Al-Qaeda: Is the Past Prologue? (New info on Planned Attacks & Recap)

Additionally, al-Qaeda has threatened to poison drinking water in major U.S. cities. In fact, the terror network may have tried to poison an American embassy in early 2002. The Al-Majallah news magazine, published in Britain, reported that Abu Mohammed al-Ablaj, a spokesman for al-Qaeda, threatened that the group is capable of using contaminants to kill Americans in their homes with their drinking water, in the May 25, 2003 edition. “Al-Qaeda [does not rule out] using sarin gas and poisoning drinking water in U.S. and Western cities... They should not therefore rule out the possibility that we will present them with our capabilities,” al-Ablaj said. Although some U.S. Department of State officials discount the information conveyed by al-Ablaj, other officials from many U.S. agencies point out that the spokesman contacted the magazine just weeks before the Riyadh bombings, warning that al-Qaeda was about to carry out multiple attacks against the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

“It is very difficult to covertly poison a reservoir. It would take many truckloads of poison, which would make it difficult to do secretly. That is not really a viable threat,” said one U.S. intelligence official, speaking to the Washington Times also on the condition of anonymity. The official also played down even the risk of an attack on a single office building. “It’s more feasible if they try to poison a specific building, but even then, the volume of water already going through the system would dilute whatever was introduced. It would be very difficult to kill anyone. What would happen would be that people would get sick, which would cause panic.” However, in February 2002, Italian police arrested four Moroccans in Rome believed to be al-Qaeda supporters. They were carrying nine pounds of cyanide and maps of the capital’s water supply marking the U.S. Embassy’s location.

According to Thomas Sanderson, Deputy Director of the Transnational Threats Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, waging an attack of this magnitude is not possible. “I don’t think it’s feasible at all; our water is constantly treated and tested,” he said. However, Sanderson asserted that there are ways to scare the public into believing that an attack was carried out. “They can plant materials elsewhere to create a panic. For instance, planting empty barrels that are marked ‘cyanide’ near a water supply.”

According to Daniel Pipes, author and the executive director and founder of the Middle East Forum, the amount of Islamist-sponsored terrorism in the U.S. is sure to increase dramatically in the next few years. Pipes asserted that with each successful attempt, Islamists would continue to believe that the U.S. is weakening and will be further demoralized. “I think that the U.S. is going to be more and more determined and therefore be ready to combat these attacks,” said Pipes. He also said that the main problem with which American officials must grapple is not Islamic fundamentalists coming in from the Middle East and Europe, but monitoring the extremists who already live in the U.S., “utilizing American resources against us.”

It appears that al-Qaeda might be shifting its focus from hijackings to well-planned assassinations of world leaders and Western diplomats, as well as bombings of “soft targets.”

The entire article, which is worth archiving...

JINSA Online, May 27, 2004

Al-Qaeda: Is the Past Prologue?

Intelligence Officials Warn of Possible al-Qaeda Attacks This Summer as al-Qaeda Reinvents Itself

American intelligence sources have voiced new concerns that al-Qaeda members may be inside the U.S. and planning a major attack this summer. Although the Department of Homeland Security has yet to raise the national threat level from its current “yellow” status, intelligence offices have reported that recent intercepts indicate that terrorists may be planning an attack at any one of the high-profile events taking place over the next few months. The events include the Republican National Convention in New York, the Democratic National Convention in Boston, the World War II memorial dedication ceremony in Washington, D.C. on May 29, and the G-8 Summit in Sea Island, Georgia.

An FBI bulletin issued between May 17-21, 2004 urged local law enforcement officials to keep especially alert for suicide bombers and people dressed suspiciously. One counterterrorism official, told the Washington Post on condition of anonymity that al-Qaeda is planning an attack designed to kill as many people as possible, and is focusing on soft targets such as passenger trains and commercial centers. Although President Bush has said that over two-thirds of al-Qaeda’s pre-9/11 leadership has been captured or killed, CIA Director George Tenet said that that fact does not diminish the threat because many terrorist groups that previously did not work together are now combining their efforts against the U.S.

“It is very difficult to covertly poison a reservoir. It would take many truckloads of poison, which would make it difficult to do secretly. That is not really a viable threat,” said one U.S. intelligence official, speaking to the Washington Times also on the condition of anonymity. The official also played down even the risk of an attack on a single office building. “It’s more feasible if they try to poison a specific building, but even then, the volume of water already going through the system would dilute whatever was introduced. It would be very difficult to kill anyone. What would happen would be that people would get sick, which would cause panic.” However, in February 2002, Italian police arrested four Moroccans in Rome believed to be al-Qaeda supporters. They were carrying nine pounds of cyanide and maps of the capital’s water supply marking the U.S. Embassy’s location.

As bombings against Western targets in the Middle East and Africa since 2002 have demonstrated, al-Qaeda has hardly been dismantled. The war on Iraq has taken much of the focus away from the U.S.-led war on terrorism, and America is far from wiping out al-Qaeda and other Islamist terrorist organizations. According to U.S. intelligence reports, there are cells all over the Middle East, Africa, Southeast Asia and Europe that are being funded to carry out attacks against American and Western interests all over the world.

Since the attacks of September 11, 2001, Washington has implemented security measures designed to counter the threat of terrorist attacks. Government officials warn of an increase in attacks within the United States, or attacks on American tourists abroad. Although al-Qaeda has not always been as decentralized and widespread as it is today, even in its early years the organization never relied on a central base of command or a single leader to achieve its goals.

After bin Laden arrived in Afghanistan in 1979 and realized that the Afghans were lacking the infrastructure and manpower they needed to fight the Soviets, he and his mentor Abdullah Azzam organized a recruiting office (Maktab al-Khidamat, or MAK) to establish a program of recruitment. The two duties of the conscripts were to come to Afghanistan to fight the Soviets and preserve Islam, and to set up more recruitment offices anywhere in the world that they could. The financial burden of these initiatives was not an issue because of bin Laden’s extensive funds from his share of his family’s successful construction business. Before the beginning of 1980, thousands of volunteers trained in bin Laden’s privately run and funded boot camps in the Middle East, Southeast Asia and Africa. It has been estimated that more than 10,000 fighters received training in just one of these camps, almost half of whom came from bin Laden’s native Saudi Arabia. Thousands also came from Algeria, Egypt, Yemen, Pakistan and the Sudan.

After the Soviet Union abandoned the conflict in Afghanistan, many of the Muslim fighters returned to their home countries steeped in bin Laden’s brand of militant Islamic fundamentalism. They used their training and their contacts with senior members of Al-Qaeda to form terrorist cells in their own countries. They recruited new members and began to wage battle with secular governments or systems of government that did not live up to the shari’a system of Islamic law. A branch was even set up in the United States, called al-Khifa (“The Struggle”). However, not all governments were opposed to the existence of such groups in their countries. For instance, in the Sudan, the government gave these veterans jobs, funded their training camps and appointed some of them to high government positions. Other Muslim fighters, barred from returning to their home countries, sought to fight for al-Qaeda in other lands. It was these fighters who became involved in terrorist groups in most Muslim countries from Egypt to Malaysia. In addition to the new training camps in Arab countries, most of the original camps in Afghanistan continued to operate, exporting Islamic mercenaries to conflicts the entire world over.

In the late 1980s, bin Laden split with Azzam (Azzam wanted to focus on Afghanistan; bin Laden wanted to broaden the struggle to the whole of the Middle East and eventually throughout the world) and in 1988 bin Laden formed Al-Qaeda. When his Saudi citizenship was revoked in 1994 for “irresponsible behavior,” bin Laden relocated to Sudan and started many business endeavors there, including a bank, a construction company, a sunflower plantation, a factory and an import-export operation. Much of his private income is generated from these holdings. Even after he was asked to leave Sudan in 1996 as a result of improving Sudan-U.S. relations (he promptly returned to Afghanistan), however, these businesses remained successful and continue to provide income and logistics for al-Qaeda.

In February 1998, bin Laden and his partner Ayman al-Zawahiri formed an umbrella organization called “The Islamic Front for the Struggle Against the Jews and the Crusaders” (Al-Jabhah al-Islamiyyah al-Alamiyyah li-Qital al-Yahud wal Salibiyyin). It is a network of Islamist extremist organizations that share the goal of establishing shari’a in state governments worldwide and create “true” Islamic societies to replace the societies that claim to be Islamic but fall short of the criteria established in strict shari’a law. Additional goals include expelling all American and other foreign troops from the Middle East and taking back the Holy Land of Palestine from the Jewish people. They all use methods of terrorism to accomplish these goals; including assassinations, kidnappings and suicide bombings. Targets include political leaders deemed corrupt or anti-Islam, Jews, and Western tourists. Some of the better-known groups that are part of this network are the Egyptian al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya and the Egyptian al-Jihad, founded by al-Zawahiri. Al-Qaeda helps to link and provide financial, logistical and technical support for these groups.

When bin Laden formed The Islamic Front for the Struggle Against the Jews and the Crusaders, Al-Qaeda became even more decentralized and grew in size to the large number of members it claims today. Al-Qaeda truly lives up to its name (“The Base”); it serves as the connection between extremist Muslim terrorist organizations and organizes the transfer of funds from followers in the Middle East, Europe, Asia, and North America to the different groups to be used for terrorist activities.

The War on Terrorism
One reason the “War on Terrorism” may not prove as effective as the U.S. government hopes is because some of the areas with the highest recruitment rates are not in the Middle East, where the military campaign is focused, but in Europe, in countries like Britain, France and Germany. Britain has a long record of taking in political refugees and non-cooperation with foreign governments on issues of extradition. For example, in 1981, a radical Islamic cleric named Abu Hamza al-Masri arrived in London, after losing both hands and an eye in the Soviet-Afghan War. He won British citizenship four years later and is now famous worldwide for preaching jihad at the Finsbury Park mosque in north London. Although al-Masri has lived in London in relative peace for the last 23 years, he was arrested on May 27, 2004 and is currently fighting deportation out of Britain. CNN reported that the U.S. has secretly been working with the UK to facilitate the extradition process for weeks and has charged al-Masri with providing material support to terrorists and aiding a kidnapping. Another example of British unwillingness to provide support is when French officials were turned down by Britain for the extradition of Algerian-based GIA members who were responsible for a series of bombings in Paris in the 1990s.

Hamburg, Germany is another major base for terrorist activity in Europe. Almost 15 percent of the city’s population is composed of foreign expatriates. Foreign students do not pay university tuition in Germany making the guise of the perpetual student the perfect cover. Many of the September 11 hijackers had lived in Hamburg, including 9/11 leader Mohammed Atta. Currently several men known to be a part of the Hamburg al-Qaeda cell are named in outstanding arrest warrants.

According to CSIS’s Sanderson, terrorist cells in Europe are thriving. “Because of immigration policies, Europe is a haven for escapees from oppressive countries,” he said. It is almost impossible to differentiate between political refugees and terrorists who are coming from the same countries. “These European cells are strong, and you can’t always tell who is a moderate and who is fundamentalist and therefore more likely to join a terrorist cell.”

The March 11, 2004 Madrid train bombings illustrate Sanderson’s point. Days after the attacks, which killed 191, a videotape was discovered that featured a man identifying himself as Abu Dujan al-Afghani, al-Qaeda’s military spokesman. In the video, he claimed that al-Qaeda was responsible for the bombings: “We declare our responsibility for what happened in Madrid exactly two-and-a-half years after the attacks on New York and Washington,” the statement began. Al-Afghani’s name was not known to European intelligence services.

Tactics and the Future
It is not in al-Qaeda’s agenda to establish an Islamic state in the U.S., but through the assassination of political leaders and economic destabilization, al-Qaeda members hope that the United States will pull its forces out of territories in the Middle East, enabling them to establish hard-line Islamic theocracies there.

Since September 11, 2001, much information about al-Qaeda has been discovered and published; will their tactics change because of this flood of information about their training camps and strategies? It appears that al-Qaeda might be shifting its focus from hijackings to well-planned assassinations of world leaders and Western diplomats, as well as bombings of “soft targets.” There is much evidence of this shift in strategy. In October 2002, U.S. Diplomat Laurence Foley, a senior administrative officer with the U.S. Agency for International Development, was killed outside his home in Amman, Jordan. The two killers were captured and confessed to being members of al-Qaeda. The men had received a down payment of $18,000, part of a promised $50,000 for carrying out the assassination.

In early January 2003, a police raid on a London apartment discovered quantities of the deadly poison ricin. This poison was named specifically in al-Qaeda documents discovered in Afghanistan as useful for assassinations. Al-Qaeda pursues a strategy of assassinating political figures with the expectation that their replacements in countries like Afghanistan and Pakistan will be more open to al-Qaeda’s goals. Within the past few years, al-Qaeda has attempted to kill then-Philippine president Fidel Ramos, former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri.

On May 22, 2004, an al-Qaeda satellite group headed by Zarqawi claimed responsibility for a bombing in Baghdad outside the home of Deputy Interior Minister Abdul-Jabbar Youssef al-Sheikhli. Though the minister survived with only minor injuries, four others were killed. Just days before, the same group claimed credit for the May 17, 2004 bombing that killed Iraqi Governing Council President Izzadine Saleem. Both men were members of the Shiite Muslim Dawa Party.

Recent al-Qaeda attacks on soft targets

May 22, 2004 - The same group that claimed responsibility for the murder of Saleem carried out a bombing outside the home of Deputy Interior Minister Abdul-Jabbar Youssef al-Sheikhli. Al-Sheikhli escaped with only minor injuries but four others died in the blast.
May 17, 2004 - An al-Qaeda affiliate group carried out a bombing that killed Iraqi Governing Council President Izzadine Saleem.
March 11, 2004 - Exactly two and a half years after the attacks in New York and Washington, al-Qaeda members in Western Europe bombed commuter trains in Madrid, killing 191.
March 2, 2004 - Abu Masab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian who has extensive ties to al-Qaeda, engineered simultaneous suicide bombings on Shiite mosques in Karbala and Baghdad, Iraq. Over 143 worshippers were killed.
November 20, 2003 - Twin suicide bombings of British interests in Istanbul, turkey killed 31. Al-Zarqawi is believed to have orchestrated the attacks.
November 8, 2004 - Immediately after midnight, three bombings rocked Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, killing at least 17 people and injuring more than 120. The target was a foreign workersÕ residential compound.
May 16, 2003 - Although there was no official claim of responsibility, most officials believe al-Qaeda is responsible for simultaneous bombings in Casablanca, Morocco that left 41 dead and over 100 injured. Sites attacked include a hotel, a Spanish social club, a Jewish cemetery, a Jewish community center and the Belgian Consulate.
May 12, 2003 - Attacks on compounds housing Westerners in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia show numerous signs linking it to al-Qaeda. The bombings killed 26 people, including nine Americans. Many others were wounded.
November 28, 2002 - Thirteen people (three Israelis and ten Kenyans) were killed and about 80 people were injured when a car bomb rocked a hotel in Mombassa, Kenya favored by Israeli tourists.
October 12, 2002 - As many as 200 people died and over 250 injured in a series of bombings at nightclubs in Bali.
August 5, 2002 - Terrorists broke into a Christian school in the foothills of the Pakistani Himalayas and killed six people in a shooting spree.
June 14, 2002 - A car bomb blast outside the U.S. Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan killed 11 and injured over 40.
May 8, 2002 - A suicide bomber killed 15 and injured over 23 outside a hotel in Karachi, Pakistan. Eleven of the dead were French nationals.
April 11, 2002 - A terrorist crashed a truck filled with natural gas into a wall surrounding a historic synagogue on the Tunisian resort island of Djerba. Nineteen people were killed and 15 injured. Sixteen of the dead were German tourists.
March 17, 2002 - Five people were killed, including two Americans, and more than 40 wounded when assailants threw grenades into a church in a heavily guarded diplomatic enclave in Islamabad, Pakistan.

Another fairly new focus for al-Qaeda is economic targets. In late 2002, the group attacked a French oil tanker off Yemen. After 9/11, bin Laden gloated that he had cost America’s economy at least $1.4 trillion and realized that tourism and the economy is central to American morale during the recent War on Iraq and the War on Terrorism. According to Peter Bergen, CNN Terrorism Analyst and author of Holy War, Inc.: Inside the Secret World of Osama Bin Laden, this shift in tactics makes the war on terrorism even more global, because there are Western businesses all over the world, not just in America and Europe. These overseas contracts may begin to see the effects of al-Qaeda and other groups like it.

Matthew Levitt, Senior Fellow in Terrorism Studies at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), does not agree that al-Qaeda has changed its tactics at all. “I think al-Qaeda has been extremely flexible in its methods and tactics,” he said. “Al-Qaeda has always had a wide range of targets and tactics. For instance, they used to target members of the Saudi royal family, but when those targets proved too difficult, they were satisfied with softer targets, like the Western housing complexes [in Saudi Arabia].”

Many scenarios involved raids on buildings with large numbers of occupants. This is suggestive of attacks on schools or office buildings. Every exercise that involved prisoners ended in the execution of the prisoners. In these situations, none of the trainees escaped or fled after they executed the prisoners; they plan to kill the hostages and die in place. Because of the nature of these attack scenarios, it is evident that the objective of al-Qaeda training is to plan for attacks with many casualties using only small groups of personnel and limited weaponry.

Analysis of past al-Qaeda attacks, as well as information from eyewitnesses and investigators, reveal that the kind of attacks for which the U.S. must prepare follow specific patterns. First, al-Qaeda targets places with a high density of civilians, such as office buildings, schools, or shopping centers. These targets are most likely economic or social centers outside the U.S. that are mainly for Americans or Europeans (such as the compounds bombed in Riyadh and the commuter trains in Madrid), but in the future, such targets inside U.S. borders cannot be ruled out. Secondly, al-Qaeda operatives use small arms and explosives; the chance that another attack with the dimensions of the 9/11 hijackings is small. Thirdly, all the attacks are well planned and organized down to every detail. Lastly and more importantly, the tapes indicate that al-Qaeda members expect to die in the course of an attack, and they always kill any hostages they have seized.

Much of al-Qaeda’s training is now focused on urban targets, such as the recent bombings of foreign worker compounds in Riyadh. After reviewing 64 training videotapes found in a house where bin Laden had reportedly stayed, analysts noted that al-Qaeda had built a replica of a Western-style city on a hillside in eastern Afghanistan using canvas and stone. The trainees were instructed on how to enter buildings from multiple breach points and destroy simulated office buildings, bridges and houses. The tapes also include step-by-step instructions on how to use a surface-to-air missile as well as small arms and improvised explosives. Hostage-taking situations and assassination simulations were also practiced.

Al-Qaeda may be shifting its tactics for another reason, as well. In a January 2003 speech at the Brookings Institution, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Richard B. Myers, USAF asserted that al-Qaeda, along with remnants of the Taliban, have changed their tactics to adapt to the strategies of the U.S.-led campaigns in the Middle East. Examples of these shifts include Taliban leaders discontinuing their use of convoys and sport utility vehicles and switching to donkeys and motorcycles instead. Also, they have begun to travel alone, so as not to draw the interest of Allied surveillance.

Al-Qaeda members have also learned to discern the sound of the propeller-driven AC-130 gunships, according to a Field Artillery magazine interview with Maj. Gen. Franklin L. Hagenbeck, who led U.S. forces in Afghanistan. At the beginning of the war in Afghanistan, these “flying battleships” were extremely successful in attacks on Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters. However, since then, the terrorists immediately disperse and “go to ground” as soon as the sound of the AC-130 is heard.

There has been more adaptation, however, to the U.S. forces’ strategy. After al-Qaeda members realized America’s technical ability to monitor voice communications, they have greatly reduced their time on telephones and radios. In the summer of 2002, the U.S. military found a large cache of new satellite phones - completely unused - possibly indicating that al-Qaeda members have found alternate ways of communicating. It has also been reported that al-Qaeda members have paid teenaged Afghans to act as spies; the young men wait outside known U.S. special-operations bases in eastern Afghanistan and notify al-Qaeda officials when patrols leave the compound.

Although the terrorist network may have been weakened over the past three years of U.S.-led counter-terrorism activity and the most recent operations in Afghanistan, al-Qaeda is still active. A U.S. official told CNN “there is a surprising level of al-Qaeda communication, and we are learning a lot more about al-Qaeda and the potential links to cells out there that we didn’t know previously existed.”

According to Jonathan Schanzer, an expert in radical Islamic movements at WINEP, al-Qaeda has always targeted economic interests, such as in 1993 when al-Qaeda first attacked the World Trade Center. “Look at how the U.S. responded to 9/11. We have demonstrated that the economy is our ‘soft underbelly,’ and al-Qaeda has picked up on that,” he said. “It’s possible that they are now using that against us.”

Perhaps another reason for these strategic changes that al-Qaeda is undergoing is because they have become so decentralized in the past three years. Al-Qaeda was never completely dependent on one single leader, but now more than ever the separate cells seem to be planning and executing their own attacks. In an interview with NBC news on March 5, 2003, Peter Bergen emphasized this point. “They [al-Qaeda] have done a franchised operation. You’re seeing various organizations around the world that have some links of one kind or another to al-Qaeda, but they’re beginning to function fairly independently. So I think this franchise idea is an important one.”

Bergen mentions that there is also a base for recruitment and training online. Websites such as alneda.com and maujaidoon.net provide basic explosives training and manuals for anyone who wants to learn. It is difficult to shut down these sites because they reappear in different spots on the web everyday, often linked to a website that has nothing to do with the subject. “They move around, these things will stay up for two days. It will get taken down for one reason or another and they find somewhere else to put it up. So it’s very hard to track,” Bergen told NBC.

Since the beginning of Operation Enduring Freedom, over two-thirds of the original al-Qaeda leadership has been apprehended or killed. The remainder of the top leaders are most likely deep in hiding from coalition forces and are probably not easily able to communicate with their followers. According to the February 13, 2004 issue of The Christian Science Monitor, a senior intelligence official said that a new leadership has had to emerge to replace the older generation. “What you are looking at is a second or third generation, but it’s a successor generation. In an insurgency, which I think this is, you always have succession planning in order to survive. You always expect to lose leaders because you are fighting a more powerful opponent.” Some of these emerging leaders include:

Abu Musab Zarqawi, a Jordanian suspected of coordinating the early 2004 bombings in Baghdad. Zarqawi’s involvement with al-Qaeda began in the early 1980s, when he was approximately 20. He came back to Jordan in 1992 and served time in prison for plotting to overthrow the monarchy. In February 2004, the U.S. government raised the reward for his capture to $10 million. U.S. intelligence officials have determined that Zarqawi was the militant in the recent video recording of Nicholas Berg being decapitated.
Abu Walid, a Saudi Arabian suspected of leading the Chechen rebel movement, according to Russian and U.S. intelligence sources. He may have been behind a suicide bombing in a Moscow subway station in February 2004 that killed approximately 40 people. He is also known to have been in Afghanistan and trained in explosives. In April 2004, Walid’s brother, Abdullah al-Saeed al-Ghamdi, told the al-Arabiya television station that Walid had been killed in Chechnya. There is no conclusive evidence of his death.
Abdul Aziz Al-Muqrin, a Saudi Arabian suspected to have been the architect of the May and November 2003 suicide bombings in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in which 53 people died. Al-Muqrin is known to have traveled to Afghanistan for training before joining the war in Bosnia; he also spent some time in a Saudi prison. He has frequently issued statements warning Muslims to stay away from U.S. military and civilian cites in the Middle East. Al-Qaeda may also be undergoing the transformation from “group” to “movement.” Because of sustained efforts to eradicate al-Qaeda from Afghanistan, the group has converted itself to a movement within many groups, all coordinating al-Qaeda-style attacks against sites in Southeast Asia, Iraq and its border regions, Yemen and the Horn of Africa and along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. The main groups carrying out the attacks are the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat in Algeria, Al Ansar Mujahideen in Chechnya, Hizb-I-Islami, Islamic Movement of the Taliban, and Jemaah Islamiah.

According to Rohan Gunaratna, author of “Al-Qaeda Adapts to Disruption” in the February 2004 edition of Jane’s Intelligence Review, much of al-Qaeda’s “center of gravity” has shifted to its associate groups. Gunaratna claims that Hizb-I-Islami, the Taliban and al-Qaeda have been trying to establish Pakistan’s Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP) as a base of operations, planning attacks on Coalition Forces in Afghanistan from there. In addition, al-Qaeda has developed “significant infrastructure” in the Horn of Africa, including Somalia, and uses its resources there to stage attacks in Africa and the Gulf. Al-Qaeda is also extremely present in Iran and Pakistan, and the main problem in those countries is the fact that the group is met with varying response.

There has also been increasing evidence that al-Qaeda is working closely with Ansar al-Islam, the group suspected of recent bombings in Iraq. The simultaneous suicide bombings in Irbil, Iraq that claimed 110 lives were illustrative of typical Ansar al-Islam attacks, which use bomb vests and frequently strike at holiday celebrations. According to Karim Sinjari, the regional government’s interior minister, many are convinced that the two groups are now merging more than ever. “We are seeing a combination of al-Qaeda and Ansar al-Islam in Iraq,” Sinjari told reporters in February 2004. “They are one now.”

Coalition forces are dealing with an extremely deadly combination of enemies. Militants who left various extremist Islamic political parties materialized Ansar al-Islam shortly before September 11, 2001; the first strike the group carried out was immediately after the attacks on New York and the Pentagon. Members of Ansar al-Islam abducted 42 Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) peshmerga soldiers (Iraqi Kurds), massacred them, and posted photographs of their mutilated bodies on the Internet. Al-Qaeda is supplying money, equipment and men experienced with explosives to Ansar al-Islam, but most importantly, al-Qaeda supplies “martyrs.” “They are having to supply the suicide bombers because Iraqis and Kurds are not ready to commit suicide,” said Sarkawt Hasan, director of security in Sulaymaniya, a northern Iraqi city dominated by the PUK. Hasan told reporters that Ansar al-Islam’s past attempts at suicide bombing have been met with failure when the young men have decided not to detonate their explosives vests.

Riyadh and Morocco bombings
Most international intelligence officials have concluded that al-Qaeda is responsible for the bombings in Riyadh on the nights of May 12 and November 8, 2003. Much of the strategy used is significant to tactics used by al-Qaeda in the past. The fact that the terrorists carried out three simultaneous attacks is characteristic of al-Qaeda, as well as the fact that the attacks were places that housed Westerners. According to CNN.com, there was intelligence pinpointing Saudi Arabia as a likely target for al-Qaeda operatives in the weeks before the attacks, and on May 8, 2003, an al-Qaeda explosives cache was found in a house in very close proximity to one of the bombed sites. Saudi investigators also believe that al-Qaeda operatives carried out the attacks, and they have detained four people they believe to be linked to al-Qaeda who were connected to the bombings.

In a CNN interview on May 14, 2003, Bergen also asserted that he would be very surprised if the attacks in Riyadh were found to have been carried out by a group other than al-Qaeda. “I mean, we’re looking at multiple attacks by suicidal attackers, you know, against high-value targets. That is an absolute hallmark of al-Qaeda, whether it was attacking two U.S. embassies simultaneously in Africa in 1998, or attacking the multiple targets it was trying to attack on 9/11.” Bergen also mentioned possible reasons for the targets - “American or Western civilian targets in Saudi Arabia are, of course, softer targets, they are less well defended, and that’s one of the reasons that we saw the attacks, because they’re easier to do.”

In addition, Saudi authorities are investigating suspected illegal arms sales by members of the country’s national guard to al-Qaeda operatives in the country. In a May 6, 2003 raid on an al-Qaeda safe house, Saudi officials found weapons such as automatic rifles that were missing from Saudi Arabian armories. Saudi officials claim that a small number of officers in the National Guard had been involved in illicit gun sales for years and had been selling weapons to anyone willing to pay prices well above market value. The officials emphasized that there was no ideological motive at work in this case, and that the only objective for the suspected officers was money.

There is more speculation about the possible collusion between al-Qaeda and Saudi Arabia. In a May 13, 2003 interview with CNN, Bergen emphasized the notion that although 15 of the suicide bombers who participated in 9/11 were from Saudi Arabia, there have been no extraditions from that country. Pakistani officials have extradited people who were part of the 9/11 plot, and in Germany suspects have been tried in court for being involved in 9/11. “But,” Bergen said, “none of this has happened in Saudi Arabia...isn’t it kind of odd?” In addition, it has been reported that the largest number of prisoners in Guantanamo Bay are also Saudis. “It is obvious that Saudis play a very important role in this organization [al-Qaeda],” Bergen said.

Many U.S. and Moroccan officials believe that al-Qaeda operatives are also responsible for the simultaneous bombings in Casablanca on May 16, 2003 that left 41 dead and over 100 injured. The Moroccan government is currently detaining 27 men who they believe are connected with the bombings. The men arrested were picked up around several different locations around Morocco, and were all Moroccan nationals aged between 18 and 22. A security guard claims that two would-be bombers tried to enter the Hotel Farah on Friday night. The first man stabbed and killed a security guard then proceeded into the lobby where he detonated his bomb, killing himself and a baggage handler and incapacitated the second would-be bomber. This man was captured by hotel guards and handed over to the police. He wore a belt lined with explosives as well as a backpack filled with them. The other sites attacked were a Spanish social club, a Jewish cemetery, a Jewish community center, and the Belgian Consulate.

Although there has been no formal claim of responsibility for the bombings, a U.S. counterterrorism official said there is a strong suspicion that al-Qaeda is behind the series of attacks. The coordinated nature of the strikes as well as the tactics used both point to al-Qaeda. Also, in the past few weeks, U.S. and British intelligence officials have warned of possible al-Qaeda attacks in Africa. Osama bin Laden has threatened Morocco specifically in the past, and spoken of overthrowing the Moroccan government, which he considers too “pro-American.” In an audiotape made public in February 2003, a man officials believe to be bin Laden called on Muslims to “break free from the slavery of these tyrannic and apostate regimes, which is enslaved by America, in order to establish the rule of Allah on Earth. Among regions ready for liberation are Jordan, Morocco, Nigeria, the country of the two shrines [Saudi Arabia], Yemen and Pakistan.”

There is a possibility, however, that the people carried out these attacks have some affiliation with al-Qaeda, but are not necessarily members of the group. According to Sanderson, who has served as a government defense analyst and consultant with the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, there are many terrorists conducting attacks who have some connection with al-Qaeda but may not be members of the organization. “These groups may have members who have passed through al-Qaeda training camps at some point, but are not directly connected to al-Qaeda,” he said. “However, I would be willing to bet it was al-Qaeda.”

Trouble raising money could be in the offing for al-Qaeda if it continues to kill Muslims. Because wealthy Muslims form a large percentage of the support base of militant groups such as al-Qaeda, some say it is not believed to be in the group’s best interest to orchestrate attacks that kill other Muslims as “collateral damage,” such as the recent bombings in Riyadh and Morocco. However, according to Matthew Levitt, there is not much of a risk of alienating their Muslim support base, even if many Muslims are killed in al-Qaeda attacks. “Al-Qaeda members believe that those actions are justified because of the greater cause. They make statements in advance of their attacks, and they do not target the average Muslim, but Muslims, Jews and Westerners alike who participate in what they consider to be ‘lewd acts,’ such as going to dance clubs and bars.”

There has been a backlash in some countries already, with similar groups that alienate much of their support base, according to Schanzer. He offered two examples of countries in which this has happened already - Algeria, with the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), and Egypt, with al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya. “The GIA was responsible for the deaths of thousands of Algerian civilians. There was a [public] backlash that led to the creation of a different group (the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat) that claims to only seek out military targets,” Schanzer said. “The same thing happened after the Luxor massacre in Egypt - a backlash against radical groups.”

The future - what to expect
The Washington Times reported March 4, 2003 that terrorists linked to al-Qaeda have targeted U.S. military facilities in Pearl Harbor. In April 2002 and in early March 2003, U.S. officials received intelligence reports about the threat in Hawaii that coincided with reports of the planning of a major attack by al-Qaeda. Intelligence officials believe that al-Qaeda was targeting Pearl Harbor because of its symbolic value and because its military facilities are open from the air. Officials also said that hijacked airliners would be flown into submarines or ships docked in Pearl Harbor. As of early March, there were 30 Navy and Coast Guard warships stationed in the harbor, including 18 nuclear submarines, five destroyers and two frigates. The Times also reported that Hickam Air Force Base, located near the Honolulu airport, was also another al-Qaeda target.

Both al-Qaeda’s tactics and leadership have changed dramatically since September 11, 2001, from military and commercial targets to civilian “soft” ones. But this does not imply that the terrorists are slowing down or shying away from American targets - in fact, al-Qaeda’s recruitment operations remain intact in Saudi Arabia, Yemen, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, according to German intelligence officials. Although al-Qaeda was always somewhat decentralized, now more than ever are local cells acting autonomously instead of waiting for orders from a central command. According to Newsweek on May 19, 2003, the FBI suspects that al-Qaeda members have been carrying out major intelligence research on American power stations, dams, transportation and bridges. This research is going on simultaneously with attacks in the Middle East and Africa, as well as suspected plotting in other areas of the world.

By JINSA analyst Jessica Altschul.

Source: http://www.jinsa.org/articles/view.html?documentid=2542

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