Matthew Levitt is the Fromer-Wexler Senior Fellow and director of the Reinhard Program on Counterterrorism and Intelligence at The Washington Institute.
Articles & Testimony
As the Islamic State devolves from governance to insurgency, NATO should stay close to its traditional role as a military alliance, not a counterterrorism agency.
With the Islamic State defeated in Mosul and on the ropes in Raqqa, NATO is trying to assess what its role could or should be in the post-caliphate phase of the counterterrorism fight to come. The alliance has an important role to play, but it should stick close to its traditional mission and skillset. At its core, NATO is a military alliance, not a counterterrorism (CT) agency.
The spike in international terror incidents in the West and the unrelenting instability rocking the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region provided a stark backdrop for the blunt comments of President Trump about NATO's need to do more on counterterrorism. NATO, then presidential-candidate Trump said in May 2016, was "obsolete."...
