In the second decade of the "war on terror", the United States's anti-insurgency efforts have increasingly moved into the shadows: fewer boots on the ground, more drones and special forces. This can make the US-led coalition's operational failures easier to conceal while hiding the cost of its deeper strategic retreat.
A notable example is a swathe of countries in west-central Africa, where attacks by armed groups with a loose affiliation to al-Qaida or its offshoots are now routine. Their growing campaigns also expose a faultline in the Trump administration's "America first" strategy: how can an enemy be defeated when the tools to oppose it are gradually depleted?
The question is already sharp in the Middle East, where short memories tempt the dangerous notion that ISIS is finished. Yet that movement, despite elements being cornered in a last redoubt in eastern Syria, still has chances to revive its insurgency in Iraq thanks to reconstruction failures and Sunni resentment at marginalisation by a predominantly Shi’a and pro-Iran government (see "Trump vs ISIS: phantom victory", 31 January 2019).
