Army Bob: Be thankful Islamic terrorists haven’t read Mao

by Robert M. Traxler

We as a country are fortunate in a way in that the Islamic terrorists do not understand how to start an insurrection.

In Mao Zedong’s Little Red Book he lays out the proper way to conduct an insurgency against an established government. Chairman Mao writes that the people must feel the government is incapable of protecting them and providing for them; government must allow the society to operate in a manner familiar and comfortable. To properly conduct an insurgency, the everyday lives of the people must be interrupted in a way that will anger or at least disrupt most citizens’ routines. If roads are closed, if the power goes out, if the stores run out of things you want, if gas is scarce or goes up in price, you get angry at our government.

The attacks on the World Trade Center made us all angry but did not disrupt our everyday lives; the attacks in Santa Barbara made us angry but did not disrupt our lives; murdering Christians on mass in Syria made us angry, but we still went to the coffee shop and watched “Dancing with the Stars.”

Before retiring from the Army, I worked on a study called “The Land Defense of CONUS (Continental U.S.) Study. The parameters were that the military was involved in two wars and fully deployed outside the U.S. and a number of terrorists cells were attacking the home land; how do we defend the infrastructure against a series of deliberate attacks?

If the Islamic terrorists wanted to disrupt the American society and turn it against the government, the way to do it is to attack the infrastructure: fuel, food, water, communications, banking, electrical power and the like. Our electrical grid, communications towers/centers, banking hubs and food delivery systems are open and vulnerable.

A terrorist would not need automatic weapons or sophisticated explosives; simple chemicals found at your local grocery store or metal cutting equipment found on line or at the local hardware store, coupled with poisons found once again at your local grocery store, will do nicely. Two cleaning chemicals we all have in our homes mixed together will generate lethal poison gas, one used widely killing thousands in World War I.

A large number of sustained attacks on our infrastructure will be low risk for the terrorists and show our government helpless to stop most attacks. The people, you and I, will get very angry with our government’s inability to keep the lights on, the food supply safe, credit cards working and gas at the pumps. History proves at first people will get mad at the terrorists, but after a short period of time the anger will shift to our government.

Most of the life’s blood of American society, gasoline comes by pipeline from the Gulf of Mexico. We cannot guard thousands of miles of pipeline, and the attacks on the fuel distribution system can be accomplished with a shovel, wrench, hand drill and Bic lighter. The odds of getting caught are very low, freeing every terrorist to commit multiple high gain attacks.

A few terrorist teams could travel the nation, spreading havoc for months, if not years, and undermine our confidence in our government to protect us. The cost in dollars would be a few hundred thousand to the terrorists, but American costs would be in the billions.

Attacks on the lock systems of our major waterways, the Mississippi, St. Lawrence Seaway, Straights of Mackinac and others would be low risk and high gain. Bridges could be damaged or destroyed fairly quickly with power metal cutting saws, and roads washed out with nothing more complicated than a few 2x4s blocking culverts.

The study I worked on showed us it was relatively easy and cheap to guard point targets such as airports, seaports, train/bus stations and sporting events, but damned near impossible at any price to protect the food, fuel, electrical, highway, comminutions and financial systems.

We must hope the evildoers don’t get their hands on Mao’s book. A handful of terrorists could reshape our nation and our government for decades to come, costing us all basic freedoms and changing our way of life.

Perhaps ISIL/ISIS, comfortable in their safe havens, are planning a new series of attacks as outlined by Chairman Mao.