The West is not losing the war against terror because it lacks intelligence, technology, or power. It is losing because it lacks clear recognition of the magnitude of the enemy-and the will to fight. Political leaders increasingly acknowledge that the threat confronting them is coordinated, ideological, transnational, and state-sponsored. It is not a series of isolated crimes or the work of deranged individuals. Yet they stop short of accepting the institutional consequences of that reality.
We are already in a global war. What we lack is the doctrine, legal framework, and strategic resolve to fight it as such.
The massacre of Jews at Bondi Beach may prove a tipping point. Like the attacks from Pittsburgh to Paris, and elsewhere, it was not an isolated eruption of violence but a battlefield action in a coordinated campaign. Iran, the likely sponsor, has made its intent explicit: to globalize the intifada and carry sustained violence into the heart of Western societies. As often observed-but still not taken seriously-Jews are targeted first because they are the most visible and historically familiar enemy. They will not be the last. They are the early warning system.
The problem today is less denial than inertia. Western governments recognize the pattern, yet continue to respond with structures designed for a different era. Condemnations are issued, security tightened, symbolic gestures performed-but the underlying architecture remains unchanged. Wars are not won by recognition alone. They are won by adapting strategy to the reality of the battlefield.
Israel learned this lesson at catastrophic cost. For years, it attempted to contain terror through measured responses-seeking temporary quiet through barriers, deterrence, limited strikes, and ceasefires. This approach, often reinforced by international pressure, assumed that terror networks could be managed indefinitely. That assumption collapsed on October 7.
Terror cannot be managed. It must be defeated. As I wrote in a 2003 article in The American Spectator, Israel cannot win asymmetric wars through “ceaseless ceasefires”, but only through victory. With the intifada now spreading like wildfire, that lesson must be globalized.
The difficulty lies not in identifying the enemy, but in updating the rules by which we confront this threat. The legal and strategic frameworks governing war were designed for a world of sovereign states, defined borders, and identifiable fronts. That world no longer exists. Today’s adversaries operate across jurisdictions, exploit open societies and weaponize sovereignty while rejecting its obligations.
In a global conflict against non-state actors, sovereignty must become conditional. States must be required to confront rather than tolerate or quietly collude with terrorist group operating within their borders. When training camps, command centers, or logistical hubs are established on a nation’s territory, that nation must dismantle them within a verifiable timeframe. If the Bondi attackers visited a training camp in the Philippines, the host country bears responsibility. If Lebanon will not or cannot degrade Hezbollah, others must.
Failure-whether through incapacity, corruption, or complicity-cannot remain consequence-free. Collective enforcement is not a violation of international order; it is its modernization.
This leads to what might be termed the Matilda Doctrine: a unified Western strategy that moves from recognition to action. Its components exist in fragments, but have never been integrated into a sustained framework.
First, intelligence must be fully integrated. Terror networks do not respect borders, yet intelligence sharing remains constrained by national silos and political hesitation. Information about radicalization hubs, financing pipelines, recruitment networks, and training sites must flow freely among allies. The traditional “need-to-know” culture must give way to a “need-to-share” imperative.
Second, the war must dismantle the enemy’s financial and logistical backbone. Victory will not come from eliminating operatives alone. Terror networks depend on funding streams, charities, digital platforms, ideological infrastructure, and state sponsors. Financial warfare-targeting banks, front organizations, platforms, and regimes-must be sustained, not episodic. Wars are won by collapsing an enemy’s capacity to function, not merely by killing its foot soldiers.
Third, states that tolerate terror infrastructure must face escalating consequences-economic, diplomatic, cyber, and, if necessary, kinetic. Neutrality cannot be a shield when it enables mass murder. Conditional sovereignty is not radical; it is overdue.
Fourth, ideology must be confronted directly. Jihadist violence cannot be defeated without challenging the belief systems that sanctify it. Contrary to claims that ideology cannot be changed, history suggests otherwise. The American occupation of Germany after World War II used the Nazi propaganda infrastructure to systematically dismantle Nazi ideology through media, education, and institutional reform. Many Islamic societies have moderated their doctrines, and large segments of Christianity have moved from Judeophobia to Judeophilia.
Finally, moral clarity must be restored. Too many Western leaders confuse hesitation with wisdom, or tolerate incitement to gain votes. History teaches the opposite. Tolerance in the face of totalitarian violence is not humanitarianism; it is an invitation to catastrophe. This war is not against a religion, but against movements that glorify death and seek civilizational destruction. That fact does not depend on context.
Skeptics argue that this battle cannot be decisively won. But past wars were not fought because victory was guaranteed; they were fought because surrender to barbarism was unacceptable. The infrastructure for victory already exists. The Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS killed tens of thousands of terrorists, liberated major cities, collapsed the caliphate, and freed millions from tyranny. That coalition can be redefined as an allied force in a declared global war on terror. Operation Inherent Resolve must live up to its name by broadening its scope and strengthening its resolve.
The recently renamed U.S. Department of War should live up to its mandate: Fight a war, when necessary, rather than defensive retaliation. Regrettably, Secretary Pete Hegseth described the response to the recent murder of three Americans in Syria as a “declaration of vengeance”, not the beginning of a war. Vengeance may be emotionally satisfying, but it is morally questionable and politically useless. Wars are not won by vengeance. They are won by strategy, resolve, and clarity of purpose.
The consequences of delay are already visible. When synagogues require armed guards, the war has come home. When public celebrations are canceled or encased in concrete barriers, it has reached the neighborhood. When families hesitate before attending concerts, markets, or walking safely through their own streets, ground has already been lost.
Globalizing the war on terror is not a call for endless conflict, but for restoring security, freedom, and decency. If the fire is not extinguished at its source, the entire building will burn. The question is no longer whether the West can afford to fight this war as a war. It is whether it can afford not to.
Dr. Robert Marc Schwartzis a psychologist and former Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Psychology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. He has published pioneering scientific work on positive psychology and consciousness, and political commentary in The American Spectator, Christian Science Monitor, Jerusalem Post, Arutz Sheva, Times of Israel, and others.