October 16, 2003: Defense Secretary Rumsfeld Wonders If More Terrorists Are Being Created than Eliminated

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld writes a memo to his aides about US efforts to combat terrorism. In it, he asks: “Today we lack metrics to know if we are winning or losing the global war on terror. Are we capturing, killing or deterring and dissuading more terrorists every day than the madrassas and the radical clerics are recruiting, training and deploying against us?” He does not attempt to give an answer. He will be asked a similar question on television in 2005 and answer that he does not know (see June 26, 2005). But a US National Intelligence Estimate in 2006 will comment, “Although we cannot measure the extent of the spread with precision, a large body of all-source reporting indicates that activists identifying themselves as jihadists… are increasing in both number and geographic distribution” (see April 2006). [Salon, 3/27/2008]