Al-Zawahiri killing shows 'over-the-horizon' counterterrorism can work

Tonight’s announcement that al-Qaeda terrorist Ayman al-Zawahiri was killed over the weekend is the product of years of effort and Americans who paid the ultimate sacrifice. But it is also important to recognize just how wrong the conventional groupthink was about the limits of post-withdrawal counterterrorism.

It cannot be exaggerated how improbable conventional critics of President Biden’s decision to withdraw from Afghanistan insisted today's success would be. The prevailing critique of an over-the-horizon strategy was that it would be nearly impossible to conduct effective counterterrorism strikes without continuing a 20-year failed counterinsurgency. Arguing otherwise became a lonely position in Washington. 

The Biden administration first pitched “over-the-horizon” strike capabilities as a way that the United States could manage counterterrorism after the withdrawal by conducting air and drone strikes from bases outside Afghanistan. It was largely received with sneers and criticism. Much of the criticism is valid from a technical standpoint. An over-the-horizon posture is complicated by less human intelligence, extended flight distances for drones and manned aircraft, and numerous other logistical and intelligence limitations. But it is a more sustainable form of risk management that necessarily diverts from the futile task of risk elimination that dominated the U.S. approach to counterterrorism in Afghanistan over the last twenty years. Furthermore, many of the deficiencies of an over-the-horizon strategy were still a reality even with tens of thousands of U.S. troops in-country, albeit at a significantly higher cost.

This weekend’s strike on Ayman al-Zawahiri represents over-the-horizon at its best: eliminating a high value target based on actionable intelligence, likely with pre-approval by the Commander-in-Chief, and potentially with regional support. This should not be conflated with the unhinged permissiveness of past drone wars which saw thousands of civilians killed based on dubious intelligence or none at all. One under-appreciated benefit of the U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan is that it has forced the U.S. military and intelligence community to truly prioritize threats.