Deaths of senior AQ leaders reported; where are we in the GWoT?

News broke yesterday morning stating that several AQAP leaders, including two U.S. citizens, had been killed in a Predator strike. Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan, both American citizens, were reported among the dead in a statement by Yemen's Defense Ministry. Also reported to have been killed was AQAP's top bomb maker, Ibrahim Hassan Tali al Asiri, in a separate strike. These successes, if indeed fact, prove that the use of drones as assets in the GWoT are virtually invaluable in eliminating high-value targets. With the intensity of this tactic under President Obama, it appears that there is no hint of attempting to slow down anytime soon.

According to the Washington Post, the CIA is in the process of constructing four drone airstrip bases intended to strike AQ affiliates inside Yemen and Somalia. The enhancement of such a program should be welcomed by many, allowing the U.S. to fight this new-age war with new-age technology that does not risk our soldiers lives.

However, with such an intensity and fury coming from drones to target the leadership in faraway places, there is an underlying question. What is really being done here at home to enhance the U.S. in this War on Terror? When President Obama took office, critics questioned if he had the determination and ability to conduct a war. It appears that indeed he has skillfully handled the GWoT in regards to specifics, but like his predecessors, is unwilling to come to a full on confrontation with the pandemic of radicalism.

The real question is legally, are we enhancing our fight and clearly defining the legal abilities of law enforcement in confronting this war? I do not feel as though the outreach mission to incorporate the Muslim community has succeeded and quite honestly, has returned to the pre-9/11 days. Between the media and politicians, we have made this a war about names - similar to the Communist threat from nation states like the USSR. However, this is a war of ideals that has no boundaries or structural organization. Dare I say without OBL's pre-9/11 corporate structuring, Al-Qaeda as a whole will splinter off into the independent franchises based in the Northern Horn of Africa, Arabian Peninsula, and Kashmir/Pakistan.

Pakistan will always play host to a radical faction of jihadists, given its dispute with India, the alliances published most recently regarding the U.S. embassy strike in Kabul will always be an asset to the ISI. Inside Afghanistan and Pakistan, U.S. strategy is seen at odds with the tribal structuring and has done little to incorporate and facilitate a partnership. While most definitely easier said than done, a comprehensive approach to turn the dependence on Taliban and AQ, especially inside Pakistan, would drastically change the dynamics of this conflict that is about winning hearts and minds.

The fact of the matter is we can take out as many leaders as we want, but there will always be this radical jihadist element that will pose the primary national security threat to the U.S. Over the duration of the War on Terror, several major blows to terrorist organizations in Indonesia, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Russia have been facilitated largely by U.S. cooperation in nearly almost every circumstance. We are taking this war to the terrorists doorsteps in, as Pres. George W. Bush stated was necessary so we would not have to fight them on our own streets as we felt on 9/11. While killing off bad guys is easy, defining the legal challenges and alliances in this war is where the real struggle lies.

The Threat Within

Since the September 11 attacks in the United States of 2001, the concept of terrorism was conceived in people's minds that the enemy was some foreign radical element living off in some mountains half-a-world away. The reality is that the enemy is something that could be already inside the United States legally. There are several circumstances where intelligence officials warn that Al-Qaida has trained individuals who, as CIA Director Michael Hayden stated, "wouldn’t attract your attention if they were going through the Customs line at Dulles with you when you’re coming back from overseas.” This warning is one that we seriously need to understand to comprehend the growing threat.

My personal greatest fear is of a "lone wolf" threat as many dub it. The "lone wolf threat" is based on the premise that an individual with no foreign assistance or links is the attacker. This concept allows a person to take up arms without having traveled to a camp in Pakistan or Afghanistan. There are a number of people operating inside the United States who sympathize with Al-Qaida. The New York Times published an article last year discussing the significance of the internet and the jihadist movement. My concern lays in the fact that these people are blatantly promoting violence and terrorism as a form. These websites are developed not as a means to express freedom of speech, but rather to develop the next wave of jihadists. The fact that anybody believes that terrorism in any context is acceptable is one that should be of significant concern.

The proof of such a threat is not very far from recent foiled plots. If you look at the case of the two students arrested in South Carolina or the Liberty City 7, these are examples of how anybody can become a jihadist. Both cases involve people who haven't traveled to play with firearms and monkey bars in Afghanistan terror camps. These people had to first accept the fact that their cause was more important than any other price. Then they accepted jihad as a personal responsibility. The evolution of the terrorist mind is one that is taken for granted. Once a person identifies with the cause, law enforcement should be allowed to utilize all means necessary to make sure that these individuals will not become the next 9/11 hijackers or 7/7 bombers. Juries must understand that the acceptance of terrorism as a means is just as dangerous as the actual act. Once the public accepts this, then we can take pride that we are actually stopping terrorism. Until then, the message of violence that these people promote will continue to grow and create acts of terror.