An Attack on Civilization

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"We are in the midst of an undeclared war."

-- CIA Director William Casey, briefing Senate Select Committee on Intelligence

A war in which almost anyone could be a target any time, anywhere, while carrying out the most innocent activities: waiting for a flight in an airport lounge, dining at a sidewalk cafe. A war waged by shadowy enemies who could be almost anyone: the passenger in the next airplane seat, the occupants of the next car driving by. Worst of all, a war in which civilized society so far is a bewildered, if not impotent, loser.

Or so it seemed to Americans who kept their eyes glued to their TV sets through a phantasmagoric week. Scarcely had an image of helplessness faded from the screen before visions of destruction appeared.

-- In Beirut, Shi'ite Amal militiamen took 37 American male passengers off the TWA jet hijacked two weeks ago and hid them somewhere in the chaos of the western sector of the city. The triumphant captors brought five of their victims before TV cameras for a news conference, in which the prisoners pleaded that the U.S. not try to rescue them or take any military reprisal lest all the hostages die. At week's end the Shi'ite Party of God staged a rally around the captured jet; 1,000 demonstrators cheered the hijackers and chanted "Death to America!"

-- In Frankfurt, an overstuffed gray travel bag left unnoticed beside a trash can in the international airport blew up next to a row of metal chairs. West German police found the mutilated remains of three victims, who were eventually identified as a Portuguese man and two Australian children. Another 42 were injured, including one American. Police had no clues to the identity or motive of the bomber.

-- In San Salvador, six to ten gunmen leaped out of a pickup truck and opened fire on diners enjoying an evening meal at four adjoining sidewalk cafes on a downtown street. Killed: four off-duty U.S. Marine guards from the nearby American embassy, two American businessmen, five Salvadorans, a Chilean and a Guatemalan. At least 15 people were injured. Witnesses said the gunmen, disguised as Salvadoran army regulars, concentrated their fire on the Marines and even hunted one down in a back room. The killers are presumed to be Marxist rebels, turning to urban terrorism because their guerrilla war in the jungles to bring down the U.S.-backed government of President Jose Napoleon Duarte is making no headway (see WORLD).

-- In Tokyo, a bomb exploded at Narita Airport Sunday as luggage was being unloaded from a Canadian Pacific Boeing 747, which minutes before had arrived from Vancouver. Two airport workers were killed and four others injured. Less than an hour later, an Air India 747 en route from Toronto plunged into the sea off the Irish coast, and all 329 people aboard were feared dead. Authorities suspected that the otherwise inexplicable crash might have been triggered by a bomb. The international police organization Interpol began an investigation of possible links between the two incidents (see WORLD).