The Real Terrorist Threat from Refugees
According to a December Quinnipiac poll, the majority of Americans support curtailing refugee immigration into the U.S. After the Paris Attacks and San Bernardino Shooting, the sentiment is an understandable reaction. Refugees are difficult to vet, especially from conflict states like Syria. They require financial support once they arrive and then often establish insulated communities (e.g., Boston alone has the Italian ‘North End,” Chinatown, and the Irish “Southie”).
The natural appeal to curbing Muslim, especially Syrian, refugees also provides the illusion of improved safety from the threat of terrorism. However, refusing to accept refugees actually makes America and the West less safe. It seems counter-intuitive, but terrorism usually is.
The Syrian refugees, for example, represent a cross-section of moderate Syrian society. The people who stand to lose the most politically in the conflict — the government/military apparatus of Assad’s regime and the rebels/terrorists fighting him — also lose if they flee with the moderates. The five largest refugee migrations to the U.S. in the last forty years illustrate this: former Soviet Union (especially Jews who were persecuted), Vietnam (post-fall of Saigon), Former Yugoslavia, Iraq, and Myanmar. Regardless of socio-economic status, the refugees of these countries faced persecution, violence, and death.
On the flip side, refugees offer an opportunity for developed nations. Since refugees represent a cross-section of their societies (from taxi drivers to scientists), we have an opportunity to recruit immigrants who will become great citizens. America has always been the great melting pot — “bring me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore.”
What kind of sad excuse for a terrorist would undergo the two-year refugee vetting process that involves fingerprinting and biometric screening to infiltrate the U.S. when they could simply apply for a visa with no background check?
Allowing refugees into the United States does create a vulnerability for terrorists and sympathizers to infiltrate the country, however; refugee screening is time-consuming, intensive, and less than 1% of global refugees qualify for resettlement according to a White House Infographic. This two-year process involves biometric screening and personal data collection; procedures terrorists typically don’t volunteer for. There are far easier ways to enter America: student or tourist visas, the unguarded Canadian border, or the porous Mexican border. What kind of sad excuse for a terrorist would undergo the two-year refugee vetting process that involves fingerprinting and biometric screening to infiltrate the U.S. when they could simply apply for a visa with no background check?
A few, actually. Out of the 785,000 refugees admitted into the U.S. since 9/11, 3–5 refugees have been arrested for terrorism (depending on if you count the Tsarnaev brothers). Comparatively, there’s another 100 post-9/11 terrorist attacks/attempts conducted by U.S. citizens or people allowed to enter the U.S. by other legal means. Accepting refugees is a calculated risk with societal, financial, and safety implications: that refugees will assimilate in society, that they’ll eventually become financially independent, and that they won’t blow something up. The stakes are high. But we must calculate the risks to America from the alternative: ignoring refugees.
Terrorist movements grow out of disenfranchised populations; people who lack a legitimate voice in their political system. If terrorists could affect political change by easier means, then they would. Terrorist movements grow out of situations where a minority population feels that their government is not responsive to their demands and they have no power to enact political change:
· Provisional Irish Republican Army: Terrorized Northern Ireland because the Protestant-dominated government was openly discriminatory against the Catholic minority.
· Basque Separatists: Created under Franco’s dictatorship to fight for self-determination.
· Tamil Tigers: Ethnic minority who felt persecuted in Sri Lanka.
· Uighur Terrorists: A Muslim minority in Han-dominated China facing economic and religious discrimination.
· Chechen Terrorists: An ethnic Muslim minority in Russia.
Refugees epitomize the politically disenfranchised. They are displaced, without financial means, socially marginalized, a minority in a foreign country, and therefore lack any political power. In other words, refugee camps are breeding grounds for extremist movements and terrorist recruiting. History shows that long-term refugees translate into terrorist movements with popular support:
· “Palestinian refugee camps breeding ground for terrorists”
· Yemense refugee camps face widespread radicalization according to a Belfer Center report.
· “Taliban Finds Fertile Recruiting Ground in Pakistan’s Tribal Refugee Camps”
Indeed, while accepting refugees from countries besieged with terrorism and civil war does increase the risk of isolated incidents of domestic terrorism, refusing to address refugee crises makes the world a more dangerous place. Should the United States trade the threat of 2–5 incidents every 15 years for the assured radicalization within refugee camps and the global instability caused by popular terrorist movements?
In terms of absolute human cost, military intervention, and economics, the West’s best value is to accept refugees and prevent the rise of future terrorist movements.
AC Davis is an officer in the Army National Guard. His career includes leadership and staff positions in logistics, engineers, and force protection. The opinions expressed are his alone, and do not reflect those of the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. government.
