installed in urban areas, security has significantly improved in just three years. This summer, residents of New York and Boston are seeing lots of extra patrols, bomb-sniffing dogs and police drills, in preparation for the political conventions.
But some of what's being done is primarily psychological: to make people feel more safe, regardless of whether they really are. And though the government must try any reasonable idea to counter terrorism, in the next round of security improvements to come there will be serious limits to practicality and affordability.
