Answer the following 5 questions. Please include the question with each answer/response.
1. You are a senior counterterrorism official for the federal government in a large American city. Your city has a significant Arab population–including both Arab American citizens and immigrants. To what degree are you going to focus your efforts on infiltrating that community within your city? Are you going to send agents to attend Mosques? Are you going to develop informants among those already living in that population? Are you bounded by any ethical considerations other than the need to prevent needless deaths through terrorism?
2. Based on the reading assignments, what status, rights and protections would you afford someone who was an American citizen captured in the United States in the act of terrorist violence? How about someone who was a foreign national engage in terrorism in the United States? An American citizen fight American forces abroad? A foreign national, but not a member of a nation’s military, fighting American forces abroad? Would torture of any of these subjects ever be justified if it could save lives?
3. What are the different perspectives concerning Just War? Can the war on terror be properly characterized as a just war? Under what circumstances would fighting terrorism cease to be just? Why?
4. How serious is the problem of anti-Americanism here at home? Should people be accountable for inciting violence when they glorify violent acts against America but they do not engage in it? What remedies are available to the government, if any, to deal with schools, mosques, and charities that indirectly support terrorism while not actually engaging in it? What should the remedies be?
5. Give your overall assessment of the USA PATRIOT ACT. Do you think it has contributed to the lack of terror attacks in the United States since 9/11? If you were in Congress, would you vote to renew the act as is? Would you change anything? Why or why not?