RENEE MONTAGNE, host:
Four years into the war on terror, Osama bin Laden is still evading capture. The insurgency in Iraq shows no sign of abating, and terrorist incidents worldwide are on the rise. These uncomfortable facts are prompting questions about President Bush's counterterrorism agenda and whether it's been adequately updated since 9/11 to meet the changing nature of the threat. Now a senior administration official tells NPR that over the summer, the administration re-tailored its strategy with a growing emphasis on non-military tactics. NPR's Mary Louise Kelly reports.
MARY LOUISE KELLY reporting:
Ever since 9/11, whenever administration officials are pushed for evidence that the US is winning the war on terror, they point to the number of al-Qaeda leaders who have been killed or captured. President Bush did this just a couple of weeks ago. He was speaking at the Pentagon and a reporter asked him, `Can you really say you're making progress in the war on terror, given that bin Laden is still a free man?'
President GEORGE W. BUSH: Yeah, I can say we're making progress in the war on terror. If you look at the organizational structure of al-Qaeda right after September the 11th and look at it today, you'll see a lot of people have been brought to justice.
KELLY: Critics of this argument, though, will tell you that for every al-Qaeda operative brought to justice or killed, at least one new recruit rises to take his place. Thus, the mounting pressure on the administration to employ other tactics, diplomatic, economic or otherwise. And in fact, in recent months, the administration's thinking on these areas has, quote, "crystalized." That's according to a senior administration official who spoke to NPR on condition he not be named. This official says that while the president and his top advisers still believe they're fighting a war on terror, there's increasing focus on it being a war of ideas. Last month, Juan Zarate, the White House's point man on counterterrorism strategy, gave a speech that was notably short on military imagery and long on talk of how to counter radical ideologies.
Mr. JUAN ZARATE (White House Adviser on Counterterrorism Strategy): There is a struggle within Islam for the hearts, souls and minds of Muslims around the world. We must find constructive and creative ways to bolster and empower the efforts of moderate voices.
KELLY: But some terrorism scholars scoff at such talk. Scott Atrin of the University of Michigan and the National Center for Scientific Research in Paris says the idea of US authorities empowering moderate Muslim voices is doomed to fail.
Mr. SCOTT ATRIN (University of Michigan and the National Center for Scientific Research): If the United States is seen to any extent to support a countervailing voice in the Muslim world, it would be the kiss of death. And that, again, is because the United States is so unpopular.
KELLY: Atrin describes US counterterrorism policy as, quote, "still flailing around in the dark." The problem, as he sees it, is that even now, four years after 9/11, policy-makers in Washington don't understand the nature of the enemy.
Mr. ATRIN: You know, al-Qaeda has not done an attack in nearly three years. I'm talking about the sort of central core, the Egyptian hard core around bin Laden. They know that al-Qaeda, of course, is an ideology. Why do they still talk about it as if it were some planned, centrally staffed world movement?
KELLY: In fairness, administration aides say they have embraced this notion of al-Qaeda as an ideology rather than a group of individual terrorists to be picked off. But this raises the question of semantics. The catch phrase `war on terror' has been controversial from the start. This past summer, Pentagon officials appeared to back off using the term in favor of new wording, `the global struggle against violent extremism.' News organizations, including NPR, picked up on the switch, wondering whether it signaled the arrival of a more nuanced counterterrorism strategy. But President Bush is said to have vetoed the change. The term `war on terror' is back in vogue. Critics such as Rand Beers, who handled terrorism issues for the National Security Council until 2003, says it's evidence the administration's thinking hasn't really changed.
Mr. RAND BEERS (National Security Council, 2003): If you're going to talk about dealing with the ideas, then you need to move away from the war imagery. So I think that it was an important discussion and I'm disappointed that the president chose to remain with the war imagery.
KELLY: The senior administration official dismisses the debate over semantics as much ado about nothing. And, he adds, the notion that this is something other than war understates the determination of our enemy. Mary Louise Kelly, NPR News, Washington.
MONTAGNE: This is NPR News.
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