The killing of Awlaki as he left a funeral in Yemen put a spotlight on an important question: how does the U.S. government confront an American terror suspect abroad?
For policymakers, the presence of American jihadists in foreign countries presents several tricky policy problems compared with similar foreign terrorists. In this paper, we explore the costs and benefits of several distinct approaches available to the U.S. government in confronting the threat of Americans fighting jihad against the United States from abroad.
These include:
• Targeting suspects with lethal force.
• Capturing terror suspects and trying them in federal court.
• Capturing suspects and detaining them in military custody.
• Assisting the government of other countries to prosecute suspects on their
own.
• Tolerating the activities of the terror suspects.
Also within this paper, we catalog the American citizens abroad who have joined the jihadist cause and operated overseas, focusing on those Americans who traveled overseas to join the enemy and have not attempted to return.
A Macroview
Bookmarks