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| Updated: 18-Mar-2005 | NATO Speeches |
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NATO HQ 12 Jan. 2004 |
The impact of September 11th on the Alliance Video
Lecture with Jamie Shea,
Ladies and gentlemen good afternoon. This is Jamie the NATO spokesman speaking to you once again from NATO Headquarters; today in a slightly different setting of the Ismay TV studio but it's still the same pleasure that I have to deliver this lecture on current NATO issues. I hope you've been following the first two on NATO partnership and the NATO's role in Balkans. And today the topic is going to be NATO's role in dealing with what is obviously the most publicized challenge of the 21st century which is international terrorism. Now everybody of course remembers September the11th... I remember it particularly well because it also happens to be my birthday. It wasn't that long ago either. Now let's not forget that September the 11th isn't the first of terrorism. Terrorism has been around almost as long as humanity itself and suicide bombers go right back or suicide attackers go right back to the first years after the death of Christ. And we all remember the assassins operating in Babylon between the 11 and the 13th centuries. But what is new about the terrorism that we saw on September the 11th is first of all the international scope. Al-Qaeda is an organization which we know has had cells in 65 different countries of the world. September the 11th was financed in Asia, organized in Europe and carried out in the United States. And this global reach of a single organization is something that was never known before in the long convoluted history of terrorism. The second aspect of course is the sophistication of these movements which are now able to use e-mail; they're able to use computers, cyber hacking... they're able to send large sums of money around to finance their operations at a moment's notice. And they have recruits on a scale which is also unprecedented. We calculate that even though about 3,000 al-Qaeda operatives are being detained or arrested since September the 11th, there could be anywhere between 20 or 30,000 still at large in the world. And that too is something which is wholy new. At the same time what is new too is the vulnerability of our societies. A few centuries ago when most of us lived in small groups, in villages away form large towns; the impact of terrorist attacks was comparatively minor. But today with our Internet integrated high-tech societies, urbanized in which we we're all dependent on the same vital functions. For example: electricity, water, telecommunications, air transport and in which every act is instantly mediatized. The impacts of a terrorist attack is potentially global and could have repercussion on the economy, on our safety, on our ability to move around that can percolate for years afterwards as we saw too on September the 11th. So there's no doubt that NATO has no choice but to respond to this type of challenge. Now NATO did immediately after September the 11th for the first time in its history invoke the Article 5, our mutual defence clause. Something of an irony that it was invoked for an attack against America or an American territory and not because of an attack by the Soviet Union against Western Europe which was always a paradigm of the Cold War years and therefore as a result Europe was to go to the help of the United States and not the other way around. Now NATO has taken some criticism for what happened after we invoked Article 5. Many people argued that we offered the United States help and the United States didn't want it or that Article 5 became simply a political symbol because no military action followed. I think that particularly with hindsight these criticisms are a little bit unfair. For instance the United States did ask NATO for help. In fact particular things such as use of bases, exchange of intelligence, overflight rights and the deployments of NATO's AWACS air patrol aircraft to the United States and all of those things that you would imagine were granted by the North Atlantic Council more or less immediately. The second thing of course is the invocation of Article 5 did show that NATO was willing to interpret Article 5 in a way that was not probably in the minds of the founding fathers. That is to say that it could be in response to a terrorist action and not necessarily in response to a major tank thrust or a major land grab against an Alliance member state. And the fact that NATO was ready to respond in Afghanistan well beyond the traditional NATO perimeter was also I think something which was overlooked at the time because it was rather revolutionary in its range. Now since September the 11th, NATO began to get to grips with what it can do to contribute to the international effort if not to eradicate that perhaps is unrealistic but at least contain and reduce terrorism. The first thing is in the field of military activities. Let me just mention too the first one is a task force called Active Endeavour which we have deployed since October 2001 in the Mediterranean and which is currently engaged in monitoring shipping to ensure that terrorists cannot use shipping in order to export weapons of mass destruction or infiltrate terrorists into the Alliance area. And since March 2003 this maritime action has also concerned the Strait of Gibraltar where we have held a number of ships we boarded over 30 ships subject to the compliance of their owners and there's some evidence that the terrorist risk to shipping in the Mediterranean has gone down significantly because of NATO's presence and that of course is good for trade as well as good for the campaign against terrorism. The second aspect is Afghanistan. No doubt NATO today would not be in Afghanistan were it not for September the 11th and although originally NATO was criticized for not being there immediately with the United States when it conducted operations against the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan to shut down the training camps and finally bring about the fall of the Taliban after the September the 11th; it's only been a matter of time for NATO to catch up because since August of last year NATO has taken over the ISAF mission in Afghanistan currently in Kabul where we've just helped to provide the security for the Loya Jirga which has given Afghanistan a new modern constitution to ensure democracy in that country and it's clear that we're going to be doing more over the next couple of weeks. One of the big subjects in NATO at the moment is the expansion of the ISAF mission beyond Kabul. We've already in fact done that because we're extending support to a provincial reconstruction team as it's called led by Germany in Kunduz in northern Afghanistan and the NATO military authorities are now working on a much more ambitious plan for NATO to deploy forces throughout the country in order to support other provincial reconstruction teams in Afghan's cities that are being set up. Now we also realize that we have to play a political role in moving Afghanistan towards a stable peace. The Secretary General Lord Robertson in his final weeks in office appointed the former Turkish Foreign Minister Chetin to be our special representative in Kabul and he'll be arriving there the end of January in order to push alongside the U.N. another international organization the reconstruction and redevelopment process forward. It's clear that NATO is going to be there in Afghanistan for some time but as the previous Secretary General Lord Robertson like to point out if we don't go to Afghanistan then Afghanistan is going to come to us in a form of drugs, in a form of instability and if we allow a situation of chaos in Afghanistan to come again as it did after the withdrawal of the Soviet Union from that country in the 1980's; we could well see once again those terrorist training camps Afghanistan being used as the base for international terrorism which proved so disastrous of course to our interests in the 1990s. So NATO is not in Afghanistan through an act of international charity. We're there because security in that country is a key part of the campaign to defeat international terrorism. Of course if one stays in the military area, it's clear that terrorism has a number of repercussions for NATO's military planning and force posture. It's obvious for example that terrorism as I said is a world-wide activity that can only be dealt with through a world-wide response. Now one of the most revolutionary things that has happened over the last few years after September the 11th is that the Alliance at the Prague Summit in November 2002 adopted a military concept for fighting terrorism which for the first time says that NATO Forces have to be equipped, postured ready to go anywhere anytime. With no geographical limitations on them and when required. This has lead to a number of innovations. One is the NATO Response Force which was inaugurated with an initial operating capacity in October last year and carried out its first live field exercise in Ismir Turkey in November last year. The NATO Response Force is NATO's first attempt to have a force of brigade size truly multinational with dedicated air and naval assets that could be deployed within a matter of five days to deal with any crisis particularly one involving terrorist who might be preparing operations against us and this Force will be fully operational by 2006. But the fact that already we have been through its first rotation and the most Allies, 11 so far out of 19 have committed substantial resources to it shows that it's the cutting edge of NATO's new military capabilities. Another example of NATO restructuring is in the Command Structure where for the first time we have established in Norfolk Virginia a strategic command which we call ACT - Allied Command Transformation which doesn’t have any day to day operational responsibility unlike the SHAPE Command in Belgium but which is dedicated to making sure that we learn the lessons of our anti-terrorist activities at various military operations in terms of improving our doctrine, improving our methods, improving the interoperability of our Forces. So for example the best of United States' gleaned from Iraq or Afghanistan can be immediately passed on to the Allies as well. Another area is defence against weapons of mass destruction. We all know from what we've discovered in Afghanistan and elsewhere that al-Qaeda was actively seeking weapons of mass destruction. Radiological, dirty bombs as they're called, missile technology even there have been talks with experts on nuclear weapons, diagrams to manufacture biological and chemical weapons were discovered in houses in Afghanistan. Now fortunately it seems that al-Qaeda was not on the verge of acquiring weapons of mass destruction but what we know means that there is no room for complacency. And so clearly NATO Forces have to be geared to an environment in which weapons of mass destruction could be used. Therefore the Prague Summit also decided that we should have certain capabilities. For example an analytical laboratory so we can quickly tell whether chemical or biological weapons are being used. It's not always easy particularly with the biological weapons that don't carry any odor or foot print. Secondly a response team and it did in this respect when NATO Defence Ministers met here last December. One of the key happenings was that they inaugurated a chemical biological radiological and nuclear defence battalion and the leadership of the Czech Republic which has got a lot of experience in this area so that NATO has got a faster response capability. And also activities to make sure that we have far more interchange in the Alliance of expertise on how to treat people who people who could be contaminated with these type of weapons. Now of course this bring the question that we will have in future if we have to go anywhere in the world as we are required, Forces that are ready to do this and one of the departing messages of the previous Secretary General Lord Robertson was that we have to improve the usability of our Forces. We have to have a far higher percentage of NATO's Forces trained, equipped and actually deployable at short notice that we have at the moment. Lord Robertson's ambition which is being discussed in the Alliance is that 40 % of all of our Forces should be effectively deployable with about 1/8th of those able to be deployed at anyone moment. We cannot... like the fire fighting brigade in your town have all of our fire-fighters out on duty and nobody left behind at the firestation to cover a new emergency situation that may arise. But the fight against terrorism has not only been reflected in the new military thinking within the Alliance. On the political front too there have been innovations. One thing is that we've realized the importance of our partnership. Terrorism is a global phenomenon so you can only fight it by being organized globally. And in this respect the 27th partner countries of NATO have come in to their own more and more. In terms of sharing intelligence, in terms of harmonizing our rules and regulations for dealing with terrorism. In terms of being able to help each other with things like border patrols, in terms of being able to help each other with best practice and experience in dealing with terrorism. So one of the first things that we did was to agree to a so-called PAP T in the NATO jargon and a partnership action plan on terrorism with those 27 partner countries and we exchange progress reports on that every time we meet. Another area was NATO Russia. NATO Russia have discovered not that they're enemies to each other, which they're not anymore, but they share a common enemy in the form of international terrorism and this subject allowed us to move ahead over the last year or so in developing relations with Moscow particularly in the area of organizing high level conferences on terrorism and we've even been able in the Balkans and elsewhere to do joint threat assessments of the likely threat that we face and to exchange intelligence information. And Russia was offered too to help NATO in this respect with its deployment in Afghanistan. Other international organizations are also important. The U.N. has a counter-terrorist committee and the chairman of that committee has been to NATO Headquarters twice to brief on what is going on in the U.N. and has asked NATO to contribute information to the U.N. so that the U.N. can come up with a more effective series of rules and regimes to restrict the ability of terrorists to organize particularly in the field for example of terrorist financing. The European Union too is an Organization which has now an increasing role to play, particularly in terms of the EU in the form justice and home affairs, police cooperation, extradition policy and so on, and as the EU's activities develop, so there's a greater scope for NATO and the EU to meet and exchange information and there will be more of this year. One area which is particularly key is in homeland defence where both the EU and NATO have responsibilities in ensuring that we can protect our civilian populations. For example in dealing with the aftermath of an attack where the military and the civilian authorities have to work together for evacuation, medical assistance to the victims, protection of an important site, the maintenance of law and order as well. And therefore defining an effective interface with the European Union in that respect is going to be a key aspect of our work this year in 2004. Looking to the future. What can NATO do? Well clearly terrorism is a subject which depressingly covers virtually every aspects of political life. As I said there's a police, there's a judicial aspect, there's a financial aspect of making sure that terrorists cannot move money around. The intelligence services are involved, the military are involved, the health and emergency services in our cities are involved. Virtually every branch of government has a potential role to play. So clearly, NATO cannot become the jack of all trades but master of none. NATO cannot do everything. NATO has been focused on where it can offer an added value in the international fight against terrorism and in our words what we can do better than other organizations or entities. And I believe that already certain fields have emerged where you're going to see NATO becoming more active. I've mentioned already consequence management. How the military in our countries can be deployed to deal with the catastrophic attacks should... God forbid but should occur and how therefore they can help to ensure that the consequences of attacks through quick response action are limited. One aspect of course is simply sharing expertise among the Allies in this area and making sure that those countries which have certain key expertise or key assets such as vaccinations against chemical or biological weapons or hospital facilities or detection devices can quickly deploy those assets to countries that may be less well off but where those attacks could take place. Secondary is missile defence. We cannot exclude that terrorists could acquire ballistic missiles and use them against us and therefore for the first time last year NATO has agreed on a feasibility study to see if there is scope for developing an Alliance wide ballistic missile defence system. Not simply to protect our troops but also our populations. Another area is in cyber-defence to make sure that our computer systems cannot be hacked or penetrated by terrorists in order to spread chaos or to gain access vital information which could make us more vulnerable. Another are is air-defence where clearly as NATO enlarges and seven new Allies as all of you know will be joining within the next few weeks, certainly by the time of the Istanbul Summit of NATO in June. We need to make sure that we can effectively police our air space and deal also subject to national constitutional requirements with any renegade aircraft hijacked by terrorists that could penetrate our air space with potentially deadly hostile intentions. We need to step up intelligence sharing in the Alliance as well. NATO does not generate its own intelligence, so we must make sure that the Alliance is an effective venue where intelligence is shared and we can more precisely anticipate the threats that we may face. And the final area is dealing with weapons of mass destruction. There are a number of things that NATO can be doing particularly to ensure that our International Arms Control Regimes are really tightening up the rules and making it more and more difficult for illicit materials such as uranium, enriched uranium or plutonium to get into the wrong hands that we have effective export controls and an international understanding of sanctions that should be applied to those who proliferate weapons of mass destruction as well. And here NATO as a Transatlantic Organization particularly with good relations with Russia and all of those partner countries I mentioned is in a very position to play a leading role. Let me conclude ladies and gentlemen. As I said at the beginning terrorism has been with us for a very very long time, thousands of years. Terrorism of course depends on individual, many of them who accept suicide, and it's very difficult as we all know is to stop individuals, particularly those who are intent on dying as a result of their actions. Our open democratic societies, if they're to stay open and democratic, our increasingly interdependent trading system is always going to be vulnerable to badly intentioned individuals. But that does not mean to say that we should be fatalistic. Mussolini famously declared the war on flies... Well that probably was particularly in the heat of the Mediterranean summer an unrealistic objective and Don Rumsfeld the Secretary of Defence of the U.S. often points out that terrorism shows up very graphically that we don't know many things that we don't know. There is a massive margin of uncertainty here which is obviously very depressing for policy makers. But if terrorism cannot be totally eradicated, it doesn't mean to say that NATO's actions cannot have a significant impact on at least frustrating terrorist attacks, or at least making more difficult for terrorist plans by keeping them perpetually on the run, depriving them of the sources of funding, the sources of weapons of mass destruction which they need for the evermore spectacular attacks they seek. And finally there are generally two sorts of terrorists. As Joseph Conrad back in the 19th century in his great novel the secret agent pointed out there are others which you might call terrorists who are educated but irrationally bent on destruction and who have an element of the irrational about them which means that they probably cannot be deterred. They represent perhaps the basic elements of evil in human nature or the human spirit. But for each of Conrad's style terrorists there are no doubt plenty of people who are pushed towards terrorism through misplaced, mistaken ideologists, through a sense of frustration, a sense of despair. And so to the extent NATO continues through its various partnerships, its members, its links with the Islamic world through NATO's Mediterranean dialogue to the extent that we can build a more secure international order, more democratic international order in which some of those social injustices, some of those political disputes are (inaudible) resolved. Then as James Woolsey the former Director of the CIA said memorably a few years ago: even if it's difficult to kill all mosquitoes, we can progressively drain the swamp which feeds international terrorism which provides more recruits and foot soldiers for those who want to do us harm and so ultimately even if its difficult like Mussolini to contemplate victory in the war against flies, we can at least look forward to a day where the type of catastrophic attacks such as we faced on September the 11th would be a thing of the past. Thank you. Questions and answers Moderator: Jamie, thank you very much. And we'll go straight to questions from our guests. Anna, I think you had the first question? Q: Do you believe that human rights could be overseen if the Alliance and allied countries continue to concentrate on the war against terrorism? Jamie Shea: Well, there's no doubt about it, that terrorism has led to a more complicated lifestyle for all of us. You want to go on a plane these days, and it's obviously more complicated than it used to be. We've all seen that over the Christmas, New Year holidays with flights being cancelled or delays because passenger lists have to be submitted in advance or scrutinised before an airplane even takes off. And I can imagine for a lot of people used to just hopping on an aircraft like a taxi, in the good old days, it's all a bit of an inconvenience. But as many Americans said, who were stranded at Heathrow Airport over the New Year, well, better safe than sorry, I'd rather be inconvenienced than obviously be blown up in the sky. But obviously, there's no doubt, all of us perhaps have to follow more security arrangements, airports being the obvious example or going into buildings than what was the case sometime ago. I personally don't, however, see that as a threat to freedom of expression
or basic political freedoms or civil liberties. I think it's simply just
the facts of life. You've also seen that parliaments, the U.S. Congress, have had their thing to say about how far governments, for example, should listen in on telephone conversations in order to be able to control terrorist activity. And clearly, some kind of modus vivendi I think, in this respect, is going to be found. But of course, what terrorists want to do is to provoke an overreaction, in other words, to provoke a form of a clamp down as an overreaction to a terrorist attack which will then, of course, alienate citizens from their governments. I think the evidence so far is that this hasn't happened, but obviously there has to be a balance struck between, on the one hand, the need to protect our security, and on the other hand, the need to protect the basic freedoms, which after all is what the terrorists are setting out to destroy. So we mustn't do the terrorist work for them by ourselves destroying the basic freedoms that we have. Q: Depuis quelques années, un dialogue s'est instauré entre l'OTAN et des pays du pourtour méditerranéen, est-ce qu'un partenariat pour la paix avec ces pays ne serait pas la meilleure façon de lutter contre le terrorisme? Jamie Shea: Il est tout à fait
sûr qu'à la lumière des événements du
11 septembre, le dialogue méditerranéen accroît en
importance. C'est tout à fait évident: si ce dialogue peut
être un pont que nous jetons entre l'Europe et le monde de l'islam,
vu que six des sept pays qui participent sont des pays donc islamiques,
ceci ne peut que nous servir. Une des choses très importantes, c'est que nous devons bien sûr demander aux pays eux-mêmes ce qu'ils attendent de l'OTAN maintenant parce que ceci doit être une route à deux sens bien sûr, pas à sens unique. Et nous allons donc les engager dans les mois à venir pour les sonder pour voir si eux aussi ils cherchent à avoir un dialogue politique plus important avec nous. Mais pour l'instant, il y a plusieurs idées qui circulent et je crois qu'effectivement cela va être un des thèmes majeurs du Sommet d'Istanbul. Moderator: We also received a number of questions by e-mail, and I'll read out one of these now. How does NATO define terrorism? One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. How do you see this? Jamie Shea: Well, clearly, I think that when we look at international terrorism, that old dictum of one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter doesn't apply any longer. What is very(?) I think interesting about the al-Qaeda organisation is that it does not have what you might call a defined political ideology. Whatever one thinks of the old-fashioned type of terrorist, often that person was involved in a nationalist movement, an independent country for example, and whoever, one could perhaps totally disagree with the violent methods, but still have some sympathy for the broad political aim. But what is clear about al-Qaeda is that its ideology, to the extent it exists, is not a finite aim that anybody could have any sympathy with. It's hatred of the West, hatred of liberal democracy, a belief that you can put the clock back, sort of a nostalgic golden age of the 7th century -- this is clear from bin Laden's own pronouncements -- that Israel has to leave the Middle East and not exist any longer, that there should be radical separation between the world of Islam and the rest of world. I mean, these are nonsensical propositions and therefore it's the irrationality in its demands, as well as the brutality of its methods of the new kind of terrorism, which means that I, personally, do not believe that you can simply say that, well, one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. I think we're dealing with a totally new breed at the moment, which is simply violence as a value in its own sake, maximising destruction, purely for its own sake, unrelated to any kind of political objective. For example, some former terrorist leaders, whether one agrees or not, managed to quit terrorism and to convert themselves into political leaders. One can hardly think of Osama bin Laden, given everything that we know about him, suddenly converting himself into a political leader willing to play by the democratic system. There is a kind of extremism there which ultimately believes that it doesn't seem likely that we can integrate those terrorists through persuasion or argument. Instead, unfortunately, whether one likes it or not, we have to find ways of defeating them. Q: I had a question about seven new countries who are joining NATO. I wanted to know if this country could offer some experience against the fight of terrorism? Jamie Shea: Certainly, I think one of the rationales for NATO enlargement since September 11th -- it's not the only one, but one -- has been that, you know, in dealing with a problem like terrorism, the more countries you can have inside your community sharing intelligence, working together, not only the more legitimacy you have, but also the more efficiency. And it's true that the new members can provide a lot of assistance. Let me just give you the example of the Czechs who have been already in NATO for some time, but are still a relatively new member. When they came into the Alliance, they brought in a lot of expertise in military medicine, particularly analysing biological and chemical weapons that they developed in the days of the Warsaw Pact, but which was far ahead of what many NATO countries have. And subsequently they've developed that niche role and I mentioned in my lecture that they've taken on the leadership of this new Chemical, Radiological, Biological, Nuclear Battalion. Slovenia is another country which is going to be joining NATO, which has some expertise in this area. So, I think that's certainly one thing. Secondly, is that the more stable these countries are and the more we're co-operating with them, the less likely that terrorists are going to be able to transit across their territory or use safe houses or bases in those countries as a kind of weak underbelly from which to attack the rest of Europe. Q: As the Alliance takes on new missions and Alliance troops are put in harm's way, for example the Bulgarian troops who were recently killed in Iraq, do you think that could hurt future NATO expansion plans? Jamie Shea: Well, I understand the agony of families that have lost their soldiers in the recent operations. I think that we went, sometime at the end of the 20th century, from an expectation that warfare would be terribly bloody and terribly costly. For example, U.S. lost 58,000 dead in Vietnam, 38,000 dead in Korea, a quarter of a million dead in World War II. The British lost a million dead in World War I, including 60,000 on the first day of the Somme. We went from that expectation suddenly to an expectation of so-called zero casualty war. The Kosovo air campaign lasted 78 days and there was not one single death, not through violent action. NATO's interventions in the Balkans, barely a casualty. The first Iraq war in the 1990s, about 250 American soldiers killed: very small by the standards of warfare. And suddenly, there was this expectation that these operations would not lead to a loss of life. I think to some extent, what we've seen now with Iraq and Afghanistan, and in the wake of September 11th, is again a realisation that unfortunately, these type of operations do produce risks and tragically, even with modern methods, modern communications, modern protection, there are going to be casualties. But I would still ask people to keep these in perspective. Compared with the wars of the 20th century, the losses are still very, very small indeed. But at the same time, it's clear that this is perhaps the price of freedom. By that I mean that, of course, if we don't respond, we cannot accept that the terrorists will stop attacking us simply because we don't respond. I mean, one of the great, I think, one of the most interesting things about September 11th is that the al-Qaeda started to plan the attack against the World Trade Center at a time when the Arab-Israeli peace process was developing rather well in the wake of the Madrid Conference, and therefore the fact that things were going well was not a disincentive to al-Qaeda. They wanted to plan an attack anyway. But yes, of course, I can understand the anxieties. And, of course, it is up to political leadership to explain why these things still have to be done, but obviously to do everything, everything that we can by frustrating the terrorists to keep these attacks to a bare minimum. Moderator: I think we have time for one more e-mail question, and that is: Does NATO see any immediate terrorist threat in Europe? Jamie Shea: Well, the answer is vigilance. A Liberal British philosopher, Jeremy Bentham, once said the price of freedom is eternal vigilance and we're back a 100 years later, I think, with that. What is clear is that since September 11th, there have been many new attacks. They haven't been so deadly, but for those people who have lost sons and daughters and loved ones, they're just as catastrophic as September 11th. Bali bombing, 250 dead. Tunisia, a number of people have died. Pakistan, a number of people have died. So the attacks continue. We have come very close to catastrophes with missiles being fired at civilian aircraft in Kenya and the like. So, although there has been no attack, killing 3,000 people like September 11th thus far, there's been plots of activity. Now, that means also, as I've said, that we have to, I think, be on our guard. What we do know is that we are learning lessons. It's clear that many attacks have been frustrated. In Europe alone, 1,700 people have been arrested. Intelligence services are co-operating much more effectively together. EU countries are co-operating with each other and the U.S. on things like extradition policy. A lot of terrorist money has been blocked in accounts. So, we are reacting much better. And no doubt, for every attack that has occurred, there must be probably 20 that we are... that we have frustrated. Sometimes, we can't be told about those kind of things for operational secrecy. But I think it would be extremely unwise to act on the assumption that the worst is ever and that future terrible attacks will not occur. I think we have to act on the assumption they will occur and do whatever we can then to prevent them. But I think that some of the... what we saw at Christmas and the New Year where clearly aircraft did not fly, that could have been subject to an attack, shows as I say that passenger lists, list of suspects are circulating better, and that therefore, we are able to anticipate and not simply react. Moderator: On that optimistic note, Jamie, thank you very much. Jamie Shea: Thank you. 
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