Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Hints of victory in the wider war
A couple of years ago I wrote a long post proposing victory conditions in the war against Islamic jihadists (most recent version). It remains my single favorite post, so if you are new to this blog you might want to take a look.
The heart of the argument was that victory over al Qaeda and its cognates would come only when its ideology had been discredited by repeated military failure.
There are hints -- footprints in the media, really -- that al Qaeda has a serious and growing credibility problem that will eventually undermine its ability to recover from losses.
Lawrence Wright, the very thoughtful author of The Looming Tower, had this to say on NPR the other day:
He says al-Qaida is unraveling in some respects.
"But in some respects, they are not losing, they are regenerating. But they're still much reduced from what they were. They're clearly losing in Iraq. Their popularity all across the Muslim world is plummeting because Muslims are the main victims. And people are beginning to question the use of violence not only in the case of al-Qaida but even in resistance movements in Palestine."
Whether or not this constitutes al Qaeda "losing," its leadership would only reconsider tactics espoused and acted upon for fifteen years if they were no longer effective. They are no longer effective because the global counterinsurgency against al Qaeda, led by the United States, has made it massively more difficult for the jihad to damage targets that the wider Muslim population wants to see damaged. Al Qaeda "central," for example, famously declared that Iraq was the central front of its war against the United States and its allies. Unfortunately for the jihadis, the United States military presented a much harder target than it anticipated, and George W. Bush was far more determined -- stubborn, if you do not like him -- than his predecessor. Once al Qaeda realized that it could not directly drive the United States out of Iraq it tried to spark a civil war that would make Iraq ungovernable. To do that, it had to kill a lot of innocent civilians. The Muslim world noticed, and was, in the main, disgusted.
Then there is this from Strategy Page:
Al Qaeda web sites are making a lot of noise about "why we lost in Iraq." Western intelligence agencies are fascinated by the statistics being posted in several of these Arab language sites. Not the kind of stuff you read about in the Western media. According to al Qaeda, their collapse in Iraq was steep and catastrophic. According to their stats, in late 2006, al Qaeda was responsible for 60 percent of the terrorist attacks, and nearly all the ones that involved killing a lot of civilians. The rest of the violence was carried out by Iraqi Sunni Arab groups, who were trying in vain to scare the Americans out of the country.
Today, al Qaeda has been shattered, with most of its leadership and foot soldiers dead, captured or moved from Iraq. As a result, al Qaeda attacks have declined more than 90 percent. Worse, most of their Iraqi Sunni Arab allies have turned on them, or simply quit. This "betrayal" is handled carefully on the terrorist web sites, for it is seen as both shameful, and perhaps recoverable.
This defeat was not as sudden as it appeared to be, and some Islamic terrorist web sites have been discussing the problem for several years. The primary cause has been Moslems killed as a side effect of attacks on infidel troops, Iraqi security forces and non-Sunnis. Al Qaeda plays down the impact of this, calling the Moslem victims "involuntary martyrs." But that's a minority opinion. Most Moslems, and many other Islamic terrorists, see this as a surefire way to turn the Moslem population against the Islamic radicals.
Al Qaeda's switch to the wholesale slaughter of Muslim civilians did not happen by accident. In the early days it attacked military or governmental targets: Mogadishu, Khobar Towers, the African embassies, the USS Cole, the Pentagon, and United Flight 93's likely target (the World Trade Center was civilian, but a symbolic bastion of the infidel power structure and not a Muslim target in any case). Then the United States moved the fight to the heart of the Muslim world with invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. Al Qaeda needed to achieve palpable victory over the United States and its allies in those theaters in order to sustain its credibility as an organization and the credibility of its ideology. When the United States proved impossible to dislodge by direct attacks, al Qaeda had no choice but to resort to terrorism against Muslim civilians, and that is proving to be its undoing.
We have them on the run. Let us hope that when President Obama actually gets to see the war from the inside he changes his point of view.
CWCID: Dawnfire82.
9 Comments:
By 
Andrew Hofer, at
Wed May 28, 08:53:00 AM:
How's that argument go down at Princeton dinner parties?
By 
, at
Wed May 28, 09:55:00 AM:
This misses a key point, the warning to the terrorists that Iraq represents. Iraq says, "f**k with us and there will be a price to pay."
Hussein and the democrats say, "f**k with us and you'll have to attend many meetings to talk about what you'll get."
In fact, there is no question in my mind that should Obama or Hillie win the election, the US will again be attacked and, withing three months of the Inauguration. Why not? Bush is no longer defending the nation and the new guy needs something to justify going to the surrender conference. At least with McCain, there is some hope that the Muslim terrorists recognize that there will still be a price to pay.
By Mrs. Davis, at
Wed May 28, 10:43:00 AM:
Let us hope Senator Obama doesn't get to see the inside of the war.
By commoncents, at
Wed May 28, 11:08:00 AM:
Great post!
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By Fat Man, at
Wed May 28, 01:00:00 PM:
Wright's article in the current New Yorker is worthwhile. It is the view from inside the Egyptian jihad movement as they begin to reconsider the wisdom of their strategy.
"The Rebellion Within: An Al Qaeda mastermind questions terrorism,"
by Lawrence Wright.
The really interesting issue is how the liberal mind will handle the cognitive dissonance.
By randian, at
Wed May 28, 02:40:00 PM:
The problem is that the "Al Qaeda mastermind" is only questioning terrorism directed at Muslims, not terrorism per se, nor is he questioning the goal of worldwide Islamic domination (to question that would be to question Islam itself). Liberals will likely take the wrong message from this.
By Tom the Redhunter, at
Wed May 28, 10:41:00 PM:
"The heart of the argument was that victory over al Qaeda and its cognates would come only when its ideology had been discredited by repeated military failure."
Sounds like you've been reading Walid Phares "The War of Ideas". If you haven't been, you should. What he says seems to fit in with your thesis.
By , at
Wed May 28, 10:51:00 PM:
I'm asking everyone here to pray sincerely to the Supreme Being of his or her choice that the words "President" and "Obama" are never less than one word apart.
By jj mollo, at
Wed May 28, 11:13:00 PM:
I think that, for the sake of the country, McCain has been doing the exact right thing, challenging Obama to go to Iraq, castigating him for failing to meet with Petraeus. It forces Obama to look presidential with respect to the military. He's going to have to get some face time with top brass if he wants to be credible.
The challenge approach is probably good for McCain's election chances as well, though I think they're pretty slim. (VP Rice could change that.)
