TERRORISMThe Legacy of the 9/11 Attacks: Terror Threats Have Multiplied
Nearly twenty-five years after the worst terrorist attack in U.S. history, the country faces a much different landscape of threats and counterterrorism challenges. The U.S. military handily defeated al-Qaeda and Taliban forces and supported the battlefield victory over forces of the so-called Islamic State, but it has largely abandoned soft power efforts that could counter their enduring appeal.
Nearly twenty-five years after the worst terrorist attack in U.S. history, the country faces a much different landscape of threats and counterterrorism challenges. The U.S. military handily defeated al-Qaeda and Taliban forces and supported the battlefield victory over forces of the so-called Islamic State—also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS)—but it has largely abandoned soft power efforts that could counter their enduring appeal.
Now, the Taliban is back in power in Afghanistan and al-Qaeda, though weakened, maintains affiliates in multiple Muslim-majority countries on three continents. The proliferation of social media and advances in technology have made these groups even more effective transnational recruiters. These online platforms are now forums for radicalization within the United States, which is coping with divisive hate-filled campaigns.
Veteran terrorism expert Bruce Hoffman and Farah Pandith, a former diplomat who pioneered new approaches to countering violent extremism, share their assessment of the U.S. response to the September 11, 2001, attacks and how the country should face the challenges ahead.
Has the United States grown any safer in the twenty-four years since the 9/11 attacks?
The United States appreciably expanded its counterterrorism capabilities after 9/11, establishing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), National Counterterrorism Center, Terrorist Screening Center, and Office of the Director of National Intelligence. It also succeeded in killing or capturing the masterminds behind the attacks and thousands of their foot soldiers. But these military and other successes—including the killing or detention of more than three-quarters of al-Qaeda’s leaders and fighters, the liberation of some fifty million people from terrorist or despotic rule, and the seizure of more than $140 million from some 1,400 bank accounts—were never matched by equally critical non-kinetic counterterrorism initiatives. For instance, there were limited efforts to boost public diplomacy, which involves information operations that effectively challenge the terrorists’ ideological call to battle.
Today, there are five times as many Salafi-Jihadi terrorist groups designated by the U.S. Department of State—more than fifty—than there were on September 11, 2001. This demonstrates the continuing resonance of the message of groups such as al-Qaeda and ISIS, the growth in the number of their respective franchises, and their resilience despite what was the most coordinated and sustained global campaign against terrorism in history.
