Wasp, by Eric Frank Russell, is one of my favorite books of all time.
The Terrans are embroiled in an interplanetary war with the Sirian Empire. As the war draws on and the death toll rises, they realize they can't win in a fair fight. They send a secret agent, James Mowry, to wage a one-man war on an entire Sirian planet. Mowry does this by committing various acts of civil disobediance and terrorism. In fact, he does very little himself; he lets the planet's government do most of the work.
By striking fear into the hearts of the populace and prompting the government to heighten security to paranoid levels, he sets a machine in motion that does virtually all his work for him. Then, when things have gotten so out of hand that the government is fighting its own people and vice versa, the Terran fleet swoops in and finishes the job.
We're losing, and we're so blind and stupid that we're actually happy about it.
Comments
Slippery slope
To quote one of my favorite movie heroes, "the people should not fear its government, the government should fear its people."
Oddly, therein lies part of the problem. Politicians of today are not so much visionaries or strategists as they are mindless slaves of short-term public opinion. The government has every reason to be afraid of terrorist attacks, not so much out of concern for human lives - after all, it sends its own people out to war - but rather because it will be chastised by the media for not having prevented an attack.
It is interesting to compare what has happened since 9/11 to what was happening in Europe in the late 1930's. I won't invoke the H-word, but you probably see what I'm getting at. Beware of leaders who tell you of nothing but danger and how you need them to stand against it. Beware of fearful people; they are contageous. Know that there is no greater enemy of true democracy than fear itself.
I, for one, am worried, for the voices who say that succumbing to fear of terror is a victory to the terrorists are growing extinct.
Re: Slippery Slope
Recently, I found myself watching the History Channel. They advertized an upcoming special:
(big boomy announcy voice)
"Sudden arrest! Detention without trial! Torture! Secret investigations of your own citizens! All ways of creating FEAR in order to take control of a country." Imagine my surprise when it was a special on the Gestapo.
I shouldn't have been surprised, because it's the History Channel, so it's all Nazis and Airplanes all the time. (In fact, the next program was 'Secret Luftwaffe Aircraft of WWII'...)