The discrepancy between the Pentagon's vision for SOF and facts on the ground tends to support suspicions that that vision actually reflects an attempt by the DOD's civilian leadership to ensure that it retains primary bureaucratic authority over the prosecution of the War on Terror-in spite of the Iraq problems that have lowered its stock and the loss of some dod intelligence authority to the new national intelligence directorate. Whatever the motivation, the Pentagon has in fact begun to use sof aggressively and problematically.

Especially since the Iraq insurgency arose, the dod's enthusiasm for special operations as a counter-terrorism tool has led to an emphasis on direct action on the part of SOF. This has occurred mainly in Iraq and Afghanistan, the two locales in which about 80 percent of active American sof are presently deployed. One conspicuous example of its success was the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of Al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia, in June 2006-an air operation made possible by intelligence developed by SOF. Some of the more novel SOF activities in friendly countries with functioning civilian security apparatuses have had more unfortunate consequences. In late 2004, a covert American sof team (known as a "military liaison element") authorized by the Pentagon had to be withdrawn from Paraguay after killing a street criminal and causing the United States-which had not disclosed the team's deployment to the host government-diplomatic embarrassment. The teams now operate under more restrictive guidelines, but CIA officials view them as conducive to unilateral U.S. military activity that could ultimately impair operational as well as diplomatic relationships with other governments. Moreover, clandestine U.S. civilian collaboration with authorities in countries harboring terrorists-e.g. in the arrest of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in Pakistan and that of Al-Qaeda-Jemaah Islamiya liaison Riduan Isamuddin (known also as Hambali) in Thailand-have yielded more frequent and durable gains.

Highly Selective Engagement

There remain a couple of areas in which robust sof activity stands to make a substantial and positive difference. Both are essentially non-kinetic. The first area is foreign internal defense (FID), which in practical usage is shorthand for the SOCOM mission of training SOF in other countries to better secure their respective territories. U.S. Central Command, for example, established an FID program for providing counter-terrorism training to allies and partners in the Middle East. The program was conceived in early 2001, formalized after the September 11 attacks and set in motion in January 2002. The first foreign SOF trained were Yemeni Special Forces, and their initial targets were the Al-Qaeda bombers who attacked the USS Cole in 2000. While American sof have operated in Philippine territory to assist indigenous forces, political sensitivities over American impingement on Philippine sovereignty bar extensive direct U.S. military involvement. The same considerations apply even more acutely to Indonesia and Malaysia. Thus, if the U.S. military is to effect better counter-terrorism in the Philippines, the most promising avenue is through training Philippine SOF. In fact, U.S. Navy seals have trained their Philippine counterparts in maritime special operations and intelligence collection, and the Filipino seals subsequently had greater success against Abu Sayyaf and the MILF.

Even with respect to places in which the United States lacks an effective state counter-terrorism partner, political constraints arguably make FID a preferable instrument to direct action insofar as it can improve the security capabilities of regional allies with minimum political turbulence. In Somalia, for example, the secular Transitional Federal Government (TFG) is friendly to the United States, though it wields little or no power on the ground. The Ethiopian government, however, is a strong U.S. counter-terrorism partner, a staunch opponent of Islamism and an ally of TFG President Abdullahi Yusuf. In the 1990s, with the United States' blessing, Ethiopia defeated Al-Ittihad Al-Islami, a pre-existing Somali radical Islamist movement that had established terrorist training camps. Ethiopia strengthened its troop presence on the Somali border after the Islamists took control of Mogadishu last June. The United States could probably ask Ethiopia to eliminate any terrorist enclaves that might arise in Somalia. Ethiopia's capacity to do so swiftly, efficiently and discreetly should be considered an asset in the campaign against Islamist terrorism, given that conspicuous and indiscriminate U.S. military action is prone to antagonize radicals and produce fresh terrorist recruits. And the United States can enhance that capacity-as well as that of other partners in the region, like Kenya-by bolstering FID through training provided by U.S. SOF. It goes almost without saying that SOCOM's FID training in Iraq, which has been extensive and reportedly quite effective, will be a key determinant of whether Iraq is able to control civil unrest and become politically viable and functionally self-sufficient.

The second area in which American and other SOF are liable to constitute a useful counter-terrorism tool is intelligence collection. Civilian agencies are generally best suited to the traditional methods of human intelligence and intercepting communications. In hostile or unruly environments where it is difficult to establish the usual civilian espionage apparatus, however, SOF can add UAVs and, for urban environments, close target reconnaissance-which involves the collection of real-time intelligence on terrorist targets by covert operatives-to the menu. Both means would yield intelligence that could be shared with government officials of the host country or, if they do not (yet) have sufficient operational capability to act on it, used by American SOF as a basis for direct action.

SOF activity along these lines could improve the ability of counter-terrorism allies and partners or the assisting country directly to deny terrorists access to, and freedom of action in, the territory in question. But the likelihood that jihadists will continue to operate mainly in cities in which civilian agencies retain primary authority over security, coupled with the negative effects that the Western application of military force can have on Muslim perceptions and the "war of ideas", suggests that the utility of SOF in the domain of counter-terrorism will probably remain limited, even if the generally greater deniability of special operations makes them more attractive than conventional warfare.

The Future of SOF

There is no doubt that direct action by sof can produce notable tactical successes, as it did in Afghanistan. And to the extent that counter-terrorism on a global scale involves military action, SOF-style direct action may well be more important and appropriate than the often overwhelming force applied by the conventional military-which is geared to fight the large armies fielded by states rather than non-state groups applying asymmetrical methods and frequently causes extensive collateral damage that hurts the United States politically. But the United States' strategic endeavor to counter transnational terrorism will not pivot on direct military action of any kind-conventional or unconventional. Rather, it will critically involve diplomatic alliances, operational cooperation and coordination among civilian law enforcement and intelligence agencies, and effective strategic communications with Muslim populations that portend a more agreeable relationship between Islam and Western governments perceived as inimical to it. All three elements indicate that extensive U.S. military activity is unwise.

In this light, and given the expected rise of China's military along with its economic clout, American military priorities-stated as well as real-will probably revert to a focus on fighting the nation's conventional wars. Despite the grand verbiage about the role of sof in the QDR and the NMSP, the lion's share of the U.S. defense budget, including its post-9/11 increases, is devoted to new or legacy large-scale platforms that are geared primarily to executing conventional military missions. But while SOCOM is not likely to grow any larger than the level contemplated by the QDR, residual terrorism concerns may preclude any reversal of SOCOM's status as a supported command. This would not be a bad thing. But SOF's steady role in the age of sacred terror should center on firming up the capacities of partner states to manage their own security by providing them with training and, when the opportunity arises, actionable intelligence. They should not be regarded primarily as a global swat team.

Jonathan Stevenson is a professor of strategic studies in the Strategic Research Department at the U.S. Naval War College. This article reflects only the views of the author and not the official position of the Naval War College, the U.S. Navy, or the Department of Defense.

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