YOU ARE HERE: LAT HomeCollections   Terror Threat May Be Mostly
a Big Bluff  The facts point to overestimation by a frightened
U.S.  September 13, 2004|Bart Kosko | Bart Kosko teaches
probability and statistics at USC, where he is a professor of
electrical engineering. He is author of "Heaven in a Chip"
(Random House, 2000).  Just what is the evidence for this
alleged terrorist threat that now dominates foreign affairs and
the presidential election? The third anniversary of the Sept. 11
attacks on the Pentagon and New York's World Trade Center has
come and gone without any terrorist attacks in the U.S. No
terrorists attacked the Olympics in Greece, as so many feared.
Nor did they attack the Republican convention in New York. And
the big statistical picture of terrorism has changed little in
years.  Deaths because of terrorism worldwide have increased a
bit lately (especially after the school attack in Russia), but
the number still remains on the order of about a thousand deaths
a year, according to the State