Marmots, Wallabies, and National Security

"Op-Ed: What Marmots Teach Us About Terrorism"
Wired Science, Wired.com (April 21, 2009)

"When dealing with national security, we would be wise to take lessons from nature about managing risks. Animals that fail to evolve or learn effective ways to avoid predation leave no descendants. Thus, by studying the diversity of anti-predator adaptations, we may learn about what works and what doesn't work with respect to our own risks...."

I doubt that this is the definitive answer to all questions regarding national security: but Daniel Blumstein makes a good case for studying animal behavior as a guide to balancing risk and cost in national security planning.

"...A key lesson is that avoiding all risk is impossible...." This may be another important point.

The author may prefer that America emulate marmots, rather than wallabies - staying away from dangerous areas. If so, I don't agree - but I recognize that isolationism is a perennially popular point of view.

Bottom line: This op-ed is a relatively easy read, and presents a pretty good case for observing nature to learn what systems work, and which don't.