ABSTRACT
The counter-terrorism effort against al-Qaeda alone will require diverse and sustained military, law-enforcement and intelligence resources that will stretch the capacities of the United States and its allies. During the 1990s, old-style terrorist groups atrophied due to the withdrawal of the Cold War's ideological impetus, were compromised when the uncovered records of complicit communist regimes exposed their operations, or were tamed in peace processes. Al-Qaeda was perceived in most European capitals as a remote and sporadic threat. The 11 September attacks vaulted terrorism back to international centre stage. Al-Qaeda's aims diverge thoroughly and qualitatively from the IRA's and those of most other 'old' terrorist groups. The eleventh of September revealed the apocalyptic intent, global scope, organisational sophistication and operational capabilities that make al-Qaeda an unprecedented terrorist threat, and necessitated an equally unprecedented global counter-terrorism agenda. Given the direness of al-Qaeda's threat, the United States and its allies must nurture finite counter-terrorist resources frugally.
