Bad news for / regarding the war on terrorism: Al Qaeda’s youngsters have taken “control over the network’s operations, according to American intelligence and counterterrorism officials” while the U.S. took out the older generation.
Al Qaeda is adapting. It has become less hierarchical, its “leadership is now more diffuse, with several planning hubs working autonomously and not reliant on constant contact with” Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri. Not much is known about the “about the backgrounds of the new Qaeda leaders; some have adopted noms de guerre. Officials and outside analysts said they tend to be in their mid-30s and have years of battlefield experience fighting in places like Afghanistan and Chechnya. They are more diverse than the earlier group of leaders, which was made up largely of battle-hardened Egyptian operatives. American officials said the new cadre includes several Pakistani and North African operatives.”
They’re battle-harded. They’ve fought in, for instance, Iraq. Robert Richer, who was associate director of operations in 2004 and 2005 for the C.I.A. explains: “The jihadis returning from Iraq are far more capable than the mujahedeen who fought the Soviets ever were. They have been fighting the best military in the world, with the best technology and tactics.”
One of the major problems the U.S. has right now, is that the CIA has no idea how operatives communicate with Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri. The New York Times quotes one senior intelligence officer as saying: “There has to be some kind of communication up the line, we just don’t see it.”
Michael Scheuer, former head of the bin Laden tracking unit at the C.I.A., explained that the U.S. (and the West as a whole for that matter) cannot afford to stop the hunt for Bin Laden, even though no terrorist attacks have been carried out in America for a number of years: “To say that Al Qaeda was out of business simply because they have not attacked in the U.S. is whistling past the graveyard. Al Qaeda is still humming along, and with a new generation of leaders.”
And that new generation of leaders is more used to modern technologies, has a lot of experience fighting the strongest army in the world and shares Bin Laden’s radical ideology.
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