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So, why I gave up on my goal to work in counterterrorism efforts.
I applied to the CIA when I was 21 because I wanted to serve my country and work in intelligence.
I went to Harvard when I was 23 so that I can increase my knowledge of and experience in counterterrorism and security studies in the Middle East.
I interned at INTERPOL when I was 24 so that I could work in their Counterterrorism Division and contribute to the global fight against terrorism.
I traveled to Northern Iraq twice, when I was 24 and 25, so that I can speak to people who are actually involved in guerilla warfare and terrorism, and gain a different perspective for my research on why terrorist groups endure.
I applied to the FBI when I was 25, then worked at Reuters’s Terrorism and Insurgency Research Unit so that I can continue to gain experience.
At Reuters, I specialized in terrorist groups in the Middle East, primarily groups like the Islamic State and al-Nusra Front. As I tracked these groups and gained a deeper insight into their operations and organizational structure, it was here that I realized how futile this fight is.
See, terrorism endures. It will continue to endure, so long as counterterrorism efforts consist entirely of military tactics, drone warfare, and government policies and UN sanctions that don’t target the root of the problem. Terrorism is an idea, and the idea has spread rapidly, especially over the past two decades.
Take, for example, the Islamic State. What we call IS today is actually an organization that is nearly 20 years old. The group is the epitome of persistence – they have moved their base of operations from Afghanistan to Northern Iraq to Syria, and they have gone through countless leadership changes. Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, who was leader of IS, was reported killed in April 2010. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was quickly announced as the next leader, but there were no confirmations of his existence. I was still at Reuters when the first video of Abu Bakr was released in July 2014; it was a video of him making a speech at the Grand Mosque in Mosul -- a city US/coalition troops fought so hard to free during the Iraq War. We lost so many in this city; yet, only years later, the leader of one of the most dangerous terrorist groups in the history of the world is making a speech and declaring his victory.
The same with other organizations. Osama bin Laden is dead? Well, his number two, al-Zawahiri, quickly took over, and the al-Qaeda franchise endures. As we saw in Boston, in Paris, in Brussels, and in Dhaka, homegrown terrorism doesn’t even require operational assistance from al-Qaeda or IS -- all that is required is the persistence of an idea.
At the CIA, I would have become a case officer, being sent to the Middle East to recruit assets that would provide information to prevent the next big attack. At INTERPOL, I would have continued tracking fugitives with terrorism ties and analyzing how pirate networks in Somalia are possibly funding al-Shabaab. At the FBI, I would have supported domestic intelligence operations to identify terrorist cells operating in the US. And at Reuters, I would have continued to research the operations of the hundreds of terrorist groups operating in the Middle East.
But none of these positions would have allowed me to make a true difference in this fight. I would have been a tiny cog in an ever-expanding machine -- truly, a speck of dust in the mammoth that is America’s counterterrorism efforts.
Ideas kill ideas. I wanted to be in the business of producing new ideas, spreading positive ones, and countering negative ones. And I realized a job with the US government, or in any counterterrorism organization, would not allow me the freedom to explore how I can influence people at the human level.
So, I’m in the entertainment industry right now, in a country that is ostensibly far removed from terrorism. But staying in the US would not have allowed me to do the things I do right now or get my name out there. I’m still far from being in any way an influential figure, but I’m hoping that eventually, I can utilize whatever fame and notiriety I can get from this work to influence not just Japan, but also the world, in a positive way.
And that is why I quit counterterrorism.