CTC Sentinel Objective

SEPTEMBER 2011 . VOL 4 . ISSUE 9 COMBATING TERRORISM CENTER AT WEST POINT CTC SentineL OBJECTIVE . RELEVANT . RIGOROUS Contents American Perceptions of FEATURE ARTICLE 1 American Perceptions of Terrorism Terrorism in the Post-9/11 in the Post-9/11 Decade By Paul R. Pillar Decade REPORTS By Paul R. Pillar 3 The Rise of Boko Haram in Nigeria By David Cook 5 Religious Allegiances among Pro-Iranian Special Groups in Iraq By Reidar Visser 8 AQIM Returns in Force in Northern Algeria By Andrew Lebovich 12 Violence Escalates in China’s Xinjiang Province By Jacob Zenn 15 The UK’s Efforts to Disrupt Jihadist Activity Online By Raffaello Pantucci 17 Recent Highlights in Terrorist Activity 20 CTC Sentinel Staff & Contacts he tenth anniversary of the yearning for an explanation that would 9/11 attacks has become an be too simple to be an accurate analysis occasion for reevaluating the of what has determined the amount of terrorism threat to the United terrorism directed against the United TStates. Three key questions have been States during the past decade. raised. What is the status and current strength of al-Qaìda, the group that 9/11 was one of the most traumatic perpetrated 9/11? Have measures taken events in U.S. history. It powerfully since 9/11 made Americans any safer shaped perceptions and emotions of the About the CTC Sentinel today? Why has the United States not American public to a degree that few other The Combating Terrorism Center is an been attacked again—at least in the sense events have. It is not an exaggeration to independent educational and research of being attacked on a scale approaching say that the thoughts of most Americans institution based in the Department of Social 9/11? These are worthwhile questions, about terrorism and counterterrorism Sciences at the United States Military Academy, although they each involve a restricted revolve almost entirely around 9/11. West Point. The CTC Sentinel harnesses perspective toward terrorism and Most Americans believe a “war on terror” the Center’s global network of scholars and counterterrorism. The first is inherently began with 9/11, notwithstanding all the practitioners to understand and confront limited by being focused on only a terrorism and efforts to counter it before contemporary threats posed by terrorism and single variety of terrorism or even just a that one event. Trauma and emotion other forms of political violence. single group. The second usually omits are not generally conducive to good reference to any standard of success understanding of any topic, terrorism and failure in securing Americans from included. It should not be surprising that The views expressed in this report are those of the authors and not of the U.S. Military Academy, terrorism or to the costs and trade-offs Americans’ trauma-driven attitudes and the Department of the Army, or any other agency entailed in obtaining a given degree of beliefs about terrorism are misplaced or of the U.S. Government. safety. The third question is usually a inaccurate in important respects. 1 SEPTEMBER 2011 . VOL 4 . ISSUE 9 Therefore, this article examines another Like spikes of attention following The equation of counterterrorism with set of questions, which are at least as earlier terrorist attacks, the one after a fight against al-Qaìda has pervaded useful as those posed above. How has 9/11 is subject to fading over time until much of the public discourse as well 9/11 molded American attitudes about another attack occurs. The spike after as the framing of public policy in the terrorism during the subsequent decade? 9/11, however, was so high that any fade decade since 9/11. Analysis of almost To what extent do popular attitudes will persist longer before returning to any terrorist incident or terrorist- and perceptions conform with, or differ the level of public interest in terrorism related discovery or individual is from, actual threats of terrorism today? before 9/11. Terrorism is still a major couched in terms of whether or not the Have counterterrorism policies been public worry. In a Gallup poll taken in subject of attention is “linked” to al- driven more by public perceptions than 2010, Americans ranked it alongside by the terrorist reality? government debt at the top of their list of “The broader phenomenon dangers to the well-being of the United Inconsistent Interest in Counterterrorism States.1 To the extent the American of Sunni jihadist terrorism The enormous public reaction to a public’s enthusiasm for vigorous to which the label al-Qaìda single event points to one important counterterrorist measures has lessened respect in which public perception at all since the first couple of years after is commonly applied is not diverges from reality. Public concern 9/11, the lessening has little to do with weaker. Instead, it is even about terrorism and support for efforts an objective assessment of the status and to counter it tends to spike upward strength of any foreign terrorist group. more widespread than it immediately after terrorist attacks and It instead is a function of—in addition to was 10 years ago.” to subside gradually downward as time the usual pattern of interest fading over passes without another attack. Interest time—the competition for attention from in counterterrorism thus produces economic and other national problems a sawtooth pattern, and the policy and a backlash against some measures Qaìda—the implication being that one priority and resources devoted to it taken in the name of counterterrorism should worry more if it is and less if it tend to follow that pattern. Yet terrorist (especially involving compromises is not. A highly disproportionate share attacks are only the aperiodic outward of privacy and treatment of detained of U.S. resources expended in the name manifestations of an underlying threat suspects) that have come to be seen as of counterterrorism have been directed that does not vary with sudden upward excesses. against this one group. This particularly spikes in a way that corresponds to includes military operations in changing public attitudes. The American View of Foreign Threats South Asia, especially a 10-year-old Another attribute of public perceptions counterinsurgency in Afghanistan The off-the-chart spike in Americans’ about terrorism in the decade since 9/11 where the chief rationale has been to concern about terrorism in response stems from a habitual American way of prevent al-Qaìda from re-establishing to 9/11 was another instance of the perceiving any foreign security threat a safe haven in the country. same phenomenon, albeit one greatly in terms of specific, named countries or amplified by the salience and physical groups or the leaders of those countries The persistence of the equation of impact of the attack. The U.S. public or groups. In that respect, the notion counterterrorism with a fight against and political response would lead one of a “war on terror”—terrorism being a al-Qaìda is clearly illustrated by the to believe that the terrorist threat to tactic rather than a specific foe—always “National Strategy for Counterterrorism” the United States was far greater on was, on the face of it, an unnatural fit that the Barack Obama administration September 12, 2001 than it had been on with the American way of thinking about published in June 2011.2 The document September 10. This was not the case, security threats as well as with logic. (As would have been more aptly titled the however. Public (and by implication, Zbigniew Brzezinski once observed, a “National Strategy for the War on al- political) attention to terrorism was “war on terror” is no more logical than a Qaìda,” because that is the strategy’s probably too low before 9/11. With the “war on blitzkrieg.”) Yet the term “war” primary focus. All other terrorist acts or overwhelming preoccupation the subject was used given the popular demand for threats of terrorism in the world are noted became after the attack, it was too high. a strong, forceful response to the horror and set aside in a few paragraphs. The greatly augmented priority and of 9/11. Americans made the concept of resources devoted to counterterrorism a “war on terror” fit more comfortably If counterterrorism, as a subject of since 2001 have assuredly mitigated with their usual way of perceiving public discussion and governmental threats, through responses ranging from foreign threats by equating the war with policy, were conceived as a result defensive security measures at home a struggle against al-Qaìda, the group of a zero-based review conducted in to offensive actions against individual that had perpetrated 9/11, and to some 2011—unencumbered by the emotions terrorists abroad. But it is still fair to degree with the group’s leader, Usama from the disaster that struck on 9/11— ask whether, by any reasonable measure bin Ladin. the commentary and policies would look of how terrorism compares with other and sound much different. They would threats to U.S. security and of how recognize that radical Sunni terrorism of resources can be efficiently utilized, the augmentation was an overreaction. 2 “National Strategy for Counterterrorism,” U.S. White 1 Lydia Saad, “Federal Debt, Terrorism, Considered Top House, June 2011, available at www.whitehouse.gov/ Threats to U.S.,” Gallup, June 4, 2010. sites/default/files/counterterrorism_strategy.pdf. 2 SEPTEMBER 2011 . VOL 4 . ISSUE 9 the sort exemplified most recognizably These two observations together imply by al-Qaìda is only one manifestation that the equation of counterterrorism The Rise of Boko Haram in of international terrorism.

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