Afghanistan, Assad, Ansar al-Sharia: Failed States, Terrorism, and the Future of American National Security
In a world racked by political instability, the future threat of terrorism is on the rise. Though failed states do not present a major threat on their own, they often can, will, and do provide a haven for terrorism and potentially dangerous nonstate actors. Strong government is not the solution to terrorism, nor will it ever be, yet terrorism is a powerful force that can only thrive in a weak state. No country, no matter how “strong” or politically stable, is immune to the dangers of terrorism, yet failed states are most at risk of being overrun. As it navigates the next decade, the primary goal of the United States should be to resolve the issue of failed states and mitigate the threat they pose to U.S. national security.
In order to create a national security strategy concerning failed states, it is first necessary to analyze the threat they pose. Terrorism in failed states can come about in two separate ways: first, terrorist groups can gain traction in failed states because of the state’s lack of monopolized legitimate force. In this instance, states are often dealing with political turmoil or civil war and are especially vulnerable to terrorist attacks. Thus, the threat, in this case, is multifaceted: not only is the nation’s government crumbling at the hands of internal conflict but it has lost its ability to govern and control the activity inside its borders. Recent examples of countries that have been overrun by terrorist groups include Afghanistan, which was conquered by the Taliban in August of 2021.
Civil wars in failed states also have the potential to help grow terrorist groups, as political scientist Alexandar Pasagic notes: “factors contributing to state failure largely overlap with those commonly considered to be root causes of terrorism. Human insecurity conditions play an important role in creating dissent and provide terrorist recruiters with a pool of young men, often unemployed, in conditions of poverty or close to it, disillusioned by the failure of government to provide for their basic needs.” Extremism can be both the side effect of failed states and an impetus for their destruction: movements, such as Boko Haram in Nigeria, not only espouse radical ideologies but use their power to effect regime change, actively undermining Nigeria’s already weak government. Terrorism and state failure are mutually reinforcing phenomena. The weaker a state gets, the number and influence of terrorist organizations increase, thus continuing the state’s downward spiral. State failure in Iraq after the U.S. invasion in 2003 gave rise to the Islamic State, which in turn contributed to Syrian and Iraqi state failure.
Finally, civil wars also allow for the proliferation of conventional weapons for all parties involved—including terrorist groups. The ongoing civil war in Yemen, for example, has allowed the terrorist organization Ansar al-Sharia to grow in power and influence. Because terrorist organizations such as Ansar al-Sharia are comprised of adherents of radical Islam, they are not rational actors and are therefore undeterrable by conventional means.
Aside from preying on vulnerability, the second way in which terrorist groups thrive in failed states is through gaining governmental sponsorship and aid. During moments of governmental vulnerability, states become the primary target of terrorist attacks. As Pasagic continues, “when weak state structures are opposed to terrorist organizations, they themselves become the most common target of terrorism, thus also increasing the number and likelihood of attacks.” Leaders that value maintaining power and a semblance of order will move to sponsor extremism in their nations: instead of competing against ISIS, Syrian strongman Bashar al-Assad supports the terrorist group, making him a “state sponsor of terrorism” in the eyes of the U.S. Department of State. As with capitalizing on turmoil, terrorists that find governmental sponsors are likely to receive large amounts of arms, which, in the hands of radicalized actors, present the threat of an undeterrable use of force, oftentimes on innocent civilians. Thus, failed states pose a serious threat to their own populations and the international community. Political scientist James Piazza puts it clearly: “States rated highly in terms of state failures, irrespective of the type of state failure experienced, are more likely to be targeted by terrorist attacks, more likely to have their nationals commit terrorist attacks in third countries, and are more likely to host active terrorist groups that commit attacks abroad.”
No matter how terrorist groups come to power, failed states pose a major threat to national security interests. The first major threat is that they provide safe havens and convenient bases of operations for terrorist groups, which leads to the unrestricted growth of terrorist groups and the spread of harmful radical ideologies. Once fully collapsed, the borders of a failed state, as Pasagic observes, provide “a territory outside of the influence of legitimate government where such organizations can function with impunity. This makes it possible for them to set up bases for planning and rehearsing attacks, as well as training camps.” Many extremist groups have been able to successfully indoctrinate their members in “madrassas, ” an example of the freedom terrorist groups find inside failed states. From the Arabic for “school,” madrassas are places of Islamic learning. Extremist organizations have erected madrassas in an effort to radicalize the next generation of fighters, and they are highly effective: many current Taliban members were educated in Pakistani madrassas. Seizing on ethnic tensions or religious piety, extremist groups have time and again displayed a remarkable ability to radicalize new members and keep their causes alive.
Once terrorists take control of a failed state, they use the base of operations to project their influence throughout the region. According to Susan E. Rice of the Brookings Institution, “Terrorist organizations take advantage of failing states’ porous borders, of their weak or nonexistent law enforcement and security services, and of their ineffective judicial institutions to move men, weapons, and money around the globe. They smuggle out precious resources like diamonds and narcotics that help fund their operations.” The global drug trade can spill over into the United States and its allies—as of 2021, 90% of global opium was produced by the Taliban in Afghanistan, and Afghan opium accounts for 95% of Europe’s supply. Terrorist groups gain a level of freedom from failed states that they cannot find in a stable one, and that allows them to grow.
Once terrorist groups grow large enough, they can shift from a regional focus to an international one and directly target the United States. Through both madrassas and regional trade, terrorist groups exercise their current power to disrupt U.S. national security and ensure that there will be future jihadists to keep fighting for their cause. Failed states present terrorists with a sanctuary in which to grow their movements and plan their next major attack on the United States.
Another way in which failed states present a threat to U.S. national security is that terrorist organizations inside their borders can create conflicts that develop into regional instability. As Rice continues, “failed states represent a threat to U.S. national security because they often spawn wider regional conflicts, which can substantially weaken security and retard development in their sub-regions… In some extreme cases, these conflicts have exacerbated conditions in neighboring countries, accelerating, though rarely precipitating, their failure.” The porous nature of the borders of failed states not only allows for transnational crime and terrorist recruiting, but also prevents failed states from containing their instability inside the confines of their borders. A failed state, then, poses a threat to most—if not, all—of its neighbors, some of whom could be allies of the United States.
The risks that failed states present are serious, as Rice enumerates: “the costs of such conflicts to the United States are substantial. They include: refugee flows that can reach American shores; conventional weapons proliferation that exacerbates regional instability and strengthens international outlaws; billions spent on humanitarian and peacekeeping assistance; the opportunity costs of lost trade and investment…” Failed states can harm global markets, such as Nigeria and the oil market or global shipping and Somalia. As well as harming American interests, failed states can damage the economic prospects of some of the United States’ closest allies, such as France or the U.K. by both limiting their trade networks and inundating them with refugees, further sparking unrest. Militarily, failed states and the threat of radical Islam existentially threaten Israel, a key ally of the United States and a vital strategic partner.
One of the biggest threats that terrorism poses is that it can never be fully stopped—radicalized jihadists will always find a way to circumvent counterterrorism measures and continue to fight in Allah’s name. Although terrorism and failed states have been a threat long before 9/11, the nature of social media and technology can give terrorists a new avenue to recruit members and foment insurgency. The U.S. should work to target and destroy madrassas that are used to train jihadists and double down on censoring social media recruiting, which will continue to pose a threat in the future. Though the containment of in-person recruiting can prove to be an effective tactic, future efforts to stem online recruiting must be made. Such a policy ties into the deep threat assessment required to combat such a shape-shifting threat. To only attack in-person madrassas would not be to know your enemy—terrorism and extremism are virtually inextinguishable because they adapt. Like tumors, terrorist groups feed on states that are in disrepair and then build in size, metastasizing across the globe. Robust online recruitment plans, then, must be expected and foiled. Terrorism is a force of nature that takes the shape of its container; thus to defeat terrorism is to think one step ahead.
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