Project Overview:
Counter-terrorism
Policy
The
policy team seeks
to
understand
and
assess
the
development
of
U.S.
counterterrorismpolicy
before
the
September
11
attacks,
the
changes
in the
immediate aftermath,
and the
nature
of the
policy today.
These
tasks will require reviewing overall priorities,
identifying
and
evaluating
the
different instruments used
to
fight
terrorism (prosecutions,military strikes, extraditions/renditions,and soon),anddetermininghowwell senior
policy
makers understoodthethreat
from
al-Qa'ida.
Another integral partof thepolicyteam's
effort
is
examining U.S. relationships
with
key
foreign partners
and
adversaries
with
regard to counterterrorism. When appropriate, the team will distinguish betweenU.S. counterterrorism policy
in
general
and
U.S.
efforts
to
fight
al-Qa'ida
in
particular.
The
nature
of
terrorism during
the
Cold
War
shaped
U.S.
counterterrorism policy when
al-Qa'ida
began to emerge. These earlier terrorists, in the words of
RAND's
BrianJenkins, wanted "a lot of
people
watching and a lot of people listening and not a lot ofpeople dead." Their goals were usually tied
to
Marxist
or ethno-nationalist
agendas.
The
most lethal terrorists during
this
era were those backed by states, not those operatingindependently. In general, terrorism during this period was viewed as an important but
not
overriding policy concern.
As
al-Qa'ida
and
affiliated
Islamist
groups emerged
and
grew
in the
1990s,
the
focus
slowly
shifted.
The
1993
attack on the World Trade Center marked a turning point. Forthe
first
time, Islamist radicals sought mass casualtiesonU.S. soil.Incontrastto theterrorists of the 1970s and
1980s,
who had balked at destroying entire buildings, the newradicals wanted a lot of
people
watching
and
a lot of people dead.Several government counterterrorism
officials
recognized the danger
al-Qa'ida
posed, but
U.S.
policy changed unevenly at
best.
The 1998 bombings of the U.S. Embassies in
Kenya
and Tanzania elevated the importance of terrorism in general and
al-Qa'ida
in
particular,
but policy still lagged behind the immensity of the threat. It took theSeptember
11
attacks to dramatically change U.S. counterterrorism policy. Even today,
counterterrorism
policy
is
evolving, with important policy decisions being made almost
daily.
The policy team expects to follow a normal investigative regimen of document requests
and
review, briefings
by key
individuals both inside
and
outside government,
and
extensive interviews with those in a position to discuss the formulation and
implementation of
U.S. government policy
in the
counterterrorism arena.
In
addition,
theteam
will draw
on the
work
of the
Congressional September
11
Joint Inquiry
asappropriate.
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