This IHT article is a melding of the topics discussed in the WAR Report edition: the radicalization of European converts to Islam and the use of biometric technology in passports (see this edition for both articles). According to the US Department of Homeland Security’s policy department, “international travelers’ fingerprints are going to be a part of their identifier.” To date, this measure is not law. This decision to register fingerprints will not be implemented in the near-term, but it is a proposed way, among others, to thwart the suspected influx of European jihadis. Such a policy would need to be negotiated with European nations, which are very sensitive to privacy concerns vis-?-vis the US, and as such cannot be expected to come to fruition for some time, if ever. Europeans are now required to provide electronic fingerprints at 154 land-border ports of entry and airports. Other measures, like digital photographs that became effective in October 2005, could be required as well.
Most Western European countries have exemptions from visa requirements, which were initially implemented to stem illegal immigration for jobs in the US. This must now be revisited, as security concerns revolve more around the risk of accepting terror-minded jihadis from Europe into the US. As is underscored in the previous essay, jihadi recruitment of non-Arab looking individuals along with second or third generation immigrant children is on the rise?as is their castigation and isolation from “European” society. Border security officials need not worry about the domestic job climate as much as al-Qaeda sending cell through open, legal channels into the US to launch an attack.
Proponents contend that all Europeans should require a visa for entry. The visa application process is arduous and includes: a background check, fingerprinting, and an interview at a US diplomatic mission. This is not only cost prohibitive for the US security apparatus, it is time prohibitive to process and interview every European who wishes to enter the US for any reason (approximately 10 million travelers per year), it is economically restrictive to the tourism industry, it will not detect forged/stolen passports using names not on a watch list, and it is a duct-tape-and-Bandaid solution to a greater problem. Just because our collective attention is on the threat from Islamic converts in Europe, security and defense efforts should not be only bolstered against Europeans. Simply focusing security efforts on whatever trendy region or country of Islamic terrorism that is highlighted in the news, leaves gaping holes in our national security posture. Higher risk countries?like Pakistan, Morocco, Indonesia, among others?continue to demand our attention. Rather than playing Whack-a-mole with homeland security, a wide-reaching, policy that includes “modeling and surveillance of terrorist behavior in its various forms and at various levels of operation seem to be increasingly advantageous” while also addressing the root causes of terrorism, as indicated in the previous essay.