Reflections on the terrorist attacks on the United States of 11 September 2001

In 2001-in the age of globalization-terrorism was transformed from a local into a global problem and the entire structure of the international security system was called into question.

One paradox of the globalization era is that, although the threat of external aggression is non-existent in many parts of the world, national security cannot be taken for granted in any state, including the United States. National security is dependent in greater measure on the developments within states and an effective international security system. Because of its position in the world the USA plays the most crucial role in shaping this new system. . . . A new and serious threat to international security is the revival of nationalism, quite often in extreme forms, including the risk of possible re-nationalization of security policies. The process of modernization is often perceived as Westernization or Americanization-an attempt to impose the values of the Western world, in particular the United States, on other regions, cultures and civilizations. This misunderstanding has to do with the fact that values such as democracy, accountability, human rights, the rule of law, and social systems based on tolerance of diversity, individual freedoms and gender equality are identified with Western liberal, secular ideas. These are then pitted against traditionalist cultures that put the laws of closed communities above the rights of individuals and the tenets and norms of religious beliefs as well as customs and traditions above the law.

The ruins of the World Trade Center attack in New York on 11 September 2001, after which the 'entire structure of the global security system was called into question'

The qualitatively novel phenomena and changes in the world call for a new, unconventional approach. Since the risks are global, the responses should be global as well. This, in turn, requires a system that fosters and generates cooperation rather than balancing influence and threats resulting from competition and rivalry among powers and other actors. The world is interdependent. Positive and negative processes and phenomena are of a global character. The greatest challenge of the contemporary world is not so much the rivalry over power or territorial expansion-motives that dominated in the colonial era-as it is dealing with the new threats of global terrorism, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and organized crime, on the one hand, and local and regional conflicts, on the other. . . .

There is a close relationship between global and local or regional threats. The main regions of conflict-Africa, Asia, the Balkans and the Middle East-have become a fertile ground for organized crime, terrorists and arms smugglers. The task ahead for the international community is to dismantle these networks. . . . this is one of the new global tasks which face the North Atlantic community.

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