Al-Qa’ida (AQ), and in particular Usama Bin Laden (UBL), has become the “boogeyman” of the 21st century. While there are many valid points concerning the AQ threat, just how successful they are conducting operations outside the IO campaign is becoming more and more debatable as evidenced by a growing series of inabilities to capitalize on unstable conditions that AQ had been able to successfully exploit in the past.
AQ’s ongoing organizational transformation, necessitated by their failures and conditions on the battlefields, reveals a terrorist operation that is much different than the pre-9/11 version. Prior to 9/11, AQ was unknown to the average American. However, after the spectacularly successful three pronged attack on 9/11, the world’s attention turned to AQ and it’s mysterious leader UBL.He has since become a household name amassing fame usually reserved for movie stars and former Argentinean doctors on red t-shirts. A deluge of news features, documentaries, articles, reports and books has shaped our understanding, although not always accurate, of AQ and UBL. As most Americans continue to rely on television for their information, a distorted understanding emerges. AQ’s tale is not one conducive to the thirty second sound bite favored by television. Let us put down our remote controls and delve into the true AQ. What do we know about AQ? What should we know? What can we learn by analyzing the gap between what we know and what we should know?
Examining the birth of AQ and their claimed “success” in the Soviet-Mujahideen conflict provides a template through which to view other AQ claims and pronouncements. While UBL has claimed a victory over the Soviets, it should be recalled that he was a low level financier responsible for housing and feeding non Afghan participants. Although he was minimally involved in a firefight, UBL was never a direct combatant. Given that the liberators of Afghanistan were the native Mujahideen backed by the latest in American weaponry and intelligence, UBL’s claim of AQ liberating the country is a lie that perpetuates itself to this day.
In trying to expand their ranks and influence, AQ allied themselves with other like- minded jihadis when they decreed the infamous fatwa ” The World Islamic Front” in February of 1998. The fatwa demanded jihad against the Jews, the Crusaders and their supporters. The fatwa, was an expansion of UBL’s first fatwa issued in 1996. That fatwa was issued without the support of Muslim clerics or scholars. As a reaction to the stinging rebuke from other Muslim leaders, UBL cosigned the 1998 fatwa with four others; Zawahiri, the emir of the Islamic Jihad in Egypt, Taha of the Egyptian Islamic Group, Hamzah, secretary of the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Pakistan, and Rahman of the Jihad Movement in Bangladesh. Immediately after issuing the fatwa UBL’s new coalition started to unravel after Taha, reacting to pressure from his organization, recanted his phoned in support by saying that he misunderstood the fatwa’s message. The net effect for the fatwa was a loss of twenty percent of the initial supporters. Ironically, if Zawahiri had not resisted the pressure from his organization to distance themselves from the fatwa, the new terror alliance may not have survived.
Although the aim of this article is not to review every action taken by UBL and AQ, any analysis would be incomplete without first reviewing the events of 9/11 (for a more in depth review of UBL and AQ see ” The Incompetency of the Jihad,” in the March issue of the NGIA Magazine). UBL claimed that 9/11 was the “tip of the spear” in the jihad against America. However, there have been no successful AQ attacks on America since that fateful day. AQ has made many attempts, but due to the diligence of our law enforcement, intelligence and military agencies, allies and concerned citizens we have remained safe.
This raises legitimate questions about the aspirations and capabilities of the jihadi group. Has there been a change of focus for AQ? Did they replace their far enemy approach with one that focuses on nearer targets? Is the United States and its citizens still the main enemy? Does AQ realistically possess the capability to carry out a major attack on American soil? Sure, all the experts agree that there will be another attack, but will it be conducted by AQ or merely a franchisee seeking the legitimacy granted by affiliating with the world’s most famous terrorist entity?
To help us answer the questions, let us examine the most famous of the franchisees, Al-Qa’ida in Iraq (AQI). The July 2007 National Intelligence Estimate states that the “al-Qa’ida in Iraq (AQI)…have expressed a desire to attack the Homeland.” AQI’s leader, Zarqawi, wanted to take the fight to the American mainland. Since Zarqawi’s death, AQI’s leadership, fronted by an imaginary emir, has laid claim to twelve Iraqi provinces in an attempt to establish a caliphate. This, combined with internecine attacks fomented by AQI, has turned the Sunni community against the AQ foreigners who are not looking to trade one tyrant for another.
Looking deeper one has to ask who was the most prominent figure in AQ after Zarqawi’s group adopted the AQ franchise? Zarqawi because he was actually fighting the infidels on a daily basis. Zarqawi was drawing all the resources from AQ led by UBL to Iraq. An examination of the headlines reveals that Zarqawi was featured very prominently in the media as focus stayed on Iraq and UBL became a disembodied voice that released an occasional tape. Zawahiri felt that Zarqawi had overstepped his boundaries by inciting the violence between the Sunnis and Shias in Iraq which led to Zawahiri rebuking him in a letter that was discovered in Iraq. So when we look at the fact that when Zarqawi was finally caught, the U.S. credited information from inside the AQ organization. Who could have the inside information about the whereabouts of Zarqawi with any certainty? With UBL and Zawahiri losing control of their organization, who would benefit the most from the death of Zarqawi?
This situation is very closely related to another prominent Jihad death, the 1998 car bombing of Abdullah Azzam. To this day it remains a mystery as to who authorized and conducted the attack. After the Afghani war, Azzam was preparing to transfer the Mujahideen to Palestine to destroy the main post World War II enemy of Islam, Israel. However, it should be noted that after the death of Azzam, UBL took over the organization and changed the direction of the organization, so instead of focusing on the Palestinian plight, he advocated the near and far enemy doctrine. So would UBL have been able to conduct the 9/11 attack without the organization that he was now leading? Would UBL have become the most prominent Jihadi if not for the timely death of Azzam? Again who benefited the most from the death of Azzam? In his December 2007 speech UBL made an interesting comment about unifying the Afghan Mujahideen leaders after “removing all obstacles” according to a translation provided by the Mansfield Report.
The crux of 2007 message is that UBL is trying to unify all Muslims worldwide to follow him on his personal path to Jihad. At every turn his offer to unite has been rebuffed because other organizations have different goals in mind. In fact AQI has tried unsuccessfully to unite the diverse terrorist and insurgent groups in Iraq since Jan 2006. This is even after they tried renaming the organization to the Islamic State in Iraq, replacing Zarqawi as the leader of this umbrella organization. UBL even promises his Palestinian brothers that the Jihad will widen to include their cause. However, UBL informs the world that he is busy fighting the Crusaders and keeping them occupied. Although he does list the Palestinians first within the AQ operational areas, it is merely a marketing ploy to gain passive support. If UBL was really interested in the Palestinian then he should have carried out Azzam’s plan to move the Mujahideen; instead he used them to carry out his own visions.
So is there a change in the AQ philosophy on which enemy to attack? Now we find AQ changing the message and trying to inspire the Muslim Ummah to attack Pakistan. This is after the messages that were released last year that threatened Europe, the African Union concerning the situation in Sudan, the United Nations, the United States and Israel. Has AQ made any strides or any major attacks in any of these areas? When we ask the question about an attack, we are not talking about the lone gunmen or local self-radicalized groups that take up the franchise name of AQ. We are asking about the hardcore members of AQ. Where has AQ pulled off a major attack as threatened?
The political turmoil in Pakistan, provided a prime setting for AQ to pull off a major coup. AQ told the people of Pakistan to rise up against the Musharaf government and overthrow their enemy. Given the situation of Musharaf disbanding the supreme court, declaring martial law and declaring his candidacy legitimate. There were uprisings in the street as lawyers and students banded together to protest these changes. AQ put out a call to the people of Pakistan, a perfect opportunity in a land where it is claimed that UBL is a hero and has the support of the people. We should have expected an overthrow immediately after the AQ message. There was no mass uprising. Instead AQ sent a lone child suicide bomber to eliminate Bhutto. AQ’s attempt at destabilizing the government resulted in generating support for AQ’s foe, the Musharraf government.
So nearly 10 years after the fatwa, UBL is being criticized for his engagement with the Americans, losing Afghanistan as a base of operations, still pleading for unity and changing his message on which enemy to fight. The world’s most infamous terrorist organization has been relegated to sending a child to do its dirty work. It seems as if AQ is all over the map with affiliate organizations such as AQI conducting most of the operations and this is becoming increasingly difficult due to the Sunni participation in getting rid of AQI. UBL and his group love to take credit for many of the terrorist operations but one has to critically look to see how involved AQ actually is in these operations. The remaining questions for us is who is really behind the these operations and what is the current real threat?