The impossibility of total vigilance against terrorism

AFTER the 9/11 attacks, the US government was understandably determined to do everything in its power to prevent a repeat. Within months the Department of Homeland Security opened for business, charged with protecting US citizens on home soil.

In 2003, the department set up the BioWatch programme: networks of sensors in major urban areas to provide early warning of biological attacks.

Almost a decade and a billion dollars down the road, BioWatch has drawn a complete blank - unless you count dozens of false alarms. It now looks like being scrapped if new sensing technology can't make it function as conceived (see "Detecting a subway bioterror attack").

If tests prove BioWatch can work, is it worth the expense? One argument is that no price is too high for vigilance against terrorism. The fact that BioWatch has not detected a single attack shows that the programme is doing its job.

Maybe. But look at it another way. Since the US anthrax attacks of 2001 there has been no bioterrorism anywhere in the world. Unlike conventional explosives, germs pose a minuscule terror risk.

Counterterrorism should remain a priority - but with a sense of perspective. Just because it is technologically possible to guard against a theoretical threat doesn't mean you should do it.

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