That seems to be the question de jour as we look back at what's happened in the last five years since 9/11.  After all, we're not just remembering that day, and mourning the loss of nearly 3,000 people.  We're also looking back that the chain of events which that day set in motion, whether we want to admit it or not.  So are we safer?  And after some thought, I can most definitely say, with an extraordinary amount of certainty, that I haven't the first damn clue.  I can also tell you with even more certainty that this is the most honest answer anyone can give you.

I don't know if I'm just getting worn down by all the constant news and polarized debate going on.  What gets me every time is the absolute certainty that people have when they talk about whether the War in Iraq has made us safer, or put as at even greater risk.  The problem is that most people look at world events from a very static perspective.  It is said that "no battle plan ever survives contact with the enemy", and most people seem to forget that.  You can plan all you want looking at the world as it stands today, but as soon as you take action, the other side will react.  Your plan, perfect for the way the world was, now has to adapt to those reactions, and the reactions to the reactions.

Right now there seems to be a bit of a philosophical argument about whether the War on Terror can really be compared to the Cold War.  Instapundit started with this:

Yes. To read some blogs today, you'd think that this was the 9th century, with camel-riding Jihadis ready to descend on helpless American towns, swinging unstoppable scimitars. It's not that way; it's more like the Ghost Dance or similar movements borne of frustration at losing, movements that do their damage all right, but that are doomed to fail. I don't mean to understate the threat, which is real enough. But it's not on the order of the Cold War, you know, and we won that one.

And then Stephen Green responded, wondering where we'd be if we had lost the Cold War, and saying that that we'd be wishing for those good ole Cold War days to return.  For the most part, I'd have to agree with VodkaPundit... but for slightly different reasons, and with the benefit of a little bit of hindsight into the Cold War.

At least during the Cold War, we could depend on the Soviets to keep their own interests at heart.  The knew that if they attacked us, we'd kill them right back.  You go, we go.  MAD may have seemed insane at the time, but it worked.  It worked because they cared just as much about themselves as we care about ourselves.  They had a nation to defend, just as we did.

Can we say the same thing today?  With so many countries in the Middle East attempting to gain nuclear advantage, can we honestly say that a terrorist organization won't get a hold of one and use it on us?  And they won't get it by accident.  Iran would have absolutely no problem giving them one, and allowing them to use it, knowing they could wash their hands of it.  That is the scenario that scares me the most.  They have no nation to defend, only an ideology... an ideology that they have shown a willingness to die for.  So how do you actively defend against that?

I think we're trying to do that right now in Afghanistan and Iraq, but that's not enough.  We need every nation in the Middle East to know that it is their responsibility to keep these weapons out of the hands of independent terrorists... and that we'll hold them responsible.  In essence... we need to declare, just like we did during the Cuban Missile Crisis, that:

It shall be the policy of this Nation to regard any rogue nuclear detonation in the Western Hemisphere as an attack by the Middle East on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Middle East.

That's right.  I said the whole Middle East.  Just a thought to ponder.