During an appearance on Fox News late last week, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claimed that “Al-Qaeda is a shadow of its former self.” His assertion is noteworthy for a few reasons. First, President Obama and his advisers used the exact same phrasing for several years, even as ISIS, an offshoot of al-Qaeda, grew in power and al-Qaeda itself spread throughout much of the Middle East and North Africa.
Tom Joscelyn is a senior fellow at Just Security.
