Al Qaeda’s role in Paris attacks underscores failings of counterterrorism strategy
AEIdeas
Administration reports of the decimation of “al Qaeda core” continue to prove exaggerated. Today, al Qaeda officially claimed credit for last week’s Charlie Hebdo attack. Ayman al Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden’s successor, sanctioned the attack. Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) operationalized it by choosing the target, planning, and financing the attack.
Bottom line: The global al Qaeda network continues to operate, the leadership still matters, safe havens are important, and the militant Islamist group can still perpetrate horrible attacks on Western soil. Obama’s counterterrorism strategy has failed.
Here is what we need to take away from the Paris jihadist attacks:
- Al Qaeda remains a threat. Al Qaeda “core” – the senior leadership in Afghanistan-Pakistan still directs the entire network and will continue to push for attacks against the West.
- Al Qaeda safe havens in Yemen, Syria, and elsewhere are where foreign fighters are recruited, vetted, trained, and then operationalized. AQAP’s late Anwar al Awlaki worked with at least one of the Kouachi brothers. Awlaki vetted the 2009 underwear bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab before introducing him to AQAP’s master bombmaker.
- Al Qaeda embraces the concept of small-scale, more frequent attacks in the West. AQAP began a campaign to inspire such attacks in 2010, calling for what it termed, “lone jihad.” That’s not to dismiss the possibility of another airline plot, but we must also be prepared for smaller one-off attacks. AQAP planted the seed for the Charlie Hebdo attack by fall 2011. What’s to say there aren’t other fighters who have returned to the West who will operationalize?
Looking forward, the picture is grim. Without a shift in the global counterterrorism strategy, the conditions today will continue to feed the threat of attacks against the West. Al Qaeda and other radical Islamist groups still enjoy safe havens (take Libya, for example). Sectarianism is engulfing the Middle East, driven by the conflicts in Iraq and Syria, and it is driving radicalization. The Islamic State in Iraq and al Sham (ISIS) and al Qaeda are competing over the global jihadist movement. Obama’s promised withdrawal from Afghanistan will re-open space for al Qaeda leadership in South Asia from which to plan and operate.
If the United States does not rethink its counterterrorism strategy, then the question the American people should be asking is not if, or even when, there will be another attack, but rather how bad it will be.
Translation of AQAP’s claim of responsibility provided through a subscription to SITE Intelligence Group.
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After 12 years of U.S. occupation the terrorist training camps in Iraq that didn’t exist until the United States invaded it to eject them make the pre-9/11 Afghani terror training grounds seem like summer camp for shy and physically awkward youngsters.
An army of recent “converts” recruited from the hordes of disaffected youth with no future are being sent from Europe to train and fight with ISIS and al Qaeda.
For every low level jihadi errand boy we kill, around 1000 innocent people are murdered. These people’s relatives now have a legitimate grievance – one which they realistically have only one way of resolving. If this is how we’re meant to “win hearts and minds”, I suggest our strategy is…um…ineffective.
In Yemen, the U.S.-backed Yemeni president has lost all control. The shiite resistance has captured the capital and driven Sunnis into the waiting embrace of Al Qaeda terrorists making their home there.
The meddling is expensive, hasn’t reduced the threat of terrorism and has now created power vacuums which are filled with the Wahhabist ISIS – which is so Wahhabi it’s too Wahhabi even for the Wahhabis.
There may be another terrorist attack on the United States.
On the other hand, since 9/11, about 180,000 Americans have been killed by terrorists—they were called drunk drivers.
About 1,120,000 American women have been raped since 9/11.
Really, when do concerns about terrorism become hysteria? How should we allocate scarce public resources? How much more should we tax productive citizens?
BTW, I think Zimmerman is correct here: “Sectarianism is engulfing the Middle East, driven by the conflicts in Iraq and Syria, and it is driving radicalization”
The North Africa-Mideast region seems to be devolving into Islamic fundamentalism. It might be a great time to pack up tents and vamoose.
And within reason, take precautions against terrorism, keeping in mind that many domestic “threats” dwarf any terrorism threat.
With 80,000 American women getting raped every year, does Ms. Zimmerman think we should allocate more resources to fighting rape, or terrorism?