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| Terror Networks | ||||
| Cracking al-Qaeda's code | ||||
| 2004-05-09 | ||||
| Last December, Brynjar Lia, an analyst at the private Norwegian Defense Research Establishment, came across a 42-page document in Arabic on the Global Islamic Media Web site, one of many Islamist sites that he routinely surveys for his research on terrorism. Entitled "Jihadi Iraq: Hopes and Dangers" and produced by someone claiming to be part of the Mujahideen Services Center, the document outlined a strategy for breaking up the U.S.-led coalition by directing "painful strikes" at America's allies, particularly Spain. Although impressed by its sophisticated analysis of Spain's domestic politics, Lia concluded that the paper's focus on jihadist activities inside Iraq, where foreign fighters were already attacking coalition partners, would come as little news to the larger intelligence community. "I mentioned it to my wife," Lia recalls, "but only to her." After the Madrid bombings on March 11, however, Lia recalled other salient aspects of "Jihadi Iraq" that he had earlier skimmed over. He and a colleague, Thomas Hegghammer, returned to the document and this time came to a startling conclusion. In both style and substance, the article seemed to bear the markings of an authoritative statement of al Qaeda strategy. Announcing their findings to the Norwegian media, Lia and Hegghammer also posted an overview of their analysis on their institute's Web site on March 19. Since then, the Norwegians have been fielding queries from various intelligence agencies (they won't say which) while scholars and counterterrorism experts have weighed in on the article's significance. But why didn't Lia grasp the document's apparent importance immediately? His initial hesitation underscores the difficulties intelligence analysts face in monitoring a foe whose tactics constantly evolve within an ideological framework that is itself strategically flexible. Those problems are compounded by the chaotic nature of the Internet, which has become one of the jihadists' preferred means of communication. "There are literally hundreds of Islamist Web sites and, at times, up to 50 different addresses related to al Qaeda alone," says Gabriel Weimann, a fellow at the United States Institute of Peace who has been tracking Internet sites for seven years in his work on terrorism and the mass media. "The great challenge is telling who is authentic and who should be analyzed." What struck the Norwegians most on their second reading of the document was that the author of "Jihadi Iraq" seemed to be suggesting that attacks might be necessary beyond Iraq. In fact, the anonymous writer laments "the lack of direct influence of Iraq events on life in Spain," broadly implying that the "painful strikes" should hit closer to home. He also emphasizes that the strikes should take place around the time of the elections. "We think that the Spanish government could not tolerate more than two, maximum three, blows after which it will have to withdraw as a result of popular pressure," he continues. "If its troops still remain in Iraq after these blows, then the victory of the Socialist Party is almost secured, and the withdrawal of the Spanish forces will be on its electoral program." That is not the only passage that appears to have had consequences. The author also advises Sunni jihadists in Iraq to put aside their historic differences with the Shiites and "if possible draw them into combat with the Americans." According to Lia, in September 2003, when the document was purportedly written, such counsel represented a pragmatic shift in al Qaeda policy, which previously reflected Wahhabi-style Islam's contempt for Shiites as takfir, or apostates. But to make such an authoritative decision--and one that appears to have been heeded--suggests that the author had credible standing.
Many experts argue that the use of insider references and coded language, often deriving from Islamic theology and history, is one way of signaling and responding to directions within the jihadist network. "I think there is a set of fingerprints and symbols that identify statements as authoritative," says David Cook, a professor of religious studies at Rice University who has studied the evolution of radical Islamist thought since the defeat of the Taliban. Indeed, the man who appeared on videotape to claim responsibility for the Madrid bombings identified himself as Abu Dujana al-Afghani, which Lia and Hegghammer say may echo the document's reference to Abu Dujana, a companion of the prophet Mohammed known as a particularly fierce fighter. Not everyone buys this textual parsing, however. Adam Dolnik, a fellow at the Institute of Defense and Strategic Studies in Singapore, told the British online magazine Spiked that the references to the Services Center and al-Ayiri were "not particularly telling." Analysts at the Central Intelligence Agency also found the article unremarkable, "a document like any number of other documents," says one intelligence official. Even Weimann notes that Global Islamic Media is not thought to be one of the official al Qaeda Web sites. But at the very least, "Jihadi Iraq" complicates the accepted wisdom that began to form shortly after the destruction of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan--that the radical Islamist threat is now not so much from al Qaeda, the organization, but from a growing movement of loosely affiliated groups. Just last month, Ambassador J. Cofer Black, the State Department's counterterrorism coordinator, testified before Congress that antiterrorism operations had decimated and isolated the al Qaeda leadership, resulting in what Black calls "a lack of clear strategic direction" within the jihadist movement. But some experts see disturbing signs of continued strategic coordination. Husain Haqqani, a Pakistani journalist at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace who has written about "Jihadi Iraq," suggests that the article might come from someone in an informal network of al Qaeda sympathizers, a kind of electronic think tank. What is most striking to Haqqani, however, is the clarity, coherence, and effectiveness of al Qaeda strategy, whether it is formulated by al Qaeda cadres or by fellow travelers. "The biggest problem for those fighting radical Islam," Haqqani says, "is that the ideology that feeds al Qaeda has never been focused upon."
What the ideological al Qaeda does so successfully is to tap into its own radical reading of the Islamic heritage to formulate and validate its plans toward the larger goal of uniting Muslims in one state living under strict religious rule. As a first step in countering this ideological campaign, which appears to be swaying even many moderates, Western intelligence services, Cook says, "should be learning how to interpret and decipher the authority of these strategic documents." If it remains difficult to determine with certainty whether a particular document is authoritative, it is possible, both Cook and Weimann suggest, to discern which documents bear the markings of an authoritative voice. But what should intelligence agencies do with this information? Obviously, Weimann says, they should share it among themselves and with allies. And they should make the jihadist strategies more widely known. "Maybe more public awareness of the ideas in the document would not have prevented the bombings in Madrid," Weimann says. "But the Spanish people might have been more aware of who was targeting them and why they were being targeted." And maybe more reluctant to fulfill al Qaeda's apparent wishes.
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| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #9 Miss Jen - Thank you, Ma'am! Captain Reagan's training films were widely regarded as the most effective - not because of their information, but because surveys of the troops they were aimed at (especially pilots) said that Reagan was the most believable as a typical AMerican soldier, sailor, airman, or Marine. He had the right touch even then. Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2004-05-09 10:57:39 PM |
| #8 Dammit Zenster I said throw the pork chop to the right! The Right! |
| Posted by: Fury 7 2004-05-09 7:16:09 PM |
| #7 I think we should leave the middle east alone completely. Let the neighbouring tribes kill each other off, just like they did in Chechnia before the Russians whent in. Let them concentrate on self destruction instead of vowing revenge on the people who don't care about anything other then what CNN tells them. |
| Posted by: Fem Fatalle 2004-05-09 7:05:19 PM |
| #6 Zipperhead, how many times have you been told to cool your jets? We are doing quite a lot to try and ensure that the IslamoNazis don't stage a successful NBC attack on this country with as vigorous a use as we can get from both Homeland Security and the Patriot Act. At the same time, both our forces stationed overseas in the Middle East and in joint operations with Coalition member countries are working to interdict the enemy with NBC weapons abroad. We don't know how many such attacks have already been aborted through good detective work and surveillance. To suggest that the Bush ("Shrub" to you) Administration is really doing nothing about this, is just flat out wrong. |
| Posted by: Jen 2004-05-09 7:05:05 PM |
| #5 Mike, great background...and you know who headed up Hollywood during WWII (as a member of the military), don't you? Of course, future President Ronald Reagan. |
| Posted by: Jen 2004-05-09 6:55:40 PM |
| #4 His initial hesitation underscores the difficulties intelligence analysts face in monitoring a foe whose tactics constantly evolve within an ideological framework that is itself strategically flexible. Such continual evolution and flexibility must be met with an overarching and inflexible set of responses. I've been doing my best to oultine potential candidates in both the Simulation Gives Glimpse of Nuke Terror and 'Our Enemy Is Not Terrorism' threads. Few people here (or anywhere else for that matter) have provided much in the way of effective alternative strategies. I am still wide-open to anything that can achieve these same results with less chaos. As AzCat said: I fear it's going to take an event of horrific proportion to galvanize public opinion to the point where an open discussion of the nature of the enemy is possible. I don't "fear" this, I know it. Somehow, world leadership needs to be snapped wide awake regarding the pervasive and fatal toxin that global terror represents. If it requires an announcement by the United States that any further atrocities will result in unilateral retaliation against Islamic holy sites, so be it. The clock is running out fast and the current set of tools being employed in our war on terror are woefully inadequate to the task (through no fault of our military). We are confronted with random and vicious brutality which demands a ruthless ferocity that many have not seen since the end of WWII. There is absolutely no logic in waiting until after an American or foreign city is entirely destroyed before asserting a policy of forceful and harsh countermeasures. We already have proof enough of what sort of harm is headed our way. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2004-05-09 6:50:04 PM |
| #3 Dan- IIRC, back during WW2 they had these wonderful little information films that discussed the scope of the Axis threat as far as what the Allies were up against in fairly concise but accurate detail. Maybe it might be time to reintroduce the practice? Those were the 'Why We Fight' series, directed by Frank Capra. They are masterpieces of propaganda (I do not mean that in the pejorative sense, but rather in the technical) that did an excellent job of showing the average American what we were up against. Keep in mind though that the scripts for the first three films were rejected because of what Capra himself called 'Communist influence' - and Capra was no conservative, either. After those scripts were canned, Capra always met with subdued resistance from some writers and producers in making the films, and on several occasions he had to resort to reminders that there was a war on, and the Government could always take over production - and the studio. And that would seem to me to be the problem here. Any attempt at a modern 'WWF' series would be met with horrified shock by modern Hollywood, which seems to consider Michael Moore as an utterly truthful and guileless crusader for right. Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2004-05-09 6:48:06 PM |
| #2 Which is why I think there will be no horrific attack on the U.S.,in the short term. Why would al Qaeda help to galvanize public opinion like it did on 9-11? They won't. No, they will let us devour each other politically. They are much more calculating than we know. We are the jackasses for failing to recognize this. We are in some deep crap. God bless GW and the troops. Brien |
| Posted by: Brien 2004-05-09 8:16:19 AM |
| #1 It's long past time to distribute information like this to the public but it's unfortunately still a political impossibility as any attempt to do so would be met with deafening cries of "Racism!" and "Biggotry!" from the left as it would necessarily have to deal with the tenets of Islam which give rise to groups like al Qaeda. I fear it's going to take an event of horrific proportion to galvanize public opinion to the point where an open discussion of the nature of the enemy is possible. |
| Posted by: AzCat 2004-05-09 3:01:24 AM |