Countering Violent Extremism

Countering Violent ExtremismDealing with the Asymmetric Threat of Global Terrorism

University of Oklahoma Advanced Programs

Justin A. Dargan05 July 2015

COUNTERING VIOLENT EXTREMISM

Introduction: Shifting an Old Paradigm to Match New Threats

The catastrophic events of 9/11 forever altered the global security dynamic for the

United States and her allies. The attacks thrust violent terrorism into the world spotlight, and

since then terrorism has remained one of, if not the most critical challenges to preserving

peace in the new millennium. Nearly fifteen years later, this remains the case. As trans-

national terrorism, fuelled by religious extremism continues to adapt and spread across the

globe, Western democracies have had to continually refine their programmes for dealing with

this unique, asymmetric threat. This paper will offer an in-depth analysis of the ways Western

powers, specifically the U.S., have adapted their security policies to deal with the terrorist

menace. This analysis will focus primarily on U.S. strategies during the Bush and Obama

administrations. In examining the failures and successes of our policies during these years,

we will look to establish valuable lessons learned. From here, we will attempt to propose

guidelines for improving our anti-terrorism strategy going forward.

In order to understand the security strategy after 9/11, it helps to first take a brief look

at the prevailing situation prior to the attacks. In the opening pages of his book, Losing

Control, acclaimed author and peace studies professor, Paul Rogers, notes that “for 45 years

the West had one primary concern, the confrontation with the Soviet Bloc. It was

straightforward, easy to understand, and very simple – them versus us.”1 To this day, it is a

commonly held belief that the United States emerged victorious from the Cold War as a

result of a determined adherence to a long-term strategy of containment and mutually assured

destruction. That this strategy was based predominantly on traditional military superiority,

only served to reinforce the pre-existing paradigm in which military power is the best way to

ensure global security. This way of thinking remained the norm in the decade following the

1 Paul Rogers, Losing Control: Global Security in the Twenty-First Century (London: Pluto Press, 2010), 4.

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collapse of the USSR. As such, it is not surprising that the George W. Bush administration, in

response to the 9/11 attacks, pursued tactics largely in keeping with this paradigm. Theirs was

a moralistic and assertive strategy, based primarily on overwhelming military force and moral

legitimacy.

The Bush Doctrine, Unilateralism, and Spreading Democracy

In the aftermath of the attacks, Bush sought to take advantage of the wave of global

support that had invariably followed. In the midst of tragedy, he saw a potential silver lining

– the opportunity to proactively spread democracy. A week after the attacks he was quoted as

saying, “we have an opportunity to restructure the world towards freedom, and we have to get

it right.”2 This spreading of democracy to the rest of the world was one of the chief ambitions

of Bush’s anti-terrorism policy. By invading and bringing new leadership to places like

Afghanistan and Iraq, we would encourage democracy in the Middle East and elsewhere.

Bush’s hope was that “more democracies will mean greater stability, peaceful relations with

neighbours, and less terrorism.”3 It was a policy that eventually spurred a large amount of

criticism of the U.S. as imperialistic from the international community.

Another of the more controversial Bush policies was the use of preventative war to

head off potential terrorist threats rather than allowing them ample time to develop. The

National Security Strategy for 2002, commonly referred to as ‘The Bush Doctrine,’ allowed

for the assumption that a brutal dictatorship will inherently seek to dominate their neighbours,

promote terrorism, and threaten U.S. and greater global stability.4 Therefore, it was reasoned,

preventative attacks on such states were justified. This rationalization has been widely

criticized. Robert Jervis, a Professor of International Affairs at Colombia University, wrote of

the Bush Doctrine, “while the generalization that states that oppress their own people will

2 Robert Jervis, “Understanding the Bush Doctrine,” in Political Science Quarterly (2003), 368.3 Ibid., 367.4 Robert Delahunty and John Yoo, “The Bush Doctrine: Can Preventative War Be Justified,” in Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy (2009).

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disturb the international system fits many cases, it is far from universal, which means that

such short-cuts to the assessment process are fallible.”5 This was seen first-hand with the

example of Iraq, where such shortcuts led to errors in intelligence (supposing a link between

al-Qaeda and the Hussein regime, assuming the regime possessed weapons of mass

destruction), which in turn rendered the invasion and subsequent war illegitimate according

to much of the international community.

The debate over the legitimacy of the Iraq War brings to mind another aspect of the

Bush Doctrine that has been criticized as a failure – that, in the absence of a broad

international coalition, it encouraged unilateralism and American hegemony when necessary.

Jervis wrote of this policy, “The United States may be correct that American dominance

serves Europe and the world, but we should not be startled when others beg to differ.”6 Even

when the Bush administration did attempt to encourage international cooperation, instances

like the war in Iraq were perceived as the U.S. strong-arming its weaker allies into “coalitions

of the willing” rather than legitimate, multi-national efforts such as those backed by the UN.

This prompted accusations of hypocrisy: by setting itself apart from the rules it would look to

apply to the rest of the international community, the U.S. suffered a diplomatic black eye and

fostered resentment among allies and enemies alike.

Initial Missteps, Learning from the Mistakes of the Bush Doctrine:

In hindsight, the Bush Doctrine proved the relative ineffectiveness of a traditional

military strategy against the asymmetric threat of terrorism. Following 9/11, the U.S. and our

allies threw the might of their military power at al-Qaeda, “only to find several years later

that they were mired in a civil war in Iraq, losing ground in Afghanistan, and, according to

prevailing expert opinion, worse off with respect to the threat of terrorism overall.”7 In

5 Jervis, Political Science Quarterly, 371.6 Ibid., 385.7 Audrey Kurth Cronin, How Terrorism Ends: Understanding the Decline and Demise of Terrorist Organizations (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2011), 167.

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evaluating the U.S. policy against terrorism in 2006, professor John L. Esposito, founding

director of the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, spoke:

Five years later, despite modest success, the world is a more dangerous place, not safer. The human cost (most importantly) as well as the economic costs can hardly be justified. The flaunting of international law at Abu Ghraib, Guantánamo, rendition and torture of prisoners, and the erosion of civil liberties at home have further affected America’s image and credibility. Anti-Americanism has increased not only across the Muslim world, but also globally. The American-led war against global terrorism is regarded as a war against Islam and the Muslim world.8

Despite this overwhelming perception of failure, the Bush administration was able to

make a number of tangible accomplishments in the fight against terrorism. In a 2010

investigation by the Washington Post, it was assessed that some 263 U.S. government

organizations were created or reorganized in response to the 9/11 attacks, including the

Department of Homeland Security, the National Counterterrorism Center, and the

Transportation Security Administration. We have built up and continually strengthened a

trillion-dollar infrastructure employing intelligence, law enforcement efforts, and military

operations to counter international terrorism on a global level.9 In the sense that we have

managed to avert ‘another 9/11’ and that attacks on the U.S. homeland have remained

extremely rare, this coordination can be seen as a success.

However, this cheery assessment belays the harsh reality that faced the U.S. and our

allies when Barrack Obama assumed office in January of 2009. At this time, despite our

staunch and expensive commitment to the Global War on Terror, the conventional wisdom

among scholars was that the U.S. strategy had not been successful in undermining al-Qaeda.

Statistics show that, as of 2008, the organization had been involved in more terrorist attacks

globally since September 11, 2001 than it had been during its entire history prior.”10 Of this

8 John L. Esposito, “The War on Terrorism: Implications for U.S. Foreign Policy,” in Georgetown University School of Foreign Service (2006).9 Audrey Kurth Cronin, “ISIS is not a Terrorist Group: Why Counterterrorism Won’t Stop the Latest Jihadist Threat,” in Foreign Affairs, (2015).10 Seth Jones and Martin Libicki, “How Terrorist Groups End: Lessons for Countering al Qa’ida,” in RAND Corporation (2015).

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resilience, terrorism expert Audrey Kurth Cronin wrote in 2009, “For it’s part, al-Qaeda

absorbed the impact of Western military force, including the death or capture of 75 percent of

its original leadership, and transformed itself from a small hierarchical organization into a

global presence facilitated by twenty-first century communications that made its reach seem

ubiquitous and its radicalization of young Muslims seem unstoppable.”11

Evaluating Obama’s Strategy and Assessing the Current Situation

Upon taking office, Obama and his advisors immediately began working on

rebuilding the international reputation of the U.S., and revising its counterterrorism strategy.

Of this challenge, in their definitive text on American foreign policy, Steven Hook and John

Spainer wrote, “no recent president faced such daunting obstacles upon taking office, and no

president since the Vietnam War had confronted a steeper climb in restoring the power and

principles of American foreign policy.”12

Despite these myriad challenges, the Obama administration has certainly had its share

of successes. Not least of all has been the massive rebound in global perception of U.S.

leadership, which has enabled us to better pursue multilateral counterterrorism efforts.13 This

fact was cited by the Norwegian Nobel Committee in 2009, when they awarded Obama the

world’s most prestigious Peace Prize. His first term in office was a stark contrast to America

under Bush, and of his presidency, the Nobel citation read, “Obama has as President created a

new climate in international politics. Multilateral diplomacy has regained a central position,

with emphasis on the role that the United Nations and other international institutions can

11 Cronin, How Terrorism Ends, 166.12 Steven Hook and John Spanier, American Foreign Policy Since WWII, (Washington: CQ Press, 2012), 319.13 James Gibney, “Everyone Likes Obama’s Foreign Policy Except Americans,” in BloombergView (2015). Article shows results of most recent Gallup poll: U.S. ranks first in leadership among powerful nations: 45 percent approval rating compared with second highest (Germany – 41 percent) and U.S. at their low point during the Bush administration (34 percent).

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play. Dialogue and negotiations are preferred as instruments for resolving even the most

difficult international conflicts.”14

Indeed, forging partnerships in the on-going war on terror, the U.S. has made

significant recent gains. This includes perhaps the most commonly referenced tactical success

of the Obama administration – the killing of Osama Bin Laden in 2011. It is unclear,

however, whether this has actually resulted in diminishing the threat of terrorism overall.

Prior to the assassination, a number of scholars predicted that even bin Laden’s death would

be very unlikely to collapse the movement he created,15 and four years later, this certainly

seems to have been the case. Bin Laden himself had an even more troubling prediction when

he declared, “I am not afraid of death. Rather, martyrdom is my passion because martyrdom

would lead to the birth of thousands of Osamas.”16 Preventing this potential consequence

must certainly be among the goals of Western democracies as we continue our efforts to

undermine terrorism.

As it stands, the current situation is still far from ideal with regards to international

terrorism. While attacks on U.S. soil have remained rare, it is evident that the global threat

has not subsided. Looking to re-baseline U.S. anti-terrorism strategy and promote multilateral

partnerships, Obama recently hosted a summit in Washington D.C., welcoming leaders from

more than 60 nations in a discussion on countering violent extremism. In a speech, he

referred to the numerous obstacles we, as peaceful democracies, still have to overcome.

Speaking of the ever-evolving threat, he stated:

Since 9/11, terrorists have murdered U.S. citizens overseas, including in the attacks in Benghazi, Libya. Here in the United States, Americans have been killed at Ft. Hood and during the Boston Marathon. In Syria and Iraq, the terrorist group we call ISIL has slaughtered innocent civilians and murdered hostages, including Americans, and has spread its barbarism to Libya with the murder of Egyptian Christians. In recent

14 The Norwegian Nobel Committee, “The Nobel Peace Prize for 2009 to President Barack Obama – Press Release,” in Nobelprize.org (2009).15 Bruce Hoffman, Inside Terrorism (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006), 294; Cronin, How Terrorism Ends, 177; Jones and Libicki, RAND Corporation, 89.16 Hoffman, Inside Terrorism, 294.

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months, we've seen deadly attacks in Ottawa, Sydney, Paris and Copenhagen. Elsewhere, the Pakistan Taliban massacred more than 100 schoolchildren and their teachers. From Somalia, al-Shabaab has launched attacks across East Africa. In Nigeria and neighboring countries, Boko Haram kills and kidnaps men, women and children. In the face of this challenge, we must stand united internationally and here at home.17

In light of the President’s speech, it is clear that international terrorism remains the

preeminent threat of our times. As such, we must continue honing our U.S. and greater global

strategy for combating it. To better enable us to do so, we will now look to propose a series

of recommendations based on our analysis thus far.

Recommendations Going Forward

In Losing Control, Paul Rogers commented on the lessons learned thus far from the

Global War on Terror, postulating that perhaps the key development of the first ten years of

the 21st century was “the degree in which we witnessed the failure of old thinking.”18 The

traditional military strategy that defined our approach to combating terrorism has proven to

be, at best, a dead-end, and at worst, a motivator for would-be terrorists worldwide.

Recognizing this, President Obama and his advisors have attempted to redefine our anti-

terrorism strategy, in a way better suited to the modern era paradigm shift of which Rogers

and Cronin have written. We will now offer a series of recommendations for Obama and

other Western leaders, as they work together to build a better overarching vision in the global

fight against terror.

First, a critical part of this strategy must start with ending the notion of a ‘war on

terrorism.’ In a recently published RAND study, professors Seth Jones and Martin Libicki

wrote of this phrase that it “raises public expectations – both in the United States and

elsewhere – that there is a battlefield solution to the problem of terrorism. It also encourages

others abroad to respond by conducting a jihad (or holy war) against the United States and

17 Barack Obama, “President Obama: Our Fight Against Violent Extremism,” in LA Times (2015).18 Rogers, Losing Control, 182.

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elevates them to the status of holy warriors.”19 Recognizing this, our British and French allies

have already ceased referring to a ‘war on terror’ in official correspondence.20 For his part,

President Obama is already on-board with this agenda, having stated in a recent speech,

“Beyond Afghanistan, we must define our effort not as a boundless ‘global war on terror’ –

but rather as a series of persistent, targeted efforts to dismantle specific networks of violent

extremists that threaten America. In many cases, this will involve partnerships with other

countries.”21

Our second recommendation dovetails with the first, and involves moving away from

a policy of traditional military force, and towards one of intelligence, international

cooperation, and law enforcement rather than war. In Jones and Libicki’s study, data analysis

revealed that policing and politics have historically been far more successful in bringing

terrorist groups to an end than military force. They found that, “of the 268 complete endings

[of terrorist campaigns], the major share came from politics (43 percent) and policing (40

percent), with victory (10 percent) and military force (7 percent) far more the exception

rather than the rule.”22 Police forces have the added benefit of being comprised primarily

from local populations. This shift is a win-win for the U.S. It will allow us to continue our

efforts to build trust among our allies, and it will save us both money and gaffes in

intelligence. Speaking of his experiences fighting al-Qaeda in Iraq (or AQI – the group borne

from al-Qaeda which eventually split off to become ISIS), U.S. Army Lt, Ed Clark

commented on local police forces: “about 10 percent of our intelligence is actionable, while

90% of their intelligence is actionable.”23 U.S. military can and will continue to be an

important part of the effort, but it should be in support of, rather than overpowering, the local

19 Jones and Libicki, RAND Corporation, xvii.20 Ibid., 124.21 The White House, "Fact Sheet: The President's May 23 Speech on Counterterrorism," in The White House Office of the Press Secretary (2013).22 Jones and Libicki, RAND Corporation, 35.23 Ibid., 94.

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effort. Jones and Libicki agreed, writing that, “The U.S. military can play a critical role in

building indigenous capacity but should generally resist being drawn into combat operations

in Muslim countries, where its presence is likely to increase terrorist recruitment.”24

The third suggestion is a two-pronged strategy to win the hearts and minds of the

global community, which is the key to power in the modern era. The first part of this strategy

must focus on winning the media war. The importance of this matter was perfectly articulated

by Osama Bin Laden himself, who said, “It is obvious that the media war in this century is

one of the strongest methods; in fact, its ratio may reach 90% of the total preparation for

battles.”25 Understanding this, al-Qaeda was able to build up its strength and support by using

various media to project a deliberately constructed image of unity and uniqueness, and

“tailoring its propaganda to different audiences, not least those in the West.”26 For the West to

counter terrorist organizations, we must use all available challenges to project our own

image, endearing us to the global constituency on which we rely.

The second half of our “hearts and minds” strategy is an increased commitment to

reclaiming and maintaining the moral ground (both at home and abroad). This will mean

taking symbolic actions, such as closing the much-maligned Abu Ghraib prison camp at

Guantanamo Bay (and then publicizing these actions through aforementioned media efforts).

Whether or not it reflects the current reality, the prison has come to represent torture and

human rights abuses, and its closure would affirm our commitment to the high ideals upon

which Western democracy is built. For his part, President Obama is in full agreement, and

when recently asked what advice he would give himself when he first entered the White

House, he responded that, “I think I would have closed Guantanamo on the first day.”27

Unfortunately, though he has continued to push for the installation’s closure, it has become a 24 Ibid., 122.25 Cronin, How Terrorism Ends, 176.26 Ibid, 177.27 Sbrina Siddiqui, “Barack Obama regrets not closing Guantanamo Bay when first elected,” in The Guardian (2015).

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hot-button political debate, and he has been handcuffed by a bi-partisan congress unwilling to

budge on the issue.

Another policy that could use some re-thinking is the use of drone strikes to

assassinate terrorists. While this policy has been extremely successful from a tactical

standpoint, and helped keep organizations like al-Qaeda on the run, it has come under fire

from the both the U.S. public and the international community. Cronin is critical of this

policy, writing, “While a well-publicized arrest may have devastating effects on a (terrorist)

campaign, there is no evidence to support the claim that killing leaders results in strategic

success.”28 She points out that “adopting the tactics of terror hardly serves the interests of the

state, whose long-term primary goal must be to demonstrate that terrorism is illegitimate and

wrong.”29 Some might call this way of thinking naïve. After all, if the terrorists are actively

pursuing the wanton slaughter of innocent civilians, is it not our right according to the

Geneva Conventions to seek them out and exercise our inherent right to self-defense?

Keeping this in mind, it is unlikely that the policy of assassination, almost always irresistible

to governments directly threatened by terrorists, will ever be eliminated completely. For this

reason, when it must be done, we must make absolutely every effort to engage the

international community, to affirm the target is legitimate, and to avoid any unnecessary

collateral damage in the process.

The fifth suggestion we will offer is to attack terrorism indirectly by dealing with its

root causes. Much of Rogers’ book is dedicated to focusing on an entirely new security

paradigm, which reflects this idea, and which, according to him, has been evolving

“unnoticed for a couple of decades.”30 “At the heart of this paradigm are three factors or

‘drivers,’ the widening of the wealth-poverty divide, the environmental constraints on

28 Cronin, How Terrorism Ends, 25.29 Ibid.30 Rogers, Losing Control, 79.

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development, and the vulnerability of elite societies to paramilitary action.”31 Rogers sees

these ‘drivers’ as the primary causes of international terrorism. Hence, from a global security

standpoint, we would do well to proactively aid economic development and fair distribution

of wealth in underprivileged areas, thus extinguishing the prime motivating factors for

terrorist movements before they are given time to develop. In this area Rogers recommends a

plan of concentrated development assistance, focused on the poorest sectors of populations

and aimed at enhancing their self-reliance. To think that these efforts would eliminate

terrorism alone is woefully naïve. As we have seen, terrorist movements, especially

religiously driven ones, have drawn participants from all different backgrounds, societies, and

levels of prosperity. This unfortunate circumstance does not, however, render Rogers’

suggestion moot, as improving conditions in impoverished areas will almost certainly help

diminish the appeal of terrorism to their inhabitants. President Obama understands this, and

in a recent speech, he touted diplomatic engagement and assistance programs as the crucial

backbone of our still-evolving anti-terrorism strategy:

Foreign aid amounts to less than one percent of our budget and it is fundamental to our national security. For what we spent in a month in Iraq at the height of the war, we could be training security forces in Libya, maintaining peace agreements between Israel and its neighbours, feeding the hungry in Yemen, building schools in Pakistan that offer an alternative to extremism, and creating reservoirs of goodwill that marginalize extremists.32

Finally, our concluding suggestion for improving the Western anti-terrorism strategy

involves heeding the advice of scholars like Cronin, Jones and Libicki, who continually

emphasize the roles terrorist organizations have historically played in defeating themselves.

Evidence suggests that many of these organizations are well on their way already. As al-

Qaeda expert Peter Bergen once noted, “Making a world of enemies is never a winning

strategy.”33 The vast majority of the world’s people are repulsed by terrorism, and

31 Ibid.32 The White House, White House Office of the Press Secretary (2013). 33 Jones and Libicki, RAND Corporation, 1.

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undoubtedly the world’s legal organizations will continue to resist it at all levels. For this

reason, terrorist groups are invariably faced with the difficult task of making their cause

attractive to followers. It is these followers upon which such organizations rely. Cronin

writes, “Marginalization from their constituency is the death-knell for modern groups. Even

groups that are small, clandestine, and peripatetic find it difficult to survive if they have

neither active nor passive support from a surrounding population.”34

Because of this, the key to defeating groups like al-Qaeda, for example, most likely

involves the group’s own missteps, which could result in its marginalization and eventual

failure. The recent split between al-Qaeda and ISIS is telling, drawing attention to an

ideological rift that threatens to divide the group’s core constituency. This rift is centred on

the targets of terrorist violence – many of which have been Muslims. The act of killing other

Muslims or judging them as takfir35 is deeply reviled by much of al-Qaeda’s support base,

and illustrates deep divisions that could threaten to undermine the movement. “The aim,”

writes Cronin, “must be to enlarge the movement’s internal inconsistencies and

differences,”36 while avoiding actions which exacerbate the group’s central rallying point –

hatred of the West.

As a final signoff, it must be emphasized that successful governments are learning

organizations. As Cronin writes, “the good news for states, is that winning strategies for

ending terrorism tend to evolve. Successful governments are learning organizations, usually

beginning with indiscriminate retaliation and then adapting to the setbacks that these

campaigns can dish out, eventually gaining the experience to minimize their own mistakes

and craft more fine tuned responses.” In continually reassessing our situation, gathering

intelligence, and crafting specific strategies to deal with individual terrorist threats as they

34 Cronin, How Terrorism Ends, 203.35 Ibid., 184. “Takfir,” loosely translated, is the practice of declaring another Muslim as impure, and an enemy of Islam. 36 Ibid., 181.

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emerge, the U.S. and her allies can be successful in ensuring the security of Western

democracies, and the world in general.

Bibliography

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Countering Violent Extremism

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