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Rumsfeld approves expansive plans for war on terror

Ann Scott Tyson Washington Post Apr. 23, 2006 12:00 AM

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has approved the military's most ambitious plan yet to fight terrorism around the world and retaliate more rapidly and decisively in the case of another major terrorist attack on the United States, according to defense officials.

The long-awaited campaign plan for the global war on terrorism, as well as two subordinate plans also approved within the past month by Rumsfeld, are considered the Pentagon's highest priority, according to officials familiar with the three documents who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about them publicly.

Details of the plans are secret, but in general they envision a significantly expanded role for the military, in particular a growing force of elite Special Operations troops, in continuous operations to combat terrorism outside war zones such as Iraq and Afghanistan. Developed over about three years by the Special Operations Command in Tampa, they reflect a beefing up of the Pentagon's involvement in domains traditionally handled by the Central Intelligence Agency and State Department.

For example, the command has dispatched small teams of Army Green Berets and other Special Operations troops to U.S. embassies in more than a dozen countries in the Middle East, Asia and Latin America, where they do operational planning and intelligence gathering to enhance the ability to conduct military operations where the United States is not at war.

And in a subtle but important shift contained in a classified order last year, the Pentagon gained the leeway to inform, rather than gain the approval of, the U.S. ambassador before conducting military operations in a foreign country, according to several administration officials. "We do not need ambassador-level approval," said one defense official familiar with the order.

Overall, the plans underscore Rumsfeld's conviction since the September 2001 terrorist attacks that the U.S. military must expand its mission beyond 20th-century conventional warfare by infantry, tanks, ships and fighter jets to fighting shadowy and fleeting non-state groups that are, above all, difficult to find.

The plans each run more than 100 pages and cover a wide range of overt and clandestine military activities - from man-hunting and intelligence gathering on terrorist networks, to attacks on terrorist training camps and recruiting efforts, to partnering with foreign militaries to eliminate terrorist sanctuaries. They amount to a plan that assigns responsibilities to different military commands to conduct what the Pentagon envisions as a long war against terrorism.

The main campaign plan sets priorities, allocates resources such as staffing and funding and coordinates operations between regional military commands to implement the Pentagon's broader National Military Strategic Plan for the War on Terrorism, published in unclassified form in February. It lays out nine key goals, such as targeting terrorist leaders, havens, communications and other logistical support and countering extremist ideology.

A second, more-detailed plan is focused on al-Qaida and associated movements, including more than a dozen groups spread across the Middle East, Central Asia, Southeast Asia and Africa.

A third plan sets out how the military can disrupt and respond to another major terrorist strike on the United States. It includes options on ways for the military to retaliate quickly against specific terrorist groups, individuals or state sponsors depending on who is believed to be behind an attack.