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Begin New Search Topic Terrorism Political Geography United States Content Type Working Paper Publishing Institution Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

1. Silver Bullet? Asking the Right Questions About Conventional Prompt Global Strike

Author:
James M. Acton
Publication Date:
09-2013
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
The development of non-nuclear weapons that can strike distant targets in a short period of time has been a U.S. goal for more than a decade. Advocates argue that such Conventional Prompt Global Strike (CPGS) weapons could be used to counter antisatellite weapons or sophisticated defensive capabilities; deny a new proliferator the ability to employ its nuclear arsenal; and kill high-value terrorists. Critics worry that CPGS weapons could create serious strategic risks, most notably of escalation—including to the nuclear level—in a conflict.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, Terrorism, and War
Political Geography:
United States

2. Simmering Discontent in the Western Sahara

Author:
Anouar Boukhars
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
The Western Sahara, a former Spanish territory annexed by Morocco despite Algerian objections, is a critical region that could quickly become part of the criminal and terrorist networks threatening North Africa and the Sahel. The undergoverned areas abutting the territory are becoming major hubs for drug trafficking, contraband smuggling, and weapons circulation. And Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is extending its reach in the region. The potential for destabilization is real.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Ethnic Conflict, Islam, Terrorism, and Self Determination
Political Geography:
Africa and United States

3. Mauritania's Islamists

Author:
Alex Thurston
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
Islamists have become an important political force in Mauritania since formal Islamist associations first emerged in the 1970s. Islamist activism has contributed to the ongoing Islamization of Mauritanian society, as is evident from the proliferation of mosques and Islamic associations in the capital, Nouakchott, and elsewhere. In the 1990s, political liberalization allowed Islamists to participate in elections as independents, and since its legalization in 2007, Tewassoul, the strongest Islamist party in Mauritania today, has become a significant minority voice in the country's politics and has built ties with Islamists elsewhere in the Arab world. These moderate Islamists who participate in elections hold different beliefs and goals from Mauritania's jihadist fringe. Overall, Mauritanian Islamism does not currently pose a threat to the United States. The mainstream of the movement appears committed to democracy and, even so, is unlikely to take power. Islamist parties like Tewassoul have never captured a large share of the vote in elections, and moderate Islamist leaders have explicitly rejected using violence to take over the state. Indeed, the United States may even find an upside to the Islamists' rise: Mainstream Islamist leaders publicly condemn the Muslim terrorist group Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), which the Mauritanian government has been combating since 2005.
Topic:
Democratization, Islam, Politics, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
United States and North Africa

4. Waiting for the Taliban in Afghanistan

Author:
Gilles Dorronsoro
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
The withdrawal of international forces from Afghanistan will leave the country worse than it was before 2001 in some respects. There is no clear plan for the future. Washington will progressively lose its influence over Kabul, and drone operations in Pakistan are not a credible way to fight jihadist groups on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. The situation will only worsen after 2014, when most U.S. troops are out of the country and aid going to the Afghan government steeply declines.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Islam, Terrorism, War, and Insurgency
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Afghanistan, United States, Washington, and Asia

5. Organized Crime and Conflict in the Sahel-Sahara Region

Author:
Wolfram Lacher
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
For the past decade, increasing instability in the Sahel and Sahara region has been a source of growing concern in Europe and the United States. Western governments have worried that the weakness of state control in the area would allow al-Qaeda in the Islamist Maghreb (AQIM) and other jihadist organizations to expand their influence and establish safe havens in areas outside government control. Such fears appear to have been vindicated by the recent takeover of northern Mali by AQIM and organizations closely associated with it.
Topic:
Crime, Development, Islam, Terrorism, Armed Struggle, Insurgency, and Fragile/Failed State
Political Geography:
Africa, United States, and Europe

6. What Comes Next in Yemen? Al-Qaeda, the Tribes, and State-Building

Author:
Sarah Phillips
Publication Date:
03-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
News that the failed Christmas Day attack on a U.S. passenger jet was tied to al-Qaeda elements in Yemen prompted questions of whether the fractious Arab state might give rise to a Taliban-style regime. For its part, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has stated its intent to achieve “our great Islamic project: establishing an Islamic Caliphate” but it is vulnerable to the threat that Yemen's tribes may ultimately find its presence a liability.
Topic:
Political Violence, Islam, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, Taliban, Yemen, and Arabia

7. Reconciling With the Taliban?: Toward an Alternative Grand Strategy in Afghanistan

Author:
Ashley J. Tellis
Publication Date:
04-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
The run-up to the announcement of President Obama's new "Af-Pak" strategy provoked a flurry of "new solutions" to the conflict. Promoting reconciliation with the Taliban is one idea that has reappeared—even in the administration's own White Paper on U.S. policy toward Afghanistan and Pakistan. While this notion would rightly have been considered ridiculous a few years ago, many in Europe and the United States obviously believe that stabilizing Afghanistan may require just that. In fact, it would be the worst approach at this time—and it is destined to fail so long as key Taliban constituents are convinced that military victory in Afghanistan is inevitable.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Terrorism, and Armed Struggle
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Afghanistan, United States, Europe, and Taliban

8. The Middle East: Evolution of a Broken Regional Order

Author:
Paul Salem
Publication Date:
07-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
The Middle East is broken. The structures and power balances put in place in the late 1970s and amended after the end of the Cold War are no longer. These structures and balances included a number of key elements. Israel was at peace with Egypt and Jordan and in an informal truce with Syria—hence the Arab–Israeli conflict was no longer pursued by any major contiguous state opponents of Israel. A weakened Palestinian movement had been chased out of Lebanon in 1982 and co-opted in the Oslo Accords of 1993. Syria's role in the region was recognized and its influence in Lebanon legitimized—indeed, after 1990, it was promoted to suzerainty. Iraq was bolstered in the 1980s by the United States as a buffer and counterbalance to revolutionary Iran, and later, throughout the 1990s, it was preserved but contained. Saudi Arabia helped manage the finances of this scheme and helped maintain Arab consensus when possible. And the United States saw out the end of Soviet influence in the region, secured a military foothold in the Gulf, and gained in political influence: first as a broker of Israeli–Egyptian peace in the late 1970s, then as the architect of a pro-Iraqi containment policy against revolutionary Iran in the 1980s, as the leader of an Arab and international coalition to liberate Kuwait from an Iraqi invasion in the early 1990s, and as the patron of another major peace initiative launched in the Madrid peace conference.
Topic:
Terrorism
Political Geography:
United States, Iraq, Middle East, Israel, and Egypt

9. Saudi Arabia's “Soft” Counterterrorism Strategy: Prevention, Rehabilitation, and Aftercare

Author:
Christopher Boucek
Publication Date:
09-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
In the aftermath of a wave of deadly terrorist attacks that began in 2003, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia launched a wide-ranging counterterrorism campaign. Central to Saudi counterterrorism efforts has been the use of unconventional “soft” measures designed to combat the intellectual and ideological justifications for violent extremism. The primary objective of this strategy is to engage and combat an ideology that the Saudi government asserts is based on corrupted and deviant interpretations of Islam. The impetus for this soft approach came in large part from the recognition that violent extremism cannot be combated through tradition security measures alone. This Saudi strategy is composed of three interconnected programs aimed at prevention, rehabilitation, and post- release care (PRAC).
Topic:
Terrorism
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, and Saudi Arabia

10. Assessing America's War on Terror: Confronting Insurgency, Cementing Primacy

Author:
Ashley J. Tellis
Publication Date:
12-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
During the 1990s the United States and its allies enjoyed a much sought-after period of prosperity and tranquility following the end of the Cold War. In hindsight, however, it is now apparent that Al Qaeda, a fiercely anti-American global terrorist network, was taking root in over sixty countries during this period, culminating in the devastating September 11 attacks on New York and Washington, D.C. The Bush administration, which had entered office determined to secure U.S. primacy amid the emergence of major power centers in Asia, such as China, soon found itself forced to confront a worldwide Islamist insurgency. This study analyzes the relevance of terrorist groups as substatal actors in international politics, their influence on deeper dynamics of the international system, and the challenges facing the United States posed by transnational terrorist organizations. It argues that international terrorism, although currently salient, does not necessarily replace or even alter the traditional concerns of international politics, but rather subsists among them. On balance, the United States has managed these interlocking challenges with partial success, and needs to pay greater attention to pursuing the legitimacy and protecting the economic foundations of its power. Failing to do so, or waging a poorly defined “war against all,” carries the risk of far-reaching economic and political reverberations that may, in the not-too-distant future, enervate the United States, undermine its legitimacy as the sole superpower, and gradually erode continued American dominance in the world order.
Topic:
Terrorism and War
Political Geography:
United States, China, New York, Washington, Middle East, and Asia

11. Islamists in the Arab World: The Dance Around Democracy

Author:
Graham E. Fuller
Publication Date:
09-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
ARE ISLAM AND DEMOCRACY COMPATIBLE? And are Islamists willing to accept a democratic order and work within it? Debate has swirled around these two grand questions for decades and has produced a broad variety of responses, often quite polarized. Whatever we may think about Islamists, the topic matters vitally because in the Middle East today they have few serious ideological rivals in leading opposition movements against a failing status quo. These Islamist movements are characterized by rapid growth, evolution, change, and diversification. In the Arab world the only ideological competition comes from Arab nationalism, the left, and liberal democracy, in diminishing order of size and importance. More significantly, since the Al Qaeda attacks of September 11, 2001, and the declaration of the Bush administration's war on terrorism, Arab nationalists and the left increasingly share a common cause with the Islamists in the face of growing political confrontation with the United States. This rising hostility shows no abatement as yet and permits political Islam (Islamism) to gain ever greater ground.
Topic:
Security, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, and Arabia

12. WMD in Iraq: Evidence and Implications

Author:
George Perkovich, Joseph Cirincione, Jessica T. Mathews, and Alexis Orton
Publication Date:
01-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
If history is any guide, the war and subsequent occupation and reconstruction of Iraq will shape U.S. relations with the Arab world—and perhaps with the whole Muslim world—for decades, just as prior military occupations altered U.S. relations with Latin America, the Caribbean, Europe, and Asia. What happens in Iraq is also likely to profoundly affect whether and with what degree of effort and success states choose to work together to constrain the spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The war and its aftermath will affect U.S. foreign relations, influence U.S. policies regarding future armed interventions, and alter the international struggle against terrorism. It is a massive understatement, then, to say that a great deal is at stake, on the ground in Iraq, around the world, and in the lessons for the future that will be drawn here at home.
Topic:
Security, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
United States, Iraq, Europe, Middle East, Asia, Arabia, Latin America, and Caribbean

13. The Next Wave: Urgently Needed New Steps to Control Warheads and Fissile Material

Author:
Matthew Bunn
Publication Date:
03-2000
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
Nothing could be more central to U.S. and world security than ensuring that nuclear warheads and their essential ingredients—plutonium and highly enriched uranium (HEU)—do not fall into the hands of terrorists or proliferating states. If plutonium and HEU become regularly available on a nuclear black market, nothing else we do to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons will succeed. Similarly, unless stockpiles of nuclear warheads and fissile materials can be secured, monitored, and verifiably reduced, it will be impossible to achieve deep, transparent, and irreversible reductions in nuclear arms. Measures to control warheads and fissile materials, therefore, are central to the entire global effort to reduce nuclear arms and stem their spread. The tens of thousands of nuclear weapons and hundreds of tons of plutonium and HEU that remain in the U.S. and Russian nuclear stockpiles represent a deadly legacy of the Cold War, and managing them securely must be a top U.S. security policy priority.
Topic:
Security, Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Europe, and Asia