Within less than a decade of U.S. presence in Afghanistan, it became clear that the counterinsurgency strategy was not succeeding. The strategy was not initiated when the intervention began. Even after a strategic reassessment in 2009, and the efforts of General Stanley McChrystal, its stringent conditions for success were not met. The Taliban and its bloody insurgency had revived. In Iraq, where it seemed for a time as if some form of counterinsurgency had turned the tide, increasingly hopes were dashed that the country might become a sustainable democracy. The United States and the world economy were in recession and had contracted dramatically. Attention was turning inward – away from these countries. The United States had withdrawn from Iraq in 2011, and had announced plans to substantially withdraw from Afghanistan in 2014.

However, the violent militant insurgency group ISIS, (or the Islamic State), changed both the situation and the boundaries in Iraq and Syria with mass recruitment and successful cross-border assaults. Despite war fatigue and donor disillusionment, the United States managed to cobble together a coalition to counteract the onslaught. The fragile coalition included several Arab nations with varying contributions, as well as the United Kingdom, Australia, France; and an opening to Turkish assistance.

The threat of terrorism – not solely in Iraq and Afghanistan – has demanded many different strategies depending on the circumstances and the country. In Iraq and Syria, counterterrorism was only part of a “hot” war fought with ground troops and conventional bombing. In Yemen and Somalia, it remained essentially a covert operation, until early 2015 when the Yemen government was routed. In Afghanistan, the alternative strategy to counterinsurgency, counterterrorism, came to play a larger part beginning in late 2010, changing the make-up of the intervention.

One central component of a counterterrorism campaign – targeted killing, particularly the use of lethal unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs or drones) – has led to a division of civilian and military roles, and the appropriateness of this division raises difficult questions. This is not a case of the military seeping into traditionally civilian domains; rather, it is one that raises the question of whether civilians – CIA personnel – are performing a military function.