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White House Fact Sheet National Strategy for Counterterrorism
The White House
June 29, 2011
“As a country, we will never tolerate our security being threatened, nor stand idly by when our people have been killed. We will be relentless in defense of our citizens and our friends and allies. We will be true to the values that make us who we are. And on nights like this one, we can say to those families who have lost loved ones to al Qaeda’s terror: Justice has been done.”
–President Barack Obama
May 1, 2011
The National Strategy for Counterterrorism, found here, http://defensealt.org/H1dCDG formalizes the approach that President Obama and his Administration have been pursuing and adapting for the past two and half years to prevent terrorist attacks and to deliver devastating blows against al-Qa’ida, including the successful mission to kill Usama bin Laden.
Rather than defining our entire national security policy, this counterterrorism strategy is one part of President Obama’s larger National Security Strategy, which seeks to advance our enduring national security interests, including our security, prosperity, respect for universal values and global cooperation to meet global challenges.
This Strategy builds upon the progress we have made in the decade since 9/11, in partnership with Congress, to build our counterterrorism and homeland security capacity as a nation. It neither represents a wholesale overhaul—nor a wholesale retention—of previous policies and strategies.
Threat—This Strategy recognizes there are numerous nations and groups that support terrorism to oppose U.S. interests, including Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and HAMAS, and we will use the full range of our foreign policy tools to protect the United States against these threats.
However, the principal focus of this counterterrorism strategy is the network that poses the most direct and significant threat to the United States—al-Qa’ida, its affiliates and its adherents.
Al-Qa’ida has murdered thousands of our citizens, including on 9/11.
Al-Qa’ida affiliates—groups that have aligned with al-Qa’ida—have attempted to attack us, such as Yemen-based al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula’s (AQAP) failed attempt to bomb a Detroit-bound airliner on December 25, 2009.
Al-Qa’ida adherents—individuals, sometimes American citizens, who cooperate with or are inspired by al-Qa’ida—have engaged in terrorism, including the tragic slaughter of our service members at Fort Hood in 2009.
Our Ultimate Objective—This Strategy is clear and precise in our ultimate objective: we will disrupt, dismantle, and ultimately defeat al-Qa’ida—its leadership core in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region, its affiliates and adherents to ensure the security of our citizens and interests.
Our Posture—We are at war. We are waging a broad, sustained, integrated and relentless campaign that harnesses every element of American power to defeat al-Qa’ida.
Our Goals–To defeat al-Qa’ida, we are pursuing specific counterterrorism goals, including:
Our Principles—Our pursuit of these goals is guided by several key principles, including:
Devastating Blows Against Al-Qa’ida—guided by this Strategy, we have achieved significant progress against al-Qa’ida over the past two and a half years.
“On a Path to Defeat”—As President Obama stated in his June 22 remarks on our way forward in Afghanistan, “we have put al Qaeda on a path to defeat, and we will not relent until the job is done.”
Information seized from his compound reveals bin Laden’s concerns about al-Qa’ida’s long-term viability.
Editor’s Comment:
In terms of military means of countering terrorism it has been reported that this Counterterrorism Strategy signals the shift away from large-scale ground interventions in foreign countries and consequently will reduce the requirement for counter-insurgency capabilities in the armed forces. Instead it relies more on special forces assisted by drones to target principals in terrorist organizations.
Time will tell whether COIN is on the way out.
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