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Paul Leighton
Rather than writing a detailed
introduction, I will refer readers to the full text
of a chapter Mark Hamm graciously allowed to be
posted here. It's called Al-Qaeda,
the Radical Right and Beyond: The Current Terrorist
Threat and it is from his new book. I think it
provides an excellent review of what has happened
since 9/11 as well as some important thoughts for
the future.
One important worth noting
comes from an article written by Kean and Hamilton,
the 9/11 Commission Chair and Vice-Chair. Their
article, Are
We Any Safer Today? notes: "Six years
later, we are safer in a narrow sense: We have not
been attacked, and our defenses are better. But we
have become distracted and complacent." (Washington
Post, Sept 9, 2007, B1). They note slow movement
on a number of reforms and a very resilient enemy.
Of particular significance for the editors of this
website is their comment:
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We face a rising tide of
radicalization and rage in the Muslim world -- a trend
to which our own actions have contributed. The enduring
threat is not Osama
bin Laden but young Muslims with no jobs and no
hope, who are angry with their own governments and
increasingly see the United States as an enemy of Islam.
Four years ago, then-Defense
Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld famously asked his
advisers: "Are we capturing, killing or deterring
and dissuading more terrorists every day than the
madrassas and the radical clerics are recruiting,
training and deploying against us?"
The answer is no.
U.S. foreign policy has not
stemmed the rising tide of extremism in the Muslim
world. In July 2004, the 9/11 commission recommended
putting foreign policy at the center of our
counterterrorism efforts. Instead, we have lost ground.
The
concern about foreign policy also expressed in my chapter,
Demystifying
Terrorism: 'Crazy Islamic Terrorists Who Hate Us Because
We're Free'? The full text of that chapter is
available on this site, and as a preview I answer that
they're not crazy.
With the
recent video from bin Laden, it is worth commenting
briefly on him and al Qaeda. I have kept my page
on bin Laden as the photo of the moment for a while,
not just because I've been busy, but because I never
bought into the belief we had somehow won and his
organization was neutralized. I think this reinforces the
resilience of the enemy and think bin Laden is important
as an inspiration to many, who is also a shrewd ringleader
for al Qaeda. A Washington Post article The
New al Qaeda Central discussed the recent failure to
keep the pressure on bin Laden, which has given him the
chance to regroup, recruit and promote loyalists from
within. Part of their take:
"All
this business about them being isolated or cut off is
whistling past the graveyard," said Michael Scheuer,
a former CIA analyst who led the agency's unit assigned
to track bin Laden. "We're looking at an
organization that is extraordinarily adept at succession
planning. They were built to survive, like the Afghans
were against the Russians."
So, in a
nutshell, we have a vibrant al Qaeda that is easily
recruiting from the ranks of people radicalized by what
the US is doing in Iraq. Kean and Hamilton are worried
about nuclear proliferation and terrorism; Mark Hamm is
worried about chemical weapons and terrorism.
We should
be studying these issues all year round, not just thinking
about them once a year on the anniversary of Sept
11.
