The New Plan for war against "Islamist Extremists"
Posted by: McQ
The QandO Blog
Tuesday, July 26, 2005
US News and World Report has an extensive report on the new strategy in the War on Terrorism which will be pursued by the Bush administration. One of the more significant points in the report is the expanded indentification of the enemy:
The terrorist threat against the United States is now
defined as "Islamist extremism" —not just al Qaeda. The
Pentagon document identifies the "primary enemy"
as "extremist Sunni and Shia movements that exploit Islam
for political ends" and that form part of a "global web
of enemy networks." Recognizing that al Qaeda's influence
has spread, the United States is now targeting some two
dozen groups—a significant change from the early focus on
just al Qaeda and its leadership.
I've seen it said any number of times that the administration is afraid to call the enemy what it really is for fear of offending Muslims. Well that's no longer the case, as, per US News, the enemy is now specifically identified as "Islamist extremists".
What this does is broaden the scope of the war and allow different strategies to be implemented which weren't possible under the more narrow focus on al Qaeda alone.
Another key to the plan:
The new approach emphasizes "encouraging" and "enabling"
foreign partners, especially in countries where the
United States is not at war. Concluding that the conflict
cannot be fought by military means alone—or by the United
States acting alone—the new Pentagon plan outlines a
multipronged strategy that targets eight pressure points
and outlines six methods for attacking terrorist networks.
Some other features of the plan include:
The Pentagon will use a new set of metrics twice a year
to measure its progress in the war against terrorism.
Commanders are to report, for example, on successes in
locating and dismantling terrorist safe havens, financial
assets, communications networks, and planning cells for
each of the target groups.
In order to understand how effective a strategy is, you have to have a method of measuring both success and failure. That provides you a method of assessment which gives you keys to necessary change for failing strategies as well as a way of knowing when to step up strategies which seem to be working well.
The Pentagon's Special Operations Command is designated
in the new plan as the global "synchronizer" in the war
on terrorism for all the military commands and is
responsible for designing a new global counterterrorism
campaign plan and conducting preparatory reconnaissance
missions against terrorist organizations around the world.
This is important. You have to have a go-to agency where everything starts. This simplifies the command structure within the military, where instead of considering territorial commands to be the first stop, now has an overarching command to set things in motion before they go through the territorial command. That means there will be a consistent strategy which is "synchronized" for effectiveness.
Under a draft national security presidential decision
directive, expected to be approved next month, the White
House would have greater flexibility to resolve turf
battles in the government's overall counterterrorism
effort.
This is equally important. Anyone who's spent more than a day in the military knows how insular various commands and services can be. Inter-service rivalry isn't a myth, but instead a reality. It is critical that such rivalry be thwarted as much as possible. Both the designation if the SO Command and the quick resolution of turf battles will go a long way in helping resolve this problem and smooth (and speed up) critical counter-terrorism ops.
The multi-pronged strategy being developed strikes at a number of terrorist elements simultaneously:
The new strategy, for the first time, formally directs
military commanders to go after a list of eight pressure
points at which terrorist groups could be vulnerable:
ideological support, weapons, funds, communications and
movement, safe havens, foot soldiers, access to targets,
and leadership. Each U.S. geographic command is to follow
a systematic approach, first collecting intelligence on
any of the two dozen target groups that are operating in
its area of responsibility and then developing a plan to
attack all eight nodes for each of those groups.
It sounds to me to be a very reasonable and aggressive way to address the War on Terror. This is good to see. This is what is necessary, in terms of adaptation of strategy, necessary to defeat terrorism. It's encouraging to see this being developed. If successfully implemented and simultaneously executed it could deal world-wide "Islamist extremists" a fatal blow. The full article is worth the read.
The NY Times has a short blurb on it here.
nytimes.com
qando.net
usnews.com
