Dueling takes on Al Qaeda

I don't have the facts necessary to make an informed opinion--which says a lot about the nature of the enemy. With the Nazis, for example, we could see how many Panzer divisions were left to fight, and knew when Berlin was taken that it was basically over. So, instead I'll just link to this opinion piece in the NYT that claims al-Queda is running out of suicide bombers due to wars in Iraq and Afhganistan:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/10/opinion/10bergman.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin

Dan:

Bruce Hoffman gives out with some cliches. Juan Cole at least provides some analysis. While Cole's conclusions about Afghanistan may be mistaken, they are at least based on some evidence. I'd like to see the blogosphere back and forth on his article.

Al Qaeda's headquarters and its leading lights have moved from Afghanistan and now reside (it appears) in Pakistan. Islamic extremists opposed to the government of Pakistan have established effective control over much of the northwest of Pakistan and even threaten nearby Rawalpindi and Islamabad. This threat induces many in the government, military, and intelligence agencies of Pakistan to favor granting the extremists shelter in Pakistan and a free hand in Afghanistan in return for their laying off the parts of Pakistan still under government control.

The army of Pakistan is reported to be not particularly capable, and many of its leaders remain primarily concerned to get control of Kashmir.

Hoffman says there is conclusive evidence that some of the terrorists who've attacked European targets were trained and supplied by al Qaeda in Pakistan. Even if there isn't, we know from experience that such training and direction can be provided from this general vicinity.

Yet again, though violence in Iraq has diminished, the American presence there has not, and for many (more than a thousand, I'd guess) Muslims it counts as a compelling reason to go over to anti-American extremism.

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs reports that we're losing the war in Afghanistan, and so long as Taliban forces can shelter in Pakistan, we're likely to continue doing so, unless American attacks in Pakistan in violation of its sovereignty can be sustained against the fierce opposition they have elicited.

How's al Qaeda doing? It seems more securely based than it was in 2001, and no less determined to kill Americans.

Cole took pains to be specific on who he thinks has been defeated, the Al Queda that planned and executed 9/11 run by Osama Bin Laden. What has emerged in Pakistan appears to be a different organization.

I would follow Juan Cole.

Al Qaeda as we saw it was defeated in a couple of months after 2001. But Al Qaeda has been a non hierarchical organization loosely knit at the outskirts and tightly controlled and almost paranoid about relationships between the leaders at the center. This Al Qaeda seems defeated.

Yet the method of widespread jihad with decentralized cells seems to have become the norm. Al Qaeda today is more of an idea of "resistance", insurgency, armed uprising (whatever you wanna call it) then a group of people.

Daniel,

Al-Qaeda won when they succeeded in hitting us on 9/11. They won because they changed the paradigm (to use Rumsfeld's words) of how we look at the world. They won because that action made the world an infinitely more dangerous and violent world. They won because America decided to "take her gloves off." They won because America chose to forcibly change regimes wherever she wants to.

It doesn't matter much what Al-Qaeda looks like now, how long-lived or short-lived their organization really is. Juan Cole is correct that the Al-Qaeda of today is not the same as the Al-Qaeda of 9/11, or pre-9/11. That's how fundamental that change was. It could have remained somewhat close to the old order of things had America decided more wisely, but alas, we chose in 2000 to go with the dumber candidate and he naturally made a mess of things.

As terrorist organizations go, Al-Qaeda will follow the traditional path of previous terrorist organizations. They will become defunct, broken up, fragmented, or completely disappear. Terrorist organizations have a very short shelf life if they can't latch themselves on to a state, like Hezbollah or Hamas, for example. Al-Qaeda is completely stateless. The oxygen of any political organization is the support of an organized population in a state system (here meaning not necessarily a Westphalian state, but legitimate support of a large enough population). Al-Qaeda has some support in Pakistan, but it isn't enough to sustain themselves especially with the constant pressure from nation-states that wish the terrorist organization destroyed. Hezbollah and Hamas enjoy popular state support and thus retain sustenance to continue breathing life.

Al-Qaeda, however, breathed all sorts of life into those who want to rebel against the current international system of governance---the nation-state. I think we will continue to see more people desiring to rebel, and to further weaken this fairly corrupt system.

Ummm, Juan Cole pretty much argued that for Al-Qaeda "there is no there, there" any more. Gone. Finito.

Terrorism still exists of course, but no organisation with Al Qaeda's goals or breathtaking global ambitions remains. I think that's largely true; what remains of Al-Qaeda is a clan in Northwest Pakistan. Bin Laden has not been seen in several years & they are incapable of waging effective action far outside that area of Pakistan.

That doesn't mean the war in Afghanistan is won by any means; Cole thinks that the way forward is to allow the Afghans to wage their own war. In the longer term I agree that western forces should be drawn down, perhaps after a 'surge' to bring stability and train Afghan forces, and perhaps allow some semblance of a government to stabilize. The out fershure.

I think Al-Qaeda calls for a different interpretation compared to, say, the IRA or ETA. It is not an army. It is "the base".

Al-Qaeda centralized radical movements from different parts of the world. The guys who did 9/11 where Al-Qaeda, but they joined AQ as members of an Egyptian organizations (the same is true to AQ's affiliated groups in Southeast Asia, I think). AQ provided funding and operational planning to these different radical projects.

Therefore, claiming AQ was defeated because its numbers have shrunk is not accurate. The point is whether it still has the funding and operational capabilities to provide support to radical groups elsewhere.

And, more importantly, are there are many of these groups still flourishing? As Venture Capitalists, AQ may be running out of good projects to fund.

An interesting question: I suspect that, with the exception of Palestine,were Hamas, as the shrewd politicians they are, have not joined AQ, most regions of muslim unrest are now in places that are in US competitors for international hegemony, like China or Russia. Will AQ stick to their radical islamism or to their anti-americanism?

All I care about is that America not be struck again, or, if it is, that casualties be held down two orders of magnitude below those of seven years ago. (This is crass, of course, but let it stand--I will concern myself with London and Madrid if I need England's and Spain's help in preventing attacks on American targets, and I do.)

Cole I assume is right--extremists of bin Laden's ilk have been reduced to impotence by the Saudi and Egyptian regimes.

Those holed up in northwestern Pakistan may be fairly secure against detection and elimination, but communication of any sort with the outside world may be too risky to be ventured. If they took in volunteers to attack American targets, would they risk detection and elimination?

The last time Muslim extremists struck a European target with considerable success was July 2005 in London. They came fairly close in August 2006 with a scheme to bring down several airliners.

Finally, and probably more important, when shaping policy in Afghanistan and Pakistan, should Americans greatly fear that again the region might serve as a launching pad for another 9/11 sort of attack? Should fear of a resurgent al Qaeda drive decisions as to whether to conduct cross border attacks with American forces or what policies to encourage in Islamabad and Kabul?

Two important empirical questions: how dependent were these attacks on support, assistance, training, supplying, financing whatever from the northwest of Pakistan? Do the extremists in that region, notably al Qaeda, have the means (I assume they still have the desire) to instigate attacks on American or European targets?

And does it matter? That is, if they lack the means, can, will Muslim extremists elsewhere--most likely Europe?-- pick up the slack?

Is John Mueller right? Should we --not relax, not let down our guard--but rest assured the chances of another serious attack have been minimized and will continue to be minimal (nearly negligible?) if we just stay the present course? (And be open to improvements that might well cost less than do measures presently in place.)

No. 6 above says, oddly, "It could have remained somewhat close to the old order of things had America decided more wisely, but alas, we chose in 2000 to go with the dumber candidate and he naturally made a mess of things."

I think the problem of going with the other candidate (Gore) was that we WOULD have left things like the old order, of which he and Clinton were a part--regular attacks by jihadists against Americans, undealt with, which of course culminated in 9/11.

Bush may have been the "dumber" candidate (though I don't think so, compared to Gore), but thankfully under his Administration we certainly have not had "the old order of things."

That is a plus, whatever negatives you might want to add to the pile.

It seems that the reason we are having this discussion at all is that no one is really sure. I think a lot of the reason for that is that the Bush administration claims all info regarding their operations against Al Qaeda and other terrorists is confidential. I think we need more information.

This conversation shows that there is a lack of information about this subject. It is due to the Bush administration regarding all terrorist operations as confidential. I think we need to open that up and find out what is going on.

Juan Cole is pretty much right. If I tell you how I know I'd have to kill you.

I have to go with Juan Cole and the consensus so far in the comments section. Cole is indeed quite specific as to which al-Qaidah he is referring to- the one financed and more or less administered by Usama bin Laden. THAT al-Qaidah is, for all intents and purposes, dead. Bruce Hoffman in contrast does NOT tell us what he means by al-Qaidah.
Both Juan Cole and John Robb (of the blogsite Global Guerrillas and the book War Made New) have pointed out numerous times in the past that none of the groups carrying the name al-Qaidah, either in Iraq or Algeria or anywhere else, have any genealogical or organizational relationship whatsoever with bin Laden. It's the terrorist equivalent of Linnux: it's an open-source name, and anyone can start his own al-Qaidah branch and his group would at this point be just as legitimate as any other al-Qaidah group, and none of these versions has any demonstrated relationship with any of the other al-Qaidah start-ups. Hoffman seems not to realize this.

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