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Last Updated 08/01/11

The U.S. vs. al Qaeda

A history of the War on Terror through three decades of the best Foreign Affairs coverage.

21 Articles

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21 Articles

Buy a Single Copy

Table of Contents

August 08, 2011

Snapshot August 08, 2011

The War on Terror in Retrospect

Anatomy of an Overreaction

Essay July 1975

The Strategy of Terrorism

November/December 1998

Comment November/December 1998

License to Kill: Usama bin Ladin's Declaration of Jihad

March/April 1999

March/April 1999

It Could Happen Here: Facing the New Terrorism

November/December 1999

Essay November/December 1999

The Taliban: Exporting Extremism

November/December 2001

Comment November/December 2001

The Sentry's Solitude

January/February 2002

Essay January/February 2002

Somebody Else's Civil War

Michael Scott Doran

January/February 2002

Essay January/February 2002

America the Vulnerable

Stephen E. Flynn

March/April 2002

Comment March/April 2002

The Reluctant Imperialist: Terrorism, Failed States, and the Case for American Empire

Sebastian Mallaby

September/October 2002

Essay September/October 2002

America's Imperial Ambition

G. John Ikenberry

January/February 2004

Comment January/February 2004

The Law of War in the War on Terror

Response May/June 2004

Combatants or Criminals? How Washington Should Handle Terrorists

Ruth Wedgwood & Kenneth Roth

January/February 2006

January/February 2006

Grading the War on Terrorism

Richard A. Falkenrath

September/October 2006

Comment September/October 2006

Is There Still a Terrorist Threat?: The Myth of the Omnipresent Enemy

Essay May/June 2007

Al Qaeda Strikes Back

November/December 2007

Essay November/December 2007

Can the War on Terror Be Won?

How to Fight the Right War

Philip H. Gordon

July/August 2008

July/August 2008

Terror and the Law

The Limits of Judicial Reasoning in the Post-9/11 World

Curtis A. Bradley

March/April 2011

Essay March/April 2011

How al Qaeda Works

What the Organization's Subsidiaries Say About Its Strength

Essay May/June 2011

Recalibrating Homeland Security

Mobilizing American Society to Prepare for Disaster

Snapshot May 11, 2011

Al Qaeda Without Bin Laden

How Terrorists Cope With their Leader's Death

September/October 2011

Essay September/October 2011

Al Qaeda's Challenge

The Jihadists' War With Islamist Democrats

William McCants