A Hard Day's Night? The United States and the Global War on Terrorism

Abstract

This paper examines the jihadist threat and its implications for the global war on terrorism (GWOT)—a threat noted for its commitment, determination, innovation, and lethality. The United States is struggling to configure its instruments of national power to address a threat that has thus far proven unresponsive to these national instruments. The paper argues that the jihadist threat needs to be framed in the context of fundamental changes in the dynamics of the international system. These dynamics have left the United States struggling to conceptually bound and define the jihadist threat in the new security environment. This paper offers explanations for this struggle and concludes that if not successful in bounding and understanding the threat that the United States may win battles in the GWOT, but it can never win the wider war. “The number of serious international terrorist incidents more than tripled last year, according to U.S. government figures, a sharp upswing in deadly attacks that the State Department has decided not to make public in its annual report on terrorism due to Congress this week.” Susan B. Glasser, Washington Post, April 27, Page A01