韩国杰出人才移民:US 10-year counter-terrorism: Success or failure?]

US 10-year counter-terrorism: Success or failure?
By Li Xuejiang (People's Daily Online)
07:45, September 09, 2011

Jeremy Littlewood's profile
On the eve of the 10th anniversary of “9.11”, People’s Daily staff reporter Li Xuejiang made and exclusive interview with a well-known Canadian expert on counter terrorism，Dr. Director of the Canadian Centre of Intelligence and Security Studies (CCISS).
Li Xuejiang: How would you like to assess successes and failures Of the U.S. counter-terrorism in the past ten years?
Dr. Littlewood: U.S. counter-terrorism efforts have been focused on radical Islamic groups associated with Al Qaeda. This is unsurprising given Al Qaeda’s role in the 9/11 attacks. The U.S. has assisted other states in countering non-Islamic terrorism, such as Colombia and its efforts against FARC. Thus the ‘Global War on Terrorism’ never was focused on all types of terrorism: rather, its focus, understandably, was on the terrorism stemming from radical interpretations of political Islam that directly threatened the U.S. homeland and its interests.
In terms of successes, we should note that there have been no further ‘spectacular’ type attacks on the U.S. homeland and Al Qaeda and its affiliates or supporters have been pushed into conducting low-level attacks against the U.S. homeland. Thus, in terms of defending the U.S. homeland the policies have been successful if success if judged by preventing or thwarting major attacks.
Other successes over the decade include degrading Al Qaeda core in Afghanistan and Pakistan, pushing them out of Afghanistan and removing the safe haven from the 1990s, and putting them on the defensive in Pakistan and the Afghanistan-Pakistan border areas, as well as in other areas of the world. Deteriorating the ability of such groups to plan and act freely is not an inconsiderable achievement.
The U.S. has also managed to galvanize some of its allies and friends into countering Al Qaeda-type terrorism, even if some did so reluctantly initially: Saudi Arabia; Pakistan for example.
Al Qaeda is much less of a threat to the U.S. now than it was ten years ago. The killing of Osama Bin Laden is perhaps the best illustration of this.
In terms of failures, history will be the better judge of that given that we are still only a few years on from the attacks and the impact of events or policies are not always immediately obvious in the long or short term. It is worth noting the following:
• Permitting Al Qaeda members to escape to Pakistan has exacerbated the problem over time, both in terms of Afghanistan and Pakistan.
• The assumption that Al Qaeda’s ideology would not spread to U.S. Muslims proved to be unfounded as the decade wore on: low-level attacks in the U.S. have been conducted by individuals radicalized by the ideas and propaganda disseminated by Al Qaeda, demonstrating that the U.S. faces the same challenges as other states.
• Significant propaganda victories for Al Qaeda and its ilk were evident in the failure in Iraq during the period 2003 to 2006, with the Abu Ghraib interrogation pictures, killing of civilians, and the rise of the Iraqi insurgency all undermining U.S. counter-terrorism efforts.
• Guantanamo Bay and the ‘torture’ memos that permitted enhanced interrogation techniques have also undermined aspects of the counter-terrorism effort with the U.S. being branded as a state that permits torture.
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