War on terror

Dunford Discusses ‘Atomized’ Terror Threat with Global Defense Chiefs: ‘The Enemy Has Adapted’

The chairman said officials have witnessed “increased communications between al-Qaeda and their affiliates in an attempt to broaden the network of individuals who can plan and conduct attacks elsewhere.”

“We’ve seen linkages from al-Qaeda in West Africa to al-Qaeda in Syria, to al-Qaeda in South Asia. So in my judgement, they are trying to regain relevance.  Regain relevance by increasing their network and conduct attacks,” Dunford continued. “…We also want to make sure that where appropriate we can help local forces deal with challenges they have that could become connected to a broader transregional terrorist organization. And that’s what we see al-Qaeda trying to do, is leverage groups in various areas that are disaffected and try to rebrand them with an al-Qaeda brand.”

Dunford said it’s “not a surprise” that “the enemy has adapted” over the past couple of years.

“This was anticipated by the intelligence community. And, frankly, the word the intel community is used is atomized. They’ve become much more dispersed in terms of their command and control. And so when we talk about the success we’ve had to date, we very quickly qualify that by saying we’ve had success to date in dealing with this particular manifestation of ISIS,” the general said. “But we’re under no illusion that we’re dealing with a long-term challenge when it comes to violent extremism, and they will try to adapt.”