A clear-eyed retrospective look at America's War on Terror, told through declassified documents and the ever-evolving foreign policy of the United States towards the Middle East.

America's Long War with Islamist Militancy charts the evolution of American foreign policy towards the Islamist movement from the Cold War to the present. At the center of this book are two intertwined narratives. The first focuses on the evolution of the Islamist movement from the early 20th Century to the present. The influence of the Cold War on the political fortunes of conservative Islam is a central feature of this narrative, as is the changing nature of the jihadist ideology and the proliferation of militant groups in the post-9/11 period.

The second narrative examines the American foreign policy response to the Islamist movement in general and to militant extremism in particular. This second part of the book outlines several distinct stages of American policy and examines the debates within the Washington policy community that shaped that policy. In doing so, the book provides an explanation for the failure of U.S. strategy to achieve its larger goals and offers an alternative way of thinking about Islamism, violence, and the utility of military power in the pursuit of American interests and values.