Dear Ils,
As I have been preaching here over and over again, Al Qaeda is not an
organisation in the traditional sense. It is a loose network of
groups, sharing the same ideology and the same means and tactics.
Therefore, there is no "head" to "the snake" that could be attacked.
You can read more of the same at the fascinating blog "Global Guerrillas"
Global Guerrillas, 2004, ?MAPPING TERRORIST NETWORKS?, Blog post from
23.April.2004, <http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2004/04/mapping_terrori.html>
What is common to this network, and holds it together? ideology, as
mentioned before; and money, of course. Someone has to fund and
support the operations logistically. Blocking the sources of money
would diminish much of the ability of Al Qaeda to plan and execute
operations. The real heroes of the contemporary war against terrorism,
thus, are lawyers and accountants.
However, it is not as easy as it sounds. First, Al Qaeda doesn't have
an account at Barclays or HSBC under the name "Al Qaeda Inc.". It uses
an elaborate network of formal and informal banking, abusing weak
states and lax banking laws. It also uses funds that disguise
themselves as charities. The contributors don't always know where the
money goes to - the organisations use the sympathy for the suffering
in Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan or Kashmir, in order to lure
contributors, who think they are funding these struggles. Moreover,
even a Western do-gooder might be lured to contribute to a fund for
the "orphans of Palestine" or a charity for the widows of Chechnya. I
am not mentioning here the fact that some people quiet consciously
support Al Qaeda (I'll refer to that later). Thirdly, they use the
regular networks, those also used by international crime syndicates,
to launder and attain funds: drug trafficking, smuggle of human
beings, and even things that seem "harmless" to us. For example, as I
have commented elsewhere on GA, some crime syndicates profit now from
computer and copyright crimes, namely selling all those cheap versions
of copyright protected products: it seems harmless to us (or even
better: beating the big guys, the industry) but it goes to other big
guys, and not nicer. You can read more about the problem to fight
these elaborate mechanisms here:
Kimberley L. Thachuk, May 2002, "Terrorism's Financial Lifeline: Can
It be Severed?", The Institute for National Strategic Studies at the
National Defense University, Paper No. 191
<http://www.ndu.edu/inss/strforum/SF191/sf191.htm>).
911 Commission, "Al Qaeda?s Means and Methods to Raise, Move, and
Use Money" <http://www.9-11commission.gov/staff_statements/911_TerrFin_Ch2.pdf>.
Matthew Levitt, March 2004, "Charitable Organizations and Terrorist Financing:
A War on Terror Status-Check" , Paper presented at a workshop "The
Dimensions of Terrorist Financing", March 19-20, 2004, University of
Pittsburgh Washington Institute for Near East Policy,
<http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/media/levitt/levitt032004.htm>.
I mentioned before, that some people contribute to Al Qaeda quiet
consciously. In Indonesia or Sinai, the terrorists could find locals
who aided them. The support of Al Qaeda or of the terrorist operations
against the West in General and the United States and Israel in
particular, is higher among the general population. In Palestine,
candies were distributed when the news of the attack on the WTC broke.
Hitting the objectives of Al Qaeda means that we must lesser, more and
more, the support in these objectives. We should dilute ourselves:
there will be always people out there that would like to conduct
terror attacks against the innocent. However, by understanding the
sources of the popular support of Al Qaeda, we can understand how to
reduce it.
Strategic thinking, therefore, should not be limited to the
operational/military side, but to other sectors as well. If we check
the places where there is the most hostility against the United
States, we'll find places whose system of education is lagging behind
the world and its contents is full of lies, Holocaust denial and
Anti-Semitism; whose population feels oppressed (but since they cannot
point their anger towards their own repressive regimes, they do it
against the symbolic oppressor, the US); that has much economic
inequality.
Much more focus must be given in that direction: so long that there is
no free media, quality education and oppression in the Arab and Muslim
world, one would find support for these ideologies; just as one found
much support for Guerrilla operations in Latin America during the
years of oppression by military regimes: "According to Rand Corp.
President James Thomson, not only is the West losing the battle to
convince possible recruits of the emptiness of al-Qaeda's message, but
the United States still has little appreciation of the roots of the
anti-West discontent that fuels the terror organization both in terms
of the loyalty exhibited by current adherents and the attraction it
represents to many young men in the Islamic world. Until the West
fully understands that, Thomson says, it risks investing too much
satisfaction in capturing or killing a dozen or two top operatives."
(SOURCE: Jamie Dettmer, 2003, "Beginning of End For Al-Qaeda?",
Insight Magazine , 25 March 2003,
<http://www.insightmag.com/news/2003/04/01/World/Beginning.Of.End.For.AlQaeda-393161.shtml>)
I hope this answers your question. Please contact me if you need any
clarification on this answer before you rate it. |
