The War on ISIS and Other Extremist Groups

The United States has demonstrated its ability to deal substantial military defeats to jihadist¹ groups that take territory and thus to constrain jihadist activity. The almost total territorial defeat of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS)² in the past year illustrates this. Yet groups, including ISIS and al-Qaeda, remain resilient, and instability in the Middle East, North Africa and parts of South Asia makes it extremely unlikely that even the defeat of any particular group will end the jihadist threat in those regions.

These conditions suggest the need for foundational evaluation of U.S. goals in its counterterrorism wars, and what is achievable at what cost. Under the Trump administration, the United States has escalated many of these wars and backtracked on the already limited transparency provided regarding them. Assessing the true impact of the Trump administration’s policy changes is difficult in this environment. The scale of the strategic and moral questions that surround the wars requires a more transparent and open discussion.

Over the past year, the United States and its partners have successfully eliminated almost all of ISIS’ territorial holdings in Iraq and Syria. In October 2017, the American-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) liberated Raqqa, the capital of ISIS’ self-proclaimed caliphate, from ISIS control.³ In November, Iraqi forces retook the last town under ISIS control in Iraq.⁴ In early 2018, the United Nations Security Council Committee Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team reported that ISIS “lost control over all remaining urban areas [in Iraq and Syria].”⁵ In April 2018, Col. Ryan Dillon, the spokesman for the counter-ISIS coalition, stated that the group had lost more than 90 percent of the territory it had captured in Iraq and Syria.⁶ In July 2018, the coalition stated that ISIS held only 300 square kilometers of territory in Syria.⁷

The loss of its territory in Iraq and Syria dramatically undercuts ISIS’ claim that it is the caliphate, because the caliphate has historically been a substantial geographic entity, such as the Ottoman Empire, as well as a theological construct.⁸

ISIS’ territorial defeat over the past year reflects a pattern of retreat since September 2014, when the United States commenced airstrikes against the group in the wake of the murder of American journalists held hostage. By September 2016, ISIS had lost key Iraqi cities including Baiji, Fallujah, Ramadi and Tikrit, as well as the Syrian city of Manbij.⁹

The coalition successfully retook eastern Mosul from ISIS in January 2017.¹⁰ In August 2017 Brett McGurk, the U.S. special presidential envoy for the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, estimated that ISIS had ceded operational control in 78 percent of its territory in Iraq and 58 percent of what it controlled in Syria.¹¹

The loss of its territory in Iraq and Syria dramatically undercuts ISIS’ claim that it is the caliphate.

While ISIS’ territorial collapse has been significant, it is important not to exaggerate its extent. ISIS continues to hold small patches of territory. On May 1, 2018, SDF officials noted, “ISIS retains a significant presence near the Iraqi borders from which it seeks to retain safe haven to plan attacks around the world and expand its territory in Syria and Iraq.”¹² ISIS also continues to operate with guerrilla actions in northern Iraq.¹³

Alongside its territorial losses, ISIS has lost many of its key leaders and fighters more generally. According to Gen. Tony Thomas, commander of the U.S. Special Operations Command, as of July 2017 the coalition had killed between 60,000 and 70,000 ISIS fighters.¹⁴

Among the key leaders and operatives killed or captured in the past year:

• Abu Abdel al-Haq: Abu Abdel al-Haq, who had been head of ISIS’ internal security, was arrested in May 2018 as a result of a sting operation.¹⁵
• Salim Benghalem: In November 2017, Salim Benghalem, a French foreign fighter accused of plotting the 2015 Paris attacks and having links to the Charlie Hebdo attackers and Mehdi Nemmouche, who conducted an attack in Brussels in 2014, was killed in an airstrike in Syria, according to family members of his.¹⁶
• Abu Khattab al-Iraqi: On May 26, 2018, Abu Khattab al-Iraqi, who according to the coalition led ISIS’ oil and gas network, was killed during coalition operations in Syria along with three other figures involved in the network.¹⁷
• Tarek Khayat: In early 2018, Tarek Khayat was arrested in Iraq. Khayat provided direction and support to a plot to bomb a flight from Sydney, Australia, according to Australian officials.¹⁸ The plot was a highly sophisticated enabled plot involving the shipping of bomb materials from Turkey.
• Saddam al–Jammel: Saddam al-Jammel, who had been in charge of ISIS’ territory around Deir al-Zour, was arrested as a result of the same sting operation involving Abdel al-Haq in May 2018.¹⁹
• Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh: Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh, two British militants who were part of the group known as “the Beatles” and who were involved in the murder of Western hostages held by ISIS, were captured by U.S.-backed Kurdish forces in January 2018.²⁰ Kotey reportedly had helped enable a foiled attack plot in Britain via online communication.²¹

ISIS leadership losses over the past year built upon substantial losses in earlier years, including Turki al-Binali, ISIS’ top religious authority; Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, who was ISIS’ emir in Syria, its principal spokesman, a key organizer of attacks on the West and a reputed possible replacement in the case of ISIS chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s death; Sami al-Jabouri, who led ISIS’ oil exploitation effort; and Omar al-Shishani, a prominent Chechen ISIS commander.²²

ISIS’ propaganda effort has also suffered setbacks. Key propaganda outputs including ISIS’ English-language magazine Rumiyah appear to have ceased publication.²³ According to the United Nations Sanctions Monitoring Team, “the propaganda machinery of the ISIL core is further decentralizing, and the quality of its material continues to decline.”²⁴ Of particular note, ISIS has claimed a series of attacks that it had no connection to over the past couple of years.²⁵ For example, ISIS claimed an attack at a casino in the Philippines to which it had no connection and appears to have been committed by an indebted gambler; falsely claimed to have placed a bomb at Charles de Gaulle Airport in France; and claimed to be behind the mass shooting in Las Vegas by Stephen Paddock, a claim for which there is absolutely not a shred of evidence.²⁶ Other sources have similarly reported a decline in the extent of ISIS’ propaganda activity.²⁷

ISIS has claimed a series of attacks that it had no connection to over the past couple of years.

While ISIS’ retreat continued in 2018, four challenges caution against overoptimism regarding the swift defeat of the group.

1. Resilience as a Terrorist Organization: A foundational challenge to the defeat of ISIS is the group’s proven ability to continue operating as a resilient terrorist organization even after territorial defeats. On January 15, 2018, ISIS conducted suicide bombings in an eastern Baghdad market, killing more than two dozen people and demonstrating its continued ability to conduct terrorist attacks.²⁸ In July 2018, ISIS killed more than 200 people in a coordinated assault on Syrian government-held territory.²⁹ In 2017, the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point reviewed more than 1,400 ISIS attacks in 16 cities that had been liberated from ISIS — 11 in Iraq and five in Syria — and found that while taking territory back from ISIS was a positive development, “pushing the Islamic State out as the formal governing party in a territory is not a sufficient development when it comes to ending the group’s ability to enact violence against individuals in Iraq and Syria.”³⁰ This is not a new phenomenon. In 2011, New America fellow Brian Fishman noted that while casualties in Iraq’s civil war had declined overall during the successes of the surge, terrorism remained “rampant” and the Islamic State of Iraq — an al-Qaeda affiliate that later morphed into ISIS — remained capable of conducting major attacks.³¹
2. Unresolved Governance Failures and Conflicts: Another challenge is posed by the coalition’s failure to resolve an interlocking set of governance failures and conflicts in Iraq and Syria. ISIS was never the root of the security challenge, but a symptom of larger failures of governance.³² Beyond the difficult challenge of reasserting effective governance in areas previously held by ISIS, transregional conflicts and tensions — including the questions of Kurdish statehood, of Turkey’s role in the region and of a stable end-state for Syria, as well as Sunni-Shia sectarian tensions — will keep driving conflict. If the intertwined regional conflicts are not resolved, the United States and its allies may once again find themselves having won the battle only to lose in “Phase IV” reconstruction and stabilization efforts, as happened previously in Iraq.³³ This challenge was illustrated by the disruption to the campaign against ISIS that occurred when Turkey began bombing Kurdish forces in the northern Syrian city of Afrin.³⁴ In many ways, Iraq has exited the ISIS crisis in far better shape than conventional wisdom expected at the outset of the campaign.³⁵ In Syria, on the other hand, the failure to resolve governance challenges remains extensive and acute.
3. ISIS Affiliates: Another challenge is posed by ISIS’ affiliates outside of Syria and Iraq. The capture of the Philippine city of Marawi by ISIS-affiliated fighters in 2017 amid setbacks for ISIS in Syria and Iraq illustrates this challenge. The recapture of the city by the government illustrates the constraints on the ability of affiliates to resuscitate ISIS’ fortunes. Yet, despite losing its hold in Marawi, ISIS remains a threat in Southeast Asia and the impact of the battle on the local population remains significant.³⁶ Libya has also often been discussed as a potential fallback for ISIS, yet ISIS has been pushed out of the territory it had held there.³⁷ That said, the 2017 Manchester bombing, which was directed by ISIS in Libya, demonstrates the potential for ISIS to use its affiliates, even those that are themselves under pressure, to maintain its campaigns.
4. The Virtual Caliphate: A final challenge is posed by ISIS’ virtual networks — what some have termed a “Virtual Caliphate.” As Mitch Silber, former NYPD director of intelligence analysis, and Jesse Morton, the former leader and cofounder of the Salafi-jihadist group Revolution Muslim, noted in a report for New America, “[a] key lesson of the effort against Revolution Muslim is that countering virtual jihadist recruitment will be an ongoing struggle, and law enforcement and intelligence agencies should not overemphasize the collapse of any particular group.”³⁸ ISIS’ advances on the template for online jihadist organizing may allow it to maintain its strength even as it suffers territorial losses. Even if such activity doesn’t occur under the ISIS brand, such virtual networks will continue to pose a challenge for the future.

Even as ISIS suffers repeated setbacks, al-Qaeda has shown resiliency in the face of the counterterrorism campaigns directed against it and the challenge from within the jihadist movement posed by the rise of ISIS. In August, al-Qaeda marked the 30th anniversary of its founding, making the group one of the longest-lasting terrorist groups in history.³⁹

More than a decade and a half after 9/11, al-Qaeda continues to operate regionally despite the heavy losses it has sustained, including the death of its founder, Osama bin Laden, and of dozens of other al-Qaeda leaders killed in drone strikes in Pakistan and Yemen. Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb all retain capacity for sustained local attacks. As the then-director of the National Counterterrorism Center, Nicholas Rasmussen, explained at the July 2017 Aspen Security Forum, “Not a day goes by where al-Qaeda and the range of al-Qaeda threats we’re managing around the world is not top priority.”⁴⁰

In Syria, al-Qaeda’s fortunes are less clear, though any accounting must acknowledge a substantial al-Qaeda presence in the country. Al-Qaeda in Syria has undergone changes to its naming and organizational design. Initially known as the Nusra Front or Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Qaeda in Syria adopted the name Jabhat Fateh al-Sham in July 2016 to distance itself from al-Qaeda core, though then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper labeled it a “PR move … to create the image of being more moderate.”⁴¹ In January 2017 another rebranding occurred, with the group taking the name Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham.⁴² Regardless of the shifting monikers, the group remained a potent force, as seen by its takeover of Idlib, a prominent city and province in the country’s northwest corner, in July 2017.⁴³ However, according to some analysts, the series of splits and rebrandings represents a meaningful loss of organizational control in Syria on the part of al-Qaeda and a major setback for the group.⁴⁴ Even so, al-Qaeda continues to count the loyalty of large numbers of fighters and to maintain a presence in Syria, demonstrating its resilience.

Even as ISIS suffers repeated setbacks, al-Qaeda has shown resiliency in the face of the counterterrorism campaigns directed against it.

While al-Qaeda has demonstrated its sustained ability to operate locally throughout the Middle East, North Africa and to some extent South Asia, its capability to strike the West is less clear. The last deadly attack in the West directed by al-Qaeda was the 2005 bombing of London’s transportation system, which killed 52 commuters. Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, trained two brothers in Yemen in 2011 who more than three years later attacked the Paris offices of Charlie Hebdo, a satirical magazine.⁴⁵ It is far from clear if AQAP had any real role in directing this attack beyond providing training years before the attack took place.

Despite this poor record of success, al-Qaeda cannot be dismissed as a threat to the West. The lone-known American returnee from Syria to plot an attack in the United States, Abdirahman Sheik Mohamud, was directed to do so by and received training from al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra, not ISIS.⁴⁶ The press release for his guilty plea states, “Mohamud planned to obtain weapons in order to kill military officers or other government employees or people in uniform.”⁴⁷ According to Nathan Sales, the U.S. State Department coordinator for counterterrorism, “AQAP retains the capability and intent to carry out external operations.”⁴⁸ In addition, although ISIS has dominated the branding of inspired attacks in the West, al-Qaeda’s brand — as opposed to that of ISIS — has been cited by a small number of attackers and plotters. For example, Tnuza Hassan, a 19-year-old U.S.-born citizen who was charged with setting a series of fires at St. Catherine University in Minnesota and attempting to provide material support to terrorists, specifically supported al-Qaeda, reportedly telling the FBI that she “was against ISIS” because “they are not part of the true caliphate. Al-Qaida is trying to create the true caliphate.”⁴⁹ In July 2018, Demetrius Pitts, a 48-year-old U.S.-born citizen, was charged with plotting an al-Qaeda attack after an undercover officer-driven investigation.⁵⁰

Al-Qaeda appears to be grooming one of Osama bin Laden’s sons, Hamza, to be a next-generation leader of the group. Hamza, in his late 20s, has long been an al-Qaeda true believer. In May 2017, al-Qaeda released audio in which Hamza called for attacks on the West.⁵¹ In March 2018, Hamza bin Laden appeared in a video where he discussed the U.S.-Saudi relationship.⁵²

Al-Qaeda’s resiliency and its preparation of a next-generation leadership raise the possibility that it could reemerge as a substantial threat to the West. It is also possible that al-Qaeda could feed off of ISIS’ setbacks to regain leadership of the global jihadist movement.⁵³ The possibility of parts of ISIS and al-Qaeda merging cannot be ruled out. At the very least, al-Qaeda’s ability to remain resilient after decades of counterterrorism efforts suggests that ISIS or at least its remnants may similarly be able to continue on long after losing its hold on much of Syria and Iraq.

Beyond the fates of particular organizations, whether al-Qaeda or ISIS, the jihadist movement has proven resilient in the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia in large part as a response to underlying stressors and continuing instability across these regions.

These underlying stressors include the Sunni-Shia sectarian conflict that overlaps with the Saudi-Iran regional proxy war playing out in Syria, Yemen and elsewhere; state collapse across the Middle East and North Africa, most extensively in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Libya; high unemployment and economic strain in much of the region; and an ongoing youth bulge.⁵⁴

This combination of factors, along with trends that reduce the barriers to entry to jihadist organizing including the rise of social media, make it likely that instability will continue in the Middle East and North Africa, and that this instability will enable jihadist activity in the region for the foreseeable future.

Instability will enable jihadist activity in the region for the foreseeable future.

The Arab Spring revolutions have passed for now, and while policymakers should remain attentive to the potential for surges of new revolutionary activity and how they might affect jihadist activity, two other region-shaping political dynamics are worthy of particular attention for their potential to fundamentally reshape the future of jihadist activity.

The first is the reform effort of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Bin Salman has announced a wide-ranging set of initiatives that include economic reforms, advances on women’s rights (including allowing women to drive) and an effort to control extremist religious ideology.⁵⁵ A successful reform effort that reduced the influence of extremist figures could have a profoundly positive effect on the jihadist threat. ISIS’ recruitment in the Arabian Peninsula was enabled and deeply shaped by the close relationships between elites in Saudi Arabia and neighboring countries and jihadists.⁵⁶ However, bin Salman’s reform effort is tied to his moves to consolidate personal power, which has resulted in the arrest of hundreds of prominent Saudis, purportedly as part of an anti-corruption drive, and their detention and alleged physical abuse.⁵⁷ In addition, the crown prince has played a key role in the pursuit of the disastrous war in Yemen, a potential risk to his consolidation of power.⁵⁸ Finally, even if implemented in a sustained and beneficial manner, bin Salman’s reforms could risk a backlash against liberalization that would benefit jihadists.⁵⁹

How bin Salman’s reform project will play out and its impact on jihadism is unclear. However, what is clear is that his effort is having a profound effect on politics in Saudi Arabia and the region that could redefine the jihadist threat and regional politics more broadly.

The second is the potential for the Saudi-Iran or U.S.-Iran proxy wars to escalate to full-scale war. As noted above, there is a Sunni-Shia conflict atop a Saudi-Iran proxy war playing out in many parts of the Middle East. While the consequences of a major escalation give strong reason for both Saudi Arabia and Iran to avoid direct confrontation and keep their conflict in the realm of proxies, a proliferation of flashpoints and the demonstrated ability of groups like Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels to strike inside Saudi Arabia pose the potential for an escalation to more direct conflict.⁶⁰ A major Saudi-Iran escalation would likely turn into an even broader regional conflict.⁶¹

In addition, the United States has reneged on the Iran nuclear deal, and the Trump administration has embraced a more escalatory tone toward Iran.⁶² Outright war remains unlikely but the risk of escalatory incidents between Iran and the U.S. is increasing, and the dangers cannot be ignored.

A major escalation in either of these conflicts would introduce fresh fuel for apocalypticism in the region and do so in a way that aligns with the jihadist ideology that has framed Iran and Shia Muslims as enemies; the consequences of a major escalation could be similar to the regional catastrophe generated by the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq.⁶³

In its first year, the Trump administration embarked upon a reshaping of U.S. policies regarding counterterrorism strikes. However, the extent and nature of these changes remains unclear as there has been little governmental transparency regarding counterterrorism operations under Trump, and what little is known comes from the news media.

During the presidential campaign, then-candidate Donald Trump made comments that suggested an interest in a radical expansion of American counterterrorism operations abroad and a loosening of restrictions regarding civilian casualties. For example, in December 2015, Trump called for the killing of terrorists’ families, saying, “The other thing with the terrorists is you have to take out their families,” while also criticizing the U.S. for “fighting a very politically correct war” against ISIS.⁶⁴

Upon taking office, the Trump administration began a review at senior levels of the National Security Council to roll back Obama-era restrictions on counterterrorism operations.⁶⁵ U.S. officials speaking to the Washington Post outlined the intentions of the review, describing it as an effort to “make it easier for the Pentagon to launch counterterrorism strikes anywhere in the world by lowering the threshold on acceptable civilian casualties and scaling back other constraints imposed by the Obama administration.”⁶⁶

Among these reported policy changes were:

• Transfer of operational authority from the White House to the Pentagon: In a February 2017 proposal to the president, Defense Secretary James Mattis recommended decreasing the decision-making time in the field by ceding tactical decisions to the Pentagon.⁶⁷ Trump obliged, giving autonomy to commanders to authorize strikes.
• Elimination of the “imminent threat” standard: The Trump administration in the summer of 2017 reportedly relaxed the Obama administration’s requirement that the target of strikes outside of war zones pose a “continuing and imminent threat” to Americans.⁶⁸ The administration has not publicly confirmed such a policy change. This reported change was preceded by the Trump administration’s approval of a series of requests to designate “areas of active hostilities,” which loosened such restrictions for specific geographic areas. Trump approved a Pentagon request to designate parts of three Yemeni provinces as “areas of active hostilities” early in his first year in office.⁶⁹ On March 29, 2017, Trump also designated the entirety of Somalia as an “area of active hostilities” for 180 days.⁷⁰
• Expanded Central Intelligence Agency paramilitary authority: The U.S. drone program began under the authority of the CIA. As the CIA is an intelligence organization, all of its paramilitary activities, including lethal operations such as drone strikes, are classified. After years of pressure, the Obama administration shifted the program, in part, to the Department of Defense in an effort to increase the drone program’s transparency. The military publicly reports airstrikes and resulting civilian casualties.⁷¹ In March 2017, in a departure from this Obama-era policy, Trump reportedly secretly granted the CIA new permissions to target and kill suspected militants, moving parts of the program back into the shadows.⁷²

Aside from policy changes, there is reason to believe that the Trump administration’s attitude toward counterterrorism operations and civilian casualties may also have influenced the conduct of strikes. In a worrisome sign potentially echoing his campaign rhetoric, while watching pre-recorded video of a drone strike where the CIA did not fire until the target had moved away from a house containing his family, Trump asked, “Why did you wait?” according to a report by the Washington Post.⁷³

In one of its first major counterterrorism operations, the Trump administration authorized a major ground raid in Yakla, Yemen, reportedly targeting Qasim al-Raymi, the leader of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. The raid resulted in at least 14 civilian deaths, including young children, and the death of Chief Petty Officer William Owens, a member of the Navy’s SEAL Team 6.⁷⁴

The Yakla raid illustrated the new aggressiveness. It was reportedly authorized over dinner following informal presentations from the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Joseph Dunford, and Defense Secretary Mattis, whereas previous authorizations would have involved multiple formal processes for such a raid.⁷⁵ Trump confidants Steve Bannon and Jared Kushner were both reportedly at the dinner despite their lack of expertise and unclear security clearance statuses at the time.⁷⁶ On the other hand, there reportedly was no representation from the State Department, a departure from the previous norm.⁷⁷ Furthermore, according to reporting by NBC, then National Security Advisor Michael Flynn explicitly argued that the raid would be a “game changer” compared to President Obama’s deliberations and hesitancy to authorize strikes.⁷⁸

The Trump administration has also expanded the United States’ armed drone capability to Niger. The United States confirmed that armed drones had been deployed to the country to target militants in early 2018.⁷⁹

It is difficult to assess the nature and impact of the Trump administration’s policy and attitudinal changes regarding counterterrorism operations because of a lack of transparency regarding the new policy. The Trump administration has not released its new guidelines, which replaced the Obama administration’s Presidential Policy Guidance (PPG) on drone strikes. This is a step backward for transparency. In 2016, the Obama administration released the PPG, albeit toward the end of the president’s term, allowing for more public debate and discussion of America’s counterterrorism operations.⁸⁰

It is difficult to assess the nature and impact of the Trump administration’s changes because of a lack of transparency regarding the new policy.

Another warning sign regarding transparency is that the Trump administration decided to ignore an Obama-era executive order that required the administration to report the number of civilian and enemy casualties from American counterterrorism strikes, and was late in publishing a congressionally mandated summary of U.S. military operations that resulted in civilian deaths.⁸¹

While it is difficult to assess the extent and specific nature of policy and attitudinal changes regarding drone strikes under the Trump administration, reporting on the strikes that have occurred suggests that they have resulted in an unprecedented escalation of some of America’s counterterrorism wars during the administration’s first year. That escalation appears to have leveled off and perhaps declined, but remained high in President Trump’s second year.

In Yemen, the Trump administration carried out an unprecedented escalation. The U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) stated that it conducted 131 strikes in Yemen in 2017, as well as multiple ground raids.⁸² That is more than three times the 43 U.S. counterterrorism operations reportedly carried out in 2016, according to New America’s tracking. It is also more than twice the 56 strikes carried out in 2012 at the peak of the campaign, according to New America’s data.

New America, which tracks only individually reported strikes, identified 48 counterterrorism operations in 2017. CENTCOM has repeatedly failed to respond to requests for individualized date and location information on the 131 strikes it reported having carried out in 2017.In 2018, the second year of the Trump administration, the pace of strikes in Yemen has lessened but remains high. As of the end of August, there have been 41 strikes in Yemen in 2018, according to New America’s data. This is far lower than the 131 CENTCOM reported for 2017 but still higher than all but three years of the campaign in Yemen, according to New America’s research.CENTCOM does not acknowledge all of these strikes. In emails to New America, CENTCOM confirmed a total of 34 strikes in Yemen through the end of August 2018 (one in August, two in July, two in June, two in May, four in April, seven in March, six in February, and ten in January).⁸³ It is unclear whether this discrepancy is due to misreporting of strikes by news media or the United States conducting strikes through means other than CENTCOM.

In Somalia, the Trump administration has also escalated strikes. In 2017, the United States carried out 34 strikes in Somalia, according to New America’s research — more than twice the prior peak of 13 strikes in 2016. In 2018, the pace of strikes appears to be slightly lower with 21 reported through the end of August, but still more than any prior year other than 2017.Despite the substantial changes and escalation under Trump, there should be caution in attributing the escalating strikes to him alone. The conduct of America’s counterterrorism wars is driven in large part by conditions on the ground.Notably in Pakistan, the Trump administration has not substantially escalated the drone war.⁸⁴ The administration did end a nine-month pause in reported drone strikes when it conducted a strike in South Waziristan on March 2, 2017. However, the number of strikes has remained low.

The Trump administration conducted only eight strikes in Pakistan in 2017, according to New America’s research. That is fewer strikes than the Obama administration conducted in any year except 2016, when the nine-month pause began. It is also far lower (more than 15 times lower) than the 122 strikes the Obama administration conducted at the peak of the drone campaign in Pakistan in 2010. In 2018, the United States has conducted five drone strikes in Pakistan as of the end of August, according to New America’s research.There are many possible reasons for the decline in strikes in Pakistan. One likely key factor is that the United States now has far fewer troops in Afghanistan than it did in 2010 and thus less need to carry out strikes to protect its forces. Another likely key factor is that Pakistan carried out a major military operation in its northwest tribal regions in 2015 that drove many militants into Afghanistan and killed others, reducing the number of militant targets in Pakistan. Both of these factors illustrate the importance of matters beyond the Trump administration’s policy changes in the conduct of the drone war.

In Libya, the Obama administration carried out a major escalation of airstrikes in 2016, conducting 510 strikes, up from only two in 2015, according to research by New America and Airwars.⁸⁵ This major escalation was the result of a decision in the second half of 2016 to authorize strikes against ISIS in and around Sirte, Libya.⁸⁶ Counter to the thesis that the Trump administration’s particular policies and attitude toward counterterrorism strikes — rather than the context on the ground — have driven an escalation, the number of strikes in Libya fell in 2017 to 17 and again in 2018 to only five strikes as of the end of August, according to New America and Airwars research.⁸⁷Furthermore, even where strikes have escalated, the particular role of Trump can be overstated. The Trump administration’s escalation in Yemen was preceded by an increase in reported strikes from 24 in 2015 to 43 in 2016, the last year of the Obama administration. Similarly in 2016, the Obama administration conducted 13 strikes in Somalia, more than twice as many as in 2015 or in any prior year, according to New America’s research.