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Al-Qaeda as an Adversary do We Understand Our Enemy?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2011

Daniel L. Byman
Daniel L. Byman
Affiliation:
Brookings Institution
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World Politics , Volume 56 , Issue 1 , October 2003 , pp. 139 - 163
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Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 2003

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References

1 After comparing the available studies of the damage of the attacks, the General Accounting Office (GAO) estimated the total impact to be $83 billion. This figure varies considerably depending on which direct and indirect costs are included. The GAO report is available at http://www.house.gov/maloney/gaoreport.pdf.

2 See Roy, Olivier, The Failure of Political Islam (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1996)Google Scholar. Roy contends that Islamist movements focused on gaining power in states have failed to gain power or even a wide following. Roy also describes the growth of what he calls “lumpen-Islamism,” a more atavistic form of political Islam, that would include bin Laden's violent credo.

3 World War III is considered to be the cold war. Eliot Cohen initially articulated the concept of World War IV, but other prominent voices such as former CIA director James Woolsey have also adopted it. See Cohen, Eliot, “World War IV,” Wall Street Journal, November 20, 2001 (electronic version)Google Scholar; Dowd, Maureen, “Neocon Coup at the Department d'Etat,” New York Times, August 6, 2003 (electronic version)Google Scholar. For a view that the threat may be overstated, see Mueller, John, “Harbinger or Aberration? A 9/11 Provocation,” National Interest (Fall 2002)Google Scholar; and Donahue, Laura K., “Fear Itself: Counterterrorism, Individual Rights, and U.S. Foreign Relations Post 9–11,” in Howard, Russell D. and Sawyer, Reid L., eds., Terrorism and Counterterrorism: Understanding the New Security Environment (Guilford, Conn.: McGraw Hill, 2002)Google Scholar.

4 The congressional 9/11 inquiry found that the Central Intelligence Agency had repeatedly warned that al-Qaeda was determined to conduct mass casualty attacks, including on U.S. soil.

5 Cronin, , “Behind the Curve: Globalization and International Terrorism,” International Security 27 (Winter 2002–3), 57Google Scholar.

6 Benjamin and Simon's book is really two books. The first half covers the evolution of the ideology of al-Qaeda and like-minded groups, while the second half examines the counterterrorism policies of the Clinton and Bush administrations, often from a firsthand perspective. While the second hah0 of the book is fascinating, this article focuses on the first half.

7 The readability and thoroughness of these documents vary considerably. The anonymous intelligence officer's book is excruciatingly referenced, perhaps to smooth its public release; the many references help the author prove that he or she is not divulging classified information. Reflecting the authors' nonacademic origins and the mass audiences intended for their books, the Benjamin and Simon tome and Bergen's work have far fewer sources, relying often on their own observations—most of which are lucid and convincing. The translation of Kepel's book is superb. Of the five, Gunaratna's book is the most problematic. Although it often overwhelms the reader in detail, many of its key claims, such as bin Laden's supposed involvement in the assassination of his mentor and partner, Abdullah Azzam, are unsupported. In addition, it often relies on intelligence reporting without so much as a hint of whether the material is from an interview, a document, or a media leak (Gunaratna, 23). Other claims advanced by Gunaratna deserve additional substantiation: a figure attributed to the CIA without further sourcing that terrorist groups have infiltrated one-fifth of Islamic NGOs (p. 6); the size of bin Laden's personal fortune, where he maddeningly cites Swiss and British intelligence as estimating up to $500 million while also citing unnamed intelligence as showing that “in fact” the figure is between $25 and S30 million (p. 19); that Clinton authorized the CIA to kill bin Laden but that the agency failed because it had no human assets in the field (pp. 47–48); the claim that USS Cole was selected as a target because it was an “Arleigh-Burke” class destroyer, the same type of ship as was used to launch the 1998 cruise missiles on Afghanistan (p. 140); and that the U.S. decision not to criminalize Hezbollah leaders led them and al-Qaeda to assume they could freely attack the United States (p. 148).

8 The full text of the speech is available at http://www.cnn.com/2001/US/09/20/gen.bush.transcript/.

9 The full text is available at http://www.fas.org/irp/world/para/docs/980223-fatwa.htm.

10 For an excellent review of the impact of sanctions, see Baram, Amatzia, “The Effect of Iraqi Sanctions: Statistical Pitfalls and Responsibility,” Middle East Journal 54 (Spring 2000)Google Scholar. The text is available at http://www.mideasti.org/articles/baram.html.

11 Bin Laden is not alone in this emphasis. Other leading radicals such as Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, a Lebanese cleric often considered Hezbollah's spiritual leader, and writers associated with the Egyptian Islamic Jihad have also emphasized the importance of power in their work. I would like to thank John Voll for bringing this to my attention.

12 See also Pillar, Paul, Terrorism and U.S. Foreign Policy (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2001), 68Google Scholar.

13 Bin Laden's own ambitions remain mysterious. The anonymous intelligence officer contends that there is little evidence that bin Laden wants to be the next caliph (p. 70). However, the oath of allegiance bin Laden demands of al-Qaeda members evokes the oath once paid to a new caliph, a nuance well understood by any committed Islamist (Benjamin and Simon, 104.)

14 Indeed, Benjamin and Simon argue that at first al-Qaeda itself focused on toppling apostate Muslim regimes (p. 103).

15 The authors note that all references to jihad in the most authoritative collections of the prophet Mohammad's sayings portray jihad as warfare and back up their argument; they refer to Encyclopedia of Islam, s.v. “Djihad” (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2002)Google Scholar. Gunaratna (p. 84), as well as Bergen (p. 100), claims that al-Qaeda's interpretation of jihad as “holy war” is mistaken. Both contend that Mohammad himself saw the more important jihad as a battle against one's own evil nature. This more comforting interpretation of jihad as an internal struggle comes from a relatively nonauthoritative collection of the Prophet's sayings (Benjamin and Simon, p. 73).

16 Terrorist groups often see themselves as on the defensive. See Rapoport, David, “The Politics of Atrocity,” in Rapoport, David and Alexander, Yonah, eds., Terrorism: Interdisciplinary Perspectives (New York: Pergamon, 1977)Google Scholar.

17 Pillar (fn. 12), 67–68.

18 In fact, al-Qaeda regards launching attacks as a goal in and of itself that demonstrates the movement's strength and determination. Bruce Hoffman argues that this perspective is common to religious groups. See Hoffman, “The Modern Terrorist Mindset: Tactics, Targets, and Technologies,” in Howard and Sawyer (fn. 3), 83. For an interesting look at religious violence in several different faiths, see Juergensmeyer, Mark, Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000)Google Scholar.

19 As with many other specific claims, these numbers are unsourced beyond “the CIA.”

20 Thomas Wilshere, statement before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, December 18, 2001, 7.

21 The text of the president's speech is available at http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/islam/s092001.htm.

22 See Ibrahim, Saad Eddin, “Anatomy of Egypt's Militant Islamic Groups: Methodological Note and Preliminary Findings,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 12, no. 4 (1980), 434Google Scholar.

23 The Pew Global Attitudes Project, “View of a Changing World” (June 2003), 20. The document is available at http://www.pewtmsts.com/pdf/vf_pew_research_global_attitudes_0603.pdf.

24 “Faithful, but Not Fanatics,” Economist (June 28, 2003), 50Google Scholar. The article contends that for many who do not share bin Laden's exact ambitions, he has more appeal as a symbol of rebellion than as a model for revolution.

25 Huntington, Samuel P., The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996), 217Google Scholar. Although Huntington made the term famous, it originally appeared in an essay by Lewis, Bernard, “The Roots of Muslim Rage,” Atlantic Monthly 266 (September 1990)Google Scholar.

26 The most pointed criticism is that Huntington overstates the cohesion of “Islamic civilization” and fails to recognize that Muslim (and Arab) states fight among themselves far more than they do with other civilizations. For an exposition on the diversity of Islam, see Geertz, Clifford, “Which Way to Mecca? (Parts I and II)” New York Review of Booh 50, nos. 10–11 (June 12, and July 3, 2003)Google Scholar. The articles are available at http://www.nybooks.com/articles/. Bergen also criticizes this idea, arguing that the “clash of civilizations” is a superficial concept (p. 228).

27 Hoffman, Bruce, “Rethinking Terrorism and Counterterrorism since 9/11,” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 25, no. 5 (2002), 308CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For bin Laden, the clash is not between cultural groups, such as the West, but rather between religious identitie.

28 For example, in mid-1996 al-Qaeda's senior military commander, Abu Ubaydah al-Banshiri, drowned in Lake Victoria. Al-Qaeda also lost Ali Muhammed, its leading trainer, when he was arrested in September 1998. Another huge blow came that month when German authorities arrested Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, a key logistician. Sidi al-Madani al-Tayyib, al-Qaeda chief financial officer, was captured or surrendered to the Saudi government in 1997, and the Saudi regime also arrested three hundred bin Laden supporters in early 1999.

29 McCormick, G. H. and Owen, G., “Security and Coordination in a Clandestine Organizational,” Mathematical and Computer Modeling, no. 31, 175–92Google Scholar.

30 Hoffman (fn. 18), 84.

31 Its cells in Yemen and Somalia ran operations in Africa, Asia was covered from Malaysia and Indonesia, and so on (Gunaratna, 10).

32 Hoffman (fn. 27), 304. Martha Crenshaw argues that, in general, “terrorists are impatient for action”; Crenshaw, “The Logic of Terrorism,” in Howard and Sawyer (fn. 3), 58.

33 For a fascinating account, see Wright, Lawrence, “The Man behind Bin Laden,” New Yorker, September 16,2002Google Scholar (http://www.newyorker.com, accessed on June 11,2003). For more on the rivalry between the Islamic Group and the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, see also Anonymous, 174.

34 For example, the Lebanese Hezbollah, while promoting the concept of Islamic unity regardless of nationality, draws primarily on Lebanese Shias. Similarly, the Palestinian group Hamas recruits Palestinians rather than Arab Muslims more broadlv.

35 Hoffman(fn.27),308.

36 See Weschler, William F., “Follow the Money,” Foreign Affairs 80 (July-August 2001)Google Scholar; Fitzgerald, Paul L., “Tightening the Screws,” National Interest 66 (Winter 2001–2)Google Scholar; and Dunn, Michael, Middle East Policy 6 (October 1998), 23–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

37 Ruthven, Malise, A Fury for God: The Islamist Attack on America (New York: Granta Books, 2002)Google Scholar.

38 Pillar (fn. 12), 55.

39 Analysts have tended to exaggerate the ease with which terrorists could acquire, weaponize, and deliver these weapons in order to kill large numbers. In addition, few terrorist groups are willing to risk the backlash from governments and from potential supporters by using these weapons. Al Qaeda, however, appears to be an exception. See Pillar (fn. 12), 21–24.

40 George Tenet, “The Worldwide Threat in 2003: Evolving Dangers in a Complex World,” February 11, 2003, available at http://www.globalsecurity.org/intell/library/reports/2003/dci_speech_02112003.html.

41 See United Nations, “Report of the Monitoring Group Established Pursuant to Security Council Resolution 1363 (2001) and Extended by Resolutions 1390 (2002) and 1455 (2003).”

42 Amuzegar, Jahangir, “Iran's Crumbling Revolution,” Foreign Affairs 82 (January-February 2003)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

43 McCormick and Owen (fn. 29), 175 fn. 43.

44 Mueller (fn. 3), 50.

45 I would like to thank David Edelstein for this suggestion.

46 For a strong argument on the counterterrorism expertise of the French intelligence services, see Shapiro, Jeremy and Suzan, Benedicte, “The French Experience of Counterterrorism,” Survival 45 (Spring 2003), 67–98Google Scholar.

47 Pillar (fn. 12), 85.

48 “Changing Minds, Winning Peace: A New Strategic Direction for U.S. Public Diplomacy in the Arab and Muslim World,” Report of the Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy for the Arab and Muslim World (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of State, October 1, 2003), 8Google Scholar.

49 Hoffman, Bruce, “The Logic of Suicide Terrorism,” Atlantic Monthly 29 (June 2003)Google Scholar.