The core justification for the 20-year military engagement in Afghanistan was preventing terrorism in the West. However, the years since the U.S. withdrawal have seen no major surge in attacks, fundamentally questioning the validity of this long-held strategic assumption.

To anticipate and prevent attacks, it is crucial to listen to adversaries' specific grievances, even if they are abhorrent. The post-9/11 "they hate us because we're free" trope was a strategic oversimplification that ignored years of specific complaints from Al-Qaeda, preventing a more nuanced and effective response.

Long periods of safety and prosperity cause societies to forget the original protective purpose of certain rules and boundaries. This leads to their deconstruction in the name of fairness and inclusion, potentially creating new vulnerabilities.

The political precedent set by the Bush administration—convincing Americans they can have both major wars and tax cuts—has disconnected the public from the true costs of conflict. This mindset makes it easier for governments to enter into tremendously expensive, multi-trillion-dollar quagmires without clear objectives or public accountability for the fiscal trade-offs.

When a country is successful for too long, its citizens forget the difficult and often violent actions required to achieve that prosperity. This ignorance leads to guilt, a weakened national identity, and an inability to make tough decisions for self-preservation.

Countering the "blowback" theory, Harris argues that the perception of jihadist success—like the rise of the ISIS caliphate—is what truly inspires new recruits. Therefore, ensuring jihadists are consistently and publicly defeated is the most effective counter-recruitment strategy.

Long-term societal success can create a generation that takes prosperity for granted. Lacking real existential threats, people may lose historical context and begin to entertain destructive ideologies, forgetting the "tooth and nail" fight required to maintain a stable society.

A leader cannot expect credit for preventing a crisis, such as a nuclear attack, if the general public never felt it was a real threat. Such 'counterfactual' victories are ineffective because they don't solve a problem the average person was worried about.

Constant, incremental escalation desensitizes the public and analysts. What would have been an unthinkable threat months ago is now just another headline. This "boiling frog" effect means we consistently underestimate the severity and risk of the current situation until it's too late.