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Obama
is not claiming final victory over extremists who still seek to kill
Americans and other Westerners. Instead, he is refocusing the long
struggle against terrorism that lies ahead, steering the United States
away from what he calls an equally frightening threat - a country in a
state of perpetual war. In doing so, Obama recasts the image of the
terrorists themselves, from enemy warriors to cowardly thugs and resets
the relationship between the U.S. and Islam.
His
speech Thursday was designed to move America's mindset away from a war
footing and refine and recalibrate his own counterterrorism strategy.
Obama asserted that al-Qaida is "on the path to defeat," reducing the
scale of terrorism to pre-Sept. 11 levels. That means that with the
Afghanistan war winding down, Obama is unlikely to commit troops in
large numbers to any conflict - in Syria or other countries struggling
with instability in the uncertain aftermath of the Arab Spring - unless,
as his critics fear, he tragically has underestimated al-Qaida's
staying power.
"Wishing the defeat of
terrorists does not make it so," said Rep. Mac Thornberry, a Texas
Republican who is vice chairman of the House Armed Services Committee
and a member of the House Intelligence Committee.
In Thornberry's view, Obama is pushing the idea that "we can simply declare al-Qaida beaten and go back to the pre-9/11 era."
From
the beginning of his presidency, Obama's centerpiece of his national
security strategy has been a desire to move beyond the wars he inherited
in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as in the shadowy spaces occupied by
al-Qaida and its offshoots now creeping up in North Africa and
elsewhere.
Those endeavors consumed enormous
amounts of his administration's time and attention during his first
term, not to mention the incalculable costs paid by military members and
their families.
"This war, like all wars, must end," he said. "That's what history advises. That's what our democracy demands."
As Obama edges toward a new approach to national security, his political opponents are quick to raise doubts.
"Too
often, this president has sought to end combat operations through
rhetoric rather than reality," GOP Rep. Howard P. "Buck" McKeon of
California, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said Friday.
"He
has declared the war in Iraq over, but the insurgency there continues.
He has declared an end to combat operations in Afghanistan, but the
Taliban fight on. He has now declared the war on terrorism over, despite
a terrorist attack in Britain this week, a terrorist attack in Boston
last month and a terrorist attack in Libya that left a U.S. ambassador
and three other Americans dead last year."
Yet
the president cautioned against a return to what he called a
complacency in counterterrorism before Islamic extremists hijacked U.S.
jetliners and slammed them into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
"Make
no mistake," he said, "our nation is still threatened by terrorists,"
noting that the deadly attacks in Benghazi, Libya, last September and in
Boston last month were tragic reminders.
But
he also left little doubt that he thinks it is time to turn the page on
the post-9/11 approach. He was referring not only to the controversial
use of armed drones to target terrorists in Pakistan, Afghanistan and
other countries, but also the commitment of tens of thousands of U.S.
ground troops in conventional fighting.
"For
all the focus on the use of force, force alone cannot make us safe," he
said. "We cannot use force everywhere that a radical ideology takes
root," adding that "a perpetual war - through drones or Special Forces
or troop deployments - will prove self-defeating and alter our country
in troubling way."
Some counterterrorism
experts long have argued that the global war on terror should be brought
to a close, and that some of the policies and programs put in place
after 9/11 should be reconsidered and possibly changed.
James
Lewis, a national security expert at the Center for Strategic and
International Studies, argues for a more traditional approach to
battling terrorism, largely through law enforcement and the intelligence
community.
Lewis said that ending the fight
against terrorism will help reinforce the administration's message that
America is not at war with Islam.
"It helps,
because it delegitimizes the terrorists," said Lewis. "They want to
think of themselves as warriors. We want the world to think of them as
crooks. We want everyone in every country not to think of them as
terrorists defending Islam, but as people who are psychos. They are
criminals, and that's what we want to paint them as."
That is closely in line with Obama's description of what remains of the terrorist threat.
He
said core al-Qaida, the organization formerly led by Osama bin Laden,
is "a shell of its former self." The president said that while one of
its most troublesome affiliates, al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, is a
force to be reckoned with, "in the years to come, not every collection
of thugs that labels themselves al-Qaida will pose a credible threat to
the United States."
He also cautioned against the threat of homegrown extremists and said terrorism may never go away entirely.
"But
as we shape our response, we have to recognize that the scale of this
threat closely resembles the types of attacks we faced before 9/11," he
said.
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