Counterterrorism requires working with partners that both help and hinder U.S. interests. Consider the United States’ post-9/11 partnership with Pakistan—on one hand, the country provided key counterterrorism cooperation in the War on Terror; at the same time, it remained a state sponsor of terrorism that supported multiple militant organizations, some of which had American blood on their hands. Nonetheless, cooperation with otherwise ‘unfriendly’ states is often unavoidable. With Us and Against Us examines how counterterrorism partnerships after 9/11 critically differ both from the ones that existed beforehand and from traditional alliances. Tankel posits that countries form effective alliances against a terror group when each party to the alliance perceives and prioritizes the threat posed by the group in the same way and does not view the group as vital to advancing its national interests.
Focusing on U.S. partnerships with Algeria, Egypt, Mali, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Yemen against al-Qaeda, ISIS and other jihadist organizations, Tankel analyzes what the U.S. can expect from its counterterrorism partners depending on the country’s set of incentives, threat perceptions, and larger security paradigm. In mapping these partnerships, Tankel argues that although the end of the Cold War and then 9/11 transformed the U.S. security paradigm, the security paradigms of many partner nations in the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia did not change nearly as dramatically. This concept should serve a lodestar when assessing the cooperation partners provide, as well as how these relationships might evolve as future terrorist threats emerge.
