The Economist explains Questions answered daily Sponsored by PreviousNextLatest The Economist explainsLatest from all our blogs The Economist explains Who runs al-Qaeda? Aug 8th 2013, 23:50 by M.J.S. THE decision taken by Barack Obama on August 1st to close down for several days nearly two dozen diplomatic missions across the Middle East and North Africa and to issue a worldwide travel alert ran counter to the administration’s oft-repeated claim that al-Qaeda is on the brink of strategic defeat. The alarm was triggered when America’s National Security Agency picked up electronic communication between Ayman al-Zawahiri, the global terror network’s titular leader, and Nasir al-Wuhayshi, the founder of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), its Yemeni affiliate. The intelligence suggested that Mr Zawahiri had ordered a major attack or series of attacks to coincide with the end of Ramadan. A few days later it emerged that a plot to attack Western interests in Yemen, blow up an oil pipeline and seize ports had probably been thwarted. Al-Qaeda clearly remains a threat. But who, if anyone, really controls the sprawling organisation? Since its origins in the early 1990s, al-Qaeda has shown itself to be a resilient and adaptable outfit. For all the trillions of dollars spent in support of George W. Bush’s “war on terror” following the attacks of September 11th 2001, the loss of its training camps in Afghanistan, the relentless drone attacks ordered by Mr Obama on its sanctuaries in the tribal badlands of Pakistan and the raid in 2011 that killed its charismatic leader, Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda is still with us. But to survive, it has had to mutate. The central leadership under bin Laden’s chosen successor, Mr Zawahiri, remains in North Waziristan, in Pakistan. But many of its operatives have fallen to American drone strikes in recent years and its ability to communicate securely with the wider network has been curtailed. Most recent plots have been hatched by radicalised “lone wolves”, attracted by the al-Qaeda brand but not necessarily trained or run by the group. Instead, al-Qaeda has morphed into a franchise, lending its brand to jihadist groups waging local campaigns and exercising relatively little control over their priorities. Besides AQAP, the most active in terms of carrying the fight to the "far enemy" in the West, these include al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, al-Qaeda in Iraq, al-Shabab in Somalia and, more recently, Jabhat al-Nusra, the most powerful rebel militia in Syria. It also has links to Boko Haram, a jihadist outfit in Nigeria. There are different views about how much influence Mr Zawahiri—dry, uncharismatic and holed up in Waziristan—has on these groups. But the events of the past few days suggest he has some sway, especially over AQAP. Mr Wuhayshi is a former protégé of bin Laden and is thought to be Mr Zawahiri’s de facto deputy and successor should he have a rendezvous with a Reaper drone. At present, the most active al-Qaeda affiliates have their own local battles to fight. But in Yemen, Iraq and Syria their insurgencies are attracting large numbers of fighters and are carving out space they more or less control. The direct threat to the West is for now fairly low (the same does not apply to Western interests in the region), but that could change at any moment. Carrying out a “spectacular” in North America or Western Europe has been made difficult by the combined efforts and technological sophistication of Western intelligence agencies. Still, the idea floated by Mr Obama that the ill-named and initially poorly-conceived “war on terror” may be drawing to a close seems wide of the mark...economist/blogs/economist-explains/2013/08/economist-explains-5
Posted on: Sun, 01 Sep 2013 04:41:31 +0000
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