Mr Bush had little choice but to institute Draconic domestic security measures to prevent a repeat of 9/11. I personally think he did the right thing, but that doesn't mean I think they worked very well, through no fault of his. The terrorists have the advantage, they have a choice about whether to attack again or not, we have no choice but to set up a defense even if it is never used. The very fact we spent an enormous amount of resources installing these defenses is already a victory for them; especially if they make no effort to challenge them. My opinion is that they felt they could much more effectively use their limited resources by trying to bog us down in Iraq, it moved the battle onto familiar territory and guaranteed them some political gain even if they lost. Of course, that's my opinion, and not a very popular one around here.

Some examples from World War II strategy may be applicable here. An air raid on civilian targets may be of limited military value, even counter-productive, especially if the cost to the attacker in men and machines is high compared to the bomb damage done to non-strategic targets. But it does force the defender to divert scarce resources to anti-aircraft defenses and other counter-measures, like shelters. This expenditure is a victory for the attacker even if he never sends another plane!

But there are intangibles, too. Winston Churchill was once criticized for the huge deployment of extremely ineffective searchlights and flak batteries in parks and rooftops all over London, and was asked to simply not use them so that RAF night fighters could prowl the sky at will and take on the Luftwaffe directly. His reply was that even more important than the number of bombers shot down was that Londoners see and hear with their own eyes and ears that they were fighting back.

In a similar situation, Mr Churchill refused to organize a massive and potentially devatating ambush against the Germans when he learned of their plans to demolish Coventry with a go-for-broke air raid. In his opinion, causing severe casualties to the Luftwaffe was not as important as keeping the Germans from realizing he had cracked their codes.

As to whether the Bush actions prevented another attack, we may never know. Politically, Mr Bush could claim his countermeasures were succeeding if no attacks followed 9/11. But it was also recognized that if another attack did come, it would re-energize the country into continuing to support his policies. Either way he would have used the news to his political advantage, as would his opposition. The follow-up attack never materialized, for whatever reason, but as we know now, another October Surprise was on already on the way.