Where We've Come since 9/11

By Michael Jacobson

My colleague Matt Levitt and I wrote two op-eds this week taking stock of the US counterterrorism efforts as we approach the seventh anniversary of 9/11. We also assess what the terrorist threat is likely to look like and what counterterrorism environment the next administration will inherit in January 2009. As we noted in one of the pieces, despite the steps that has been made, this area is still very much a work in progress.

Here is an excerpt from our op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle:

As the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks approaches, and with the Bush administration entering its final months, it's worth pausing to reflect on how much progress we've made these past seven years against the terrorist threat to the United States. Yet the next administration will face an evolving terrorist threat and inherit a counterterrorism regime that is still a work in progress.

While the United States has overhauled its counterterrorism structure to face this new, ever-evolving enemy, keeping up with the adapting threat is a serious challenge for the often plodding government bureaucracy.

At the time of the Sept. 11 attacks, al Qaeda was a centralized, hierarchical organization that directed international terrorist operations from its base in Afghanistan. By 2004, al Qaeda appeared to be in disarray, with its capabilities dramatically diminished. That picture has changed substantially over the past few years, as al Qaeda's center has grown stronger once again, with its new safe haven in the tribal areas of Pakistan, where it can train and recruit operatives, and direct its global propaganda efforts.

To read the entire piece, click here:

Our other piece appeared in the Camden Courier-Post this past Sunday. Here is an excerpt from that piece:

Despite setbacks, al-Qaida remains a potent threat. In mid-August, the U.S. intelligence community's senior ranking terrorism analyst concluded that while increased counterterrorism efforts worldwide have constrained the ability of al-Qaida to attack the United States and its allies, the group "remains the most serious terrorist threat to the United States."
As recently thwarted terrorist plots in Britain, Germany and elsewhere make clear, seven years after 9/11 we remain in a heightened threat environment. But the nature of the transnational threats facing the world today is far different than the ones the United States and its allies faced on 9/11.

While al-Qaida itself remains a formidable opponent -- particularly with its recent resurgence and secure safe haven in northwest Pakistan -- its affiliates and homegrown cells pose a growing threat as well. As of 9/11, al-Qaida was the main threat facing the United States. At the time of the 9/11 attacks, al-Qaida was a centralized, hierarchical organization directing terrorist operations around the world from its base in Afghanistan.

The Unites States now faces a different -- and in some ways more complicated -- threat than it did on 9/11. This is a threat -- and an enemy -- that continues to evolve rapidly, often in response to U.S. and international pressure. Today, the United States and its allies face a three-fold threat. The first is from the core al-Qaida. While al-Qaida was on its "back foot" from 2004 to 2007, it has now "regained its equilibrium," according to a senior Homeland Security official.

To read that entire piece, click here:

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