Key Findings

• The United States has demonstrated its ability to deal substantial military defeats to jihadist groups that take territory. Yet jihadist groups remain a resilient threat, forcing a discussion of U.S. objectives and aims in its counterterrorism wars.
• Over the past year, the United States and its partners have successfully eliminated almost all of ISIS’ territorial holdings in Syria and Iraq.
  • ISIS lost its capital, Raqqa, in October 2017 and the last Iraqi town it held in November 2017.
  • The United Nations reports that ISIS has lost all of the urban areas it held in Iraq and Syria.
  • In July 2018, the coalition stated that ISIS held only 300 square kilometers of territory.
  • ISIS’ territorial losses undercut its ability to train and organize terrorist attacks as well as its claim to be the caliphate, traditionally understood as a territorial entity.
  • ISIS’ territorial losses over the past year reflect a pattern that began under the Obama administration.
• ISIS has also continued to face substantial personnel and leadership losses as a result of coalition operations.
• ISIS’ propaganda apparatus has deteriorated under military and other forms of pressure.
  • The apparatus is increasingly decentralized.
  • Multiple studies have found a declining level of propaganda output, and key parts of the propaganda apparatus, including the Rumiyah magazine, appear to have ceased publication.
  • ISIS has made multiple blatantly false claims of responsibility in recent years, including claiming an attack by an indebted gambler in the Philippines and the Las Vegas shooting by Stephen Paddock, despite no evidence of any ISIS role.
• Despite these setbacks, ISIS will likely pose a resilient threat.
  • ISIS continues to hold a small amount of territory, and efforts to retake that territory have been disrupted by a flare-up in the conflict between Turkey and the Kurds.
  • ISIS continues to operate as a guerrilla and terrorist organization. In January 2018, ISIS conducted bombings in Baghdad killing more than two dozen people, and in July 2018 it killed more than 200 people in a raid on Syrian government-held territory.
  • Unresolved governance issues in Iraq and Syria provide fertile ground for jihadists to exploit to stage a resurgence, though the potential for such a resurgence in Iraq should not be overestimated.
  • ISIS’ affiliates will continue to pose their own threat, though they will also face the constraints of U.S. and partner military force. Both of these dynamics were seen in ISIS’ seizure and loss of the Philippine city of Marawi and the fragmentation of ISIS in Libya.
  • ISIS’ virtual networks will likely continue to inspire and organize attacks and provide support for foreign fighter travel in the case of a new fighter flow.
• Al-Qaeda remains a resilient and persistent threat in the Middle East and North Africa. And despite its poor track record on this front in recent years, an al-Qaeda attack in the West cannot be ruled out.
• Regardless of the fate of particular organizations, the Middle East and North Africa remain the site of political and economic instability, likely ensuring a resilient jihadist movement for the foreseeable future.
• Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman’s reform project offers the potential for important positive gains in the effort against jihadism. The impact of the reforms is unclear, but they warrant close attention as they will likely shape the nature of the jihadist threat in coming years.
• Policymakers should also be wary of the potential for an escalation in the Saudi-Iran proxy war or the U.S.-Iran tension that could fuel apocalypticism and benefit jihadism in the region on a scale similar to the aftermath of the 2003 Iraq invasion.
• The Trump administration has reportedly loosened restrictions on drone strikes and the United States’ counterterrorism wars. The administration’s policy changes reportedly include:
  • Transferring the authority to approve strikes to combatant commands.
  • Eliminating the requirement for a target to pose an “imminent threat.”
  • Moving some authority to conduct strikes from the military back to the CIA, where strikes can be covert.
• The Trump administration has backtracked on transparency regarding the U.S. counterterrorism wars, making the extent and impact of these changes difficult to assess.
  • The administration has not released its new policy guidance that replaced the Obama-era Presidential Policy Guidance regarding counterterrorism strikes.
  • The administration has ignored an Obama-era executive order requiring a yearly update on casualties in U.S. counterterrorism strikes.
• The Trump administration has substantially escalated the U.S. drone wars in Yemen and Somalia.
  • In Yemen, the United States conducted 131 counterterrorism strikes in 2017, according to CENTCOM — more than twice the previous peak. There have been 41 strikes in 2018 as of the end of August, according to New America’s research.
  • In Somalia, the United States conducted an unprecedented 34 strikes in 2017 and 21 strikes so far in 2018 as of the end of August, according to New America’s research.
  • However, strikes were already escalating in Yemen and Somalia under the Obama administration, according to New America’s research.
• In contrast, in Pakistan and Libya, the Trump administration has been more restrained in conducting strikes.
  • In 2017, the Trump administration ended a nine-month pause in strikes in Pakistan, but conducted only eight strikes in 2017 and five in 2018 as of the end of August, according to New America’s research, a rate similar to the last years of the Obama administration and far below the peak of the campaign.
  • In 2016, the United States conducted 510 strikes in Libya, mostly aimed at ISIS in the area around Sirte. The war deescalated under the Trump administration with 17 strikes in 2017 and only five strikes in 2018 as of the end of August.
• The jihadist terrorist threat to the United States is relatively limited.
  • Jihadists have killed 104 people in the United States since 9/11. Every one of these deaths is a tragedy. They do not, however, represent the kind of strategic failure that occurred on 9/11. The death toll is far below what many analysts expected after the 9/11 attacks.
  • Neither al-Qaeda, ISIS nor any other foreign terrorist organization has directed a terrorist attack inside the United States since 9/11.
• The number of jihadist terrorism cases in the United States has declined consistently and substantially since 2015, when an unprecedented 80 people were either charged with crimes or died before being charged, compared with only eight people in 2018 as of the end of August.
• ISIS’ losses constrain its ability to target the United States. However, because the threat to the United States was almost entirely from ISIS-inspired or ISIS-enabled attacks rather than ISIS-directed attacks, policymakers should not expect a fundamental shift in the threat as a result of ISIS’ losses. The October 2017 truck ramming attack in Manhattan illustrates the potential for continued attacks.
• The United States is protected by its enormous investment in both defensive and offensive counterterrorism efforts, and it is a much harder target than it was on 9/11.
• The most likely threat to the United States remains attacks inspired or enabled but not directed by ISIS.
• ISIS has executed a successful effort to inspire and organize jihadist violence in the United States.
  • Since 2014, the year ISIS declared its caliphate, 83 people have been killed in jihadist attacks, three-fourths of all deaths in such attacks since 9/11.
  • Since 2014, there have been eight deadly attacks in the United States (seven of which were inspired in part by ISIS), and 12 nonlethal jihadist attacks.
• Despite this threat, caution should be exercised in attributing the attacks solely to jihadist ideology. Many of the attackers had personal issues including histories of nonpolitical violence and mental health problems, and some appear to have been influenced by multiple ideologies and not just jihadism.
• The threat to the United States is almost entirely homegrown. Just under half of jihadist extremists charged in the U.S. were born citizens and 84 percent are citizens or legal permanent residents. About three in ten are converts to Islam.
• The travel ban would not have prevented a single deadly attack since 9/11 nor would it have prevented the 9/11 attacks.
• Jihadists are not the only threat to the United States. Far-right extremists have killed 73 people since 9/11 and have conducted six deadly attacks since the beginning of the Trump administration alone.
• Europe faces a far more severe threat than the United States. Since 2014, it has seen five attacks directed by ISIS that killed 188 people, more than have been killed in any type of jihadist attack inside the United States since 9/11.
• The threat to Europe may be turning the corner.
  • The last attack directed by ISIS core occurred in March 2016, and the last attack by an affiliate was the May 2017 Manchester bombing directed by ISIS in Libya.
  • The number of attacks grew through 2017, driven by an increase in ISIS-inspired attacks, but appears to have declined so far in 2018.
• However, the threat to Europe is elevated compared to the United States due to the large number of European foreign fighters and returnees, the greater size and more established nature of European jihadist networks, the failure of Europe to integrate its Muslim population, rising conflict driven in part by immigration and the growth of anti-immigrant right-wing populism, and Europe’s geographic proximity to conflict zones in North Africa and the Middle East.
• Terrorism will likely be shaped by several key trends in the near future. These include:
  • The use of TATP explosives in particular by attackers with close ties to ISIS or other more organized groups.
  • The rise and increasing popularity of vehicular ramming as a terrorist tactic and the expansion of its current popularity to those not motivated by jihadism.
  • The use of armed drones by terrorist organizations, as demonstrated by ISIS, the Houthi rebels and a variety of other groups.
  • Aviation as a continued focus of jihadist terrorists, being a potential route for groups to conduct mass-casualty attacks while avoiding many of the difficulties of organizing terrorism inside the United States or other Western countries.
  • The continued absence of chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear attacks in the West by jihadists and the reliance upon lower-technology forms of weaponry like vehicular ramming, explosives and firearms. Recent jihadist plots involving ricin and chemical agents require attention to the potential threat, however.
  • The coming release of large numbers of individuals convicted of terrorism-related crimes both in Europe and the United States, and often inadequate efforts to reintegrate them.

Given the state of the threat, we recommend the following:

• The president and his National Security Council should release a public counterterrorism strategy.
• The United States should conduct an assessment and audit of the amount of money spent on counterterrorism efforts since the 9/11 attacks.
• Congress should debate and pass a new Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF).
• The White House should draft and publicly release a report detailing the Trump administration’s policies regarding counterterrorism strikes similar to the Presidential Policy Guidance released by the Obama administration in 2016.
• The Pentagon should provide a public accounting of the countries where the United States is conducting counterterrorism operations and better communicate the existence and role of such operations to legislators and the public. Congress should uphold its responsibility to pay attention to where and why the U.S. is engaged in military action.
• Congress should expand oversight of U.S. counterterrorism strikes and the Pentagon should expand protections against civilian casualties.
• The United States should seek to deescalate conflicts in the Middle East and North Africa.
• The president should end the travel ban.
• The United States government should build trust with rather than alienate Muslim communities.
• The United States should relentlessly hammer home the message that while ISIS has positioned itself as the defender of Muslims, its victims are overwhelmingly Muslim.
• The United States should conduct a review and assessment of alternatives to prison time for convicted jihadists, efforts to prevent radicalization in prison, and the state of preparations for release for those convicted of terrorism-related crimes.