May the United States continue to be blessed with incompetent and stupid adversaries

The Human Security Brief has released its 2007 report. The headline findings:

Challenging the expert consensus that the threat of global terrorism is increasing, the Human Security Brief 2007 reveals a sharp net decline in the incidence of terrorist violence around the world. Fatalities from terrorism have declined by some 40 percent, while the loose-knit terror network associated with Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda has suffered a dramatic collapse in popular support throughout the Muslim world. The Brief also describes and analyses the extraordinary, but largely unnoticed, positive change in sub-Saharan Africa’s security landscape. The number of conflicts being waged in the region more than halved between 1999 and 2006; the combat toll dropped by 98 percent.

It should be noted that the 40 percent decline is based on excluding Iraq from the count:

The most interesting (and heartening) finding I’ve seen comes from Pakistan:

Wow, it’s almost like once citizens experience terrorism, they become less tolerant of it as a political tactic. Who knew? Seriously, what would be interesting would be if Pakistani support for terrorist tactics increased after the most recent drop in attacks. Click here for more on the report.