Zarqawi’s Suicide Fighter Shortage Makes Him Consider His Own Guerilla Army
Employees Wanted: Must be foreigner (but not an infidel) for high-energy job with explosive future. No retirement benefits offered (or needed).
That might be the kind of ad Al Qaeda’s Iraqi bigwig Abu Musab al-Zarqawi might place — because he’s now reportedly facing an acute shortage of foreign suicide fighters (past employees have found they have to just kill themselves in that job).
His solution? Look into creating his own guerilla army, which means having a force that could be on The Terror Team a bit longer:
THE leader of al-Qa’ida in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, is trying to set up his own mini army and move away from individual suicide attacks to a more organised resistance movement:
Faced with a shortage of foreign fighters willing to undertake suicide missions, Zarqawi wants to turn his group into a more traditional force mounting co-ordinated guerilla raids on the US-led coalition forces.Al-Qa’ida is sending training and planning experts to help set up the guerilla force and infiltrate members into Iraq with the assistance of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, the sources said.
Ayman al-Zawahiri, deputy leader of al-Qa’ida, claimed in a video posted on an Islamist website yesterday that 800 “martyrdom operations” in three years had “broken the back of America in Iraq”.
The change of strategy will make it easier for Zarqawi to link up with Iraqi insurgents and evade the special operations teams trying to track him down.
If this report is true, it would indicate that the reports several years ago about an almost infinite number of foreigners willing to pour into Iraq to fight in alliance with Al Qaeda haven’t been proven correct — that there are limits…even on the supply of foreigners willing to kill themselves to advance Al Qaeda’s cause.
UPDATE: Great minds think alike department. James Joyner has also picked up this story.
6 Responses to “Zarqawi’s Suicide Fighter Shortage Makes Him Consider His Own Guerilla Army”
Joe,
I saw this article earlier today too, but I just can’t buy into it. Simply put, their decentralized strategy and hit run approach is actually working in swaying the American and European public in turning against the progress of democracy. The fact is, Zarqawi and other factionist groups cannot win in Iraq. In the laws and measurements of War, it is impossible. The only thing they can do is “buy time” and sway the public opinion to the extent that they dry out any effort the US has in seeing this through. Hence the reason there is a consistent and steady increase in attacks and activity every time their is some type of positive progress being made.
No nation will ever benefit from prolonged warfare either economically, strategically, or in the eyes of the public. The American people simply do not have the patience or endurance.
Because Zarqawi knows he cannot win in Iraq, he is only trying to hold out until the American people put enough pressure on the government to withdraw. He will not organize a resistance movement as was his “lesson learned” in Fallujah, which was the last time they actually put up a resistance against the U.S. Military and failed miserably–they took a huge defeat. I would hope that they would fight like real men…but unfortunately they see they simply cannot win. That is why we must see it through in the progress of democracy in Iraq. As freedom and justice steadily progress, the Iraqi public’s confidence and morale of their government will also steadily increase. The most committed will win….
Quite right Joe and Berean. This is obviously a sign that we are in fact winning in Iraq. That we’ve now so demoralized the opposition that they’ve given up on their pathetic suicide bombing attacks.
It is obviously by now that Iraqis opposed to our occupation cannot win. They will be occupied whether they like it or not. It’s time that they saw the light and just give in. It’ll make the whole thing less painful for all involved.
Sorry, but this article has all the makings of a propaganda piece. First, wouldn’t we all love to believe that Zarqawi’s running out of suicide bombers? Second, all the sources are anonymous. Let’s think about who these sources might be? Third, note the mysterious mention of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards? There is no credible evidence that Iran’s Revolutionary Guards are helping out the Sunni insurgency against the Iranian-backed Shi’ite government in Iraq. This is just neo-con fantasy.
I wouldn’t say there are no retirement benefits. Those virgins waiting in Heaven are very real to the bombers.
for some indications on the number of suicide bombs, etc see the Brookings Iraq Index.
Zarqwai might be only be regrouping, it is too early to tell if this is true or something else is going on.