Current State Department spokesman John Kirby speaks in 2014. | AP Photo State Department: Brussels attacks show terrorists 'under pressure'

For the State Department, Tuesday's terror attacks in Brussels signaled that the Islamic State and other terrorist organizations are "under pressure."

“This is a group that isn’t operating at all the way it used to, and we think that one of the reasons why we are starting to see more of these kinds of attacks — even in Baghdad — is because this group is under some pressure," spokesman Adm. John Kirby told MSNBC.


The attacks at the airport and a metro station Tuesday morning killed at least 34 and injured hundreds. ISIL claimed responsibility for the attacks within hours, though Kirby stated that he was not himself saying the group was responsible.

“Clearly, groups like this have capabilities that we have to take very seriously. And they have threatened Western targets now for a long, long time, and it’s a threat we are all too familiar with, sadly, in trying to better prepare ourselves for," Kirby said in the interview.

ISIL, Kirby continued, is "under increasing pressure in Iraq and Syria, and we are seeing them resort to more traditional terrorist tactics like suicide bombings and car bombs and those kinds of things because they aren’t able to hold and grab the territory they once were because they are suffering a lot of hits to their resources.”