WASHINGTON, 24 November 2003 — The American invasion and occupation of Iraq has provided Al-Qaeda with a powerful propaganda tool in its holy war against the West, injecting new energy into the worldwide network even though many of its key operatives are in jail or dead, its top leadership is on the run and its sources of money are shrinking, according to international security analysts.
While exhorting Muslims to turn Iraq into a new anti-American battleground, the network has staged spectacularly bloody bombings in neighboring Turkey and Saudi Arabia in hopes of undermining their governments and demonstrating that it remains a dangerous force, analysts say.
Meanwhile, Al-Qaeda and related groups have used websites, videos and publications throughout the Muslim world to seek new warriors, proclaiming its message that Islam itself is under threat from the United States and that the region’s governments are powerless to defend it.
“Iraq is a rallying cause for Al-Qaeda — it’s allowed them to attract new recruits,’’ said Kenneth Katzman, a terrorism specialist at the Congressional Research Service, the think tank for the House and Senate. “This was an organization that was under enormous pressure. Iraq has put new wind in its sails, definitely.’’
Indeed, the period since the buildup to the war in Iraq may mark a new stage in the life of this adaptable network, which is showing an ability to regroup and even reinvent itself even as it comes under fierce attack.
“We think we can decapitate them by going after leaders,’’ said Zachary Abuza, a specialist on militant Islamic groups in Southeast Asia. But instead the groups “are going to morph and be able to reorganize with the same principles but with different organizations and leaders.’’
President Bush has frequently described the invasion of Iraq as part of the nation’s overall war on terror launched after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. While the president’s justification for the Iraq invasion remains a focus of worldwide debate, the conflict’s role in energizing Al-Qaeda raises new doubts about whether it can be seen as a successful milestone in the war on terrorism, at least in the short term.
As officials explain the phases in the American anti-terror strategy, the invasion of Afghanistan eliminated Al-Qaeda’s haven. The war in Iraq eliminated a dictatorial regime with what US National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice has called “broad and deep’’ links to terrorism and the intent to amass an arsenal of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons that in turn might fall into the hands of militants.
Separately, a worldwide assault on Al-Qaeda proceeded, drawing on intelligence and law-enforcement agencies of many nations, in addition to military forces. Al-Qaeda has been badly damaged. Its bases and training camps in Afghanistan were wiped out. Nearly half its leadership has been killed or captured and tens of millions of dollars have been seized.
Throughout the world, Al-Qaeda suspects are under watch or in hiding. The two top leaders, Osama bin Laden and the Egyptian physician Ayman Al-Zwahiri, are widely believed to be holed up somewhere along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
This heavy pressure has forced the network to become much less centralized. As top leaders worry about their own survival, like-minded affiliate groups are exercising more autonomy, analysts said. No attacks approaching the scale, audacity and sophistication of Sept. 11 have occurred since, although Al-Qaeda’s hand has been seen in bombings that have cumulatively resulted in hundreds of casualties in Morocco, Tunisia, Kenya, Indonesia, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and, many analysts believe, in Iraq.
“Rather than a global network (Al-Qaeda) is a series of regional networks. There is still coordination, but not as much as there once was,’’ said Daniel Byman, an international security specialist at Georgetown University.
From an ideological standpoint, however, the American actions in Afghanistan and, more recently, in Iraq, have handed Bin Laden and radical Islamist warriors a new weapon that they are using to mobilize their ranks and attract new followers, feeding on a widespread sense of humiliation in the Muslim world because of back-to-back defeats in Afghanistan and Iraq.
“There is a strong sense among experts who look at this that (the war in Iraq) has breathed new life into the jihadist movement,’’ said Daniel Benjamin, a terrorism specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “More and more groups are trying to take up the Al-Qaeda cause. There is a general movement toward more radical thinking in the Muslim world.’’
This certainly appears to be true in Southeast Asia, where “anti-Americanism has never been higher,’’ according to Abuza, who teaches at Simmons College in Boston. It is found in community groups, political parties, student study groups and on-line communities, and is spread in mosques, journals and magazines, he said. The top-selling magazine in Indonesia promotes the conservative, anti-Western brand of Islam promoted by Al-Qaeda, Abuza said.
“It’s so much easier to recruit people because of what’s happening in Iraq,’’ Zeyno Baran of the Nixon Center, who has studied militant groups in Turkey and Central Asia. “People ask, ‘How can I fight the British and American occupiers?’ and they find each other.’’
Al-Qaeda propaganda argues that the invasion proves the point Bin Laden made in a now-famous 1996 statement — that the United States is the leader of an ‘infidel’ movement bent on destroying Islam, occupying Muslim land and seizing control of Middle East oil.
Rand Corp. terrorism specialist Bruce Hoffman believes Al-Qaeda probably wanted the United States to invade Afghanistan, hoping US forces would be “ground up and defeated’’ much as the Soviets were in the 1990s at the hands of Osama Bin Laden and warriors drawn from throughout the Muslim world. Having failed in Afghanistan, the terror network sees Iraq as “a second bite of the apple,’’ he said.
