Tuesday December 19, 2006
The "Pakistanization" of the Taliban and the Survival of Core al Qaeda
Terrorism experts in and out of the intelligence community are growing increasingly concerned about the "Pakistanization" of the resurgent Taliban in the tribal territories that border Afghanistan.
There is increasingly strong evidence that lower-level ISI officers not only tolerate the Taliban, but host training camps for them and provide logisitcal support, helping the Taliban to regain political and military footing that is taking an increasingly heavy toll on the the Afghan central government as well as the U.S. and NATO forces on the ground.
It also seems that senior ISI officials can get in contact with Osama bin Laden or Zawahiri when necessary, indicating that, if not necessarily aware of the exact location at all times of the two most wanted men in the world, there still exist channels of direct communication.
This is certainly troubling, given Pakistan's central role in the Bush strategy of fighting Islamists. The recent Bush policy of working with India on its nuclear projects seems to have convinced the Pakistani leadership that Pakistan is not getting a fair shake and can therefore does not need to pay the internal political price for tackling the Islamists in a serious fashion.
The Taliban remains in close contact with the "core" al Qaeda leaders, but the "Arab Afghans," that is, the foreign fighters, are mostly limited to acting as advisers and trainers for the Taliban troops, rather than fighting as independent units. Taliban units usually have severl Arabs when them when carrying out their increasingly sophisticated attacks on the NATO and U.S. forces.
One of the primary roles seems to be to facilitate the transfer of technological know-how and bombing techniques from those fighting in Iraq to the cadres in Afghanistan. Hence, the sudden rise in suicide bombings in Afghanistan, the use of similar explosive devises to attack troops and the beheadings and other Iraqi-inspired tactics.
Peter Bergen, in his Sunday Outlook piece in the Washington Post argues that that traditional al Qaeda and its leadership, remain a real threat. He correctly points out that the presumed ringleader, Mohammed Sidique Khan, was tied to the al Qaeda core, not just a peripheral, self-starting radical. The British decision not to make this a more central part of their report is a mystery.
It is also a mistake to view the current Somali crisis and the leadership of the radical Salafist groups now holding the bulk of the power as totally separate from the core of al Qaeda. Rather, many of the current leaders have long-standing ties to the traditional al Qaeda leadership.
But Afghanistan seems to be the core al Qaeda's main project now, a chance, as they see it, to reverse the most humiliating defeat of the organization, and make new inroads that will tie up U.S. and NATO resources for an indefinite period of time, bleeding the enemy until they simply declare victory and go home.
That, coupled with the emphasis on expanding the war fronts in as many places as possible-Somalia, the GSPC in northern Nigeria and other parts of West Africa, the sudden al Qaeda public interest in Darfur, show the contours of a long-term strategy in which the core of al Qaeda continues to play a central role, dispersed and self-starting groups can join and aid the effort and a long war that will wax and wane in many parts of the globe.
There is increasingly strong evidence that lower-level ISI officers not only tolerate the Taliban, but host training camps for them and provide logisitcal support, helping the Taliban to regain political and military footing that is taking an increasingly heavy toll on the the Afghan central government as well as the U.S. and NATO forces on the ground.
It also seems that senior ISI officials can get in contact with Osama bin Laden or Zawahiri when necessary, indicating that, if not necessarily aware of the exact location at all times of the two most wanted men in the world, there still exist channels of direct communication.
This is certainly troubling, given Pakistan's central role in the Bush strategy of fighting Islamists. The recent Bush policy of working with India on its nuclear projects seems to have convinced the Pakistani leadership that Pakistan is not getting a fair shake and can therefore does not need to pay the internal political price for tackling the Islamists in a serious fashion.
The Taliban remains in close contact with the "core" al Qaeda leaders, but the "Arab Afghans," that is, the foreign fighters, are mostly limited to acting as advisers and trainers for the Taliban troops, rather than fighting as independent units. Taliban units usually have severl Arabs when them when carrying out their increasingly sophisticated attacks on the NATO and U.S. forces.
One of the primary roles seems to be to facilitate the transfer of technological know-how and bombing techniques from those fighting in Iraq to the cadres in Afghanistan. Hence, the sudden rise in suicide bombings in Afghanistan, the use of similar explosive devises to attack troops and the beheadings and other Iraqi-inspired tactics.
Peter Bergen, in his Sunday Outlook piece in the Washington Post argues that that traditional al Qaeda and its leadership, remain a real threat. He correctly points out that the presumed ringleader, Mohammed Sidique Khan, was tied to the al Qaeda core, not just a peripheral, self-starting radical. The British decision not to make this a more central part of their report is a mystery.
It is also a mistake to view the current Somali crisis and the leadership of the radical Salafist groups now holding the bulk of the power as totally separate from the core of al Qaeda. Rather, many of the current leaders have long-standing ties to the traditional al Qaeda leadership.
But Afghanistan seems to be the core al Qaeda's main project now, a chance, as they see it, to reverse the most humiliating defeat of the organization, and make new inroads that will tie up U.S. and NATO resources for an indefinite period of time, bleeding the enemy until they simply declare victory and go home.
That, coupled with the emphasis on expanding the war fronts in as many places as possible-Somalia, the GSPC in northern Nigeria and other parts of West Africa, the sudden al Qaeda public interest in Darfur, show the contours of a long-term strategy in which the core of al Qaeda continues to play a central role, dispersed and self-starting groups can join and aid the effort and a long war that will wax and wane in many parts of the globe.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Tuesday December 19, 2006
What is Missing in the SWIFT Program Debate
My friend Dennis Lormel and others are correct in stating that programs to attack terror finance must be differentiated and viewed in their many different elements. Which is why what is striking in the current debate is not what is said but what is not discussed.
What is not being discussed is the non-formal methods of money transfer, with the accompanying use of commodities and other methods to store financial value; and the use of the Islamic banking structures and its corresponding, massive offshore structures. This includes not only the multiple holdings of DMI and others in the Bahamas, Caymen and Panama, but also the offshore holdings of designated terrorist financiers such as Yousef Nada and Idriss Nasreddin. None of these have been touched.
The Islamic banking strucutre, while having every right to exist as a system to meet particular religious constraints, does not play by the same rules. Massive amounts of money move outside the SWIFT-reported systems all over the world, in part through Islamic banks that are specifically designed to help the customer avoid the Western banking system. One need look no further than Bank al Taqwa and Akita Bank in Nassau to see how ripe for abuse the system is.
It has been important for the U.S. and international banking structures to take additional measures to both crack down on the use of facilities by terrorists and to help track terrorist operations.
But numerous people who work or have recently worked in the terror finance structures of different government organizations can see what is also obvious-Islamists don't want to use Western banks. There are enough offshore havens willing to open subsidiary companies and offshore banks to insure that almost any suspect transaction can go through unreported.
It is similar in the world of commodities, regardless of whether one agrees with me on the particulars of the diamond story. Commodities and gold, through hawalas and other structures, also allow one to avoid intersecting almost entirely with the Western fianncial structure.
One recently-retired intelligence community career official who worked on terror finance likened the attention paid to the formal banking structure to the old joke about the drunk who lost his car keys. He groped for them under a streetlight when a passerby asked what he was doing. The drunk said he was looking for keys he had dropped on the lawn. Then why, the passerby asked, was he looking in the street? Because, the drunk said, there is more light over here.
We all like to do what we know how to do and do well. We do banking records very well. But it might be profitable to spend more time on learning more about things we don't know, and working where the light isn't so bright.
What is not being discussed is the non-formal methods of money transfer, with the accompanying use of commodities and other methods to store financial value; and the use of the Islamic banking structures and its corresponding, massive offshore structures. This includes not only the multiple holdings of DMI and others in the Bahamas, Caymen and Panama, but also the offshore holdings of designated terrorist financiers such as Yousef Nada and Idriss Nasreddin. None of these have been touched.
The Islamic banking strucutre, while having every right to exist as a system to meet particular religious constraints, does not play by the same rules. Massive amounts of money move outside the SWIFT-reported systems all over the world, in part through Islamic banks that are specifically designed to help the customer avoid the Western banking system. One need look no further than Bank al Taqwa and Akita Bank in Nassau to see how ripe for abuse the system is.
It has been important for the U.S. and international banking structures to take additional measures to both crack down on the use of facilities by terrorists and to help track terrorist operations.
But numerous people who work or have recently worked in the terror finance structures of different government organizations can see what is also obvious-Islamists don't want to use Western banks. There are enough offshore havens willing to open subsidiary companies and offshore banks to insure that almost any suspect transaction can go through unreported.
It is similar in the world of commodities, regardless of whether one agrees with me on the particulars of the diamond story. Commodities and gold, through hawalas and other structures, also allow one to avoid intersecting almost entirely with the Western fianncial structure.
One recently-retired intelligence community career official who worked on terror finance likened the attention paid to the formal banking structure to the old joke about the drunk who lost his car keys. He groped for them under a streetlight when a passerby asked what he was doing. The drunk said he was looking for keys he had dropped on the lawn. Then why, the passerby asked, was he looking in the street? Because, the drunk said, there is more light over here.
We all like to do what we know how to do and do well. We do banking records very well. But it might be profitable to spend more time on learning more about things we don't know, and working where the light isn't so bright.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Tuesday December 19, 2006
Some Small Movement with the Lord's Resistance Army
One of the great tragedies of Africa in the past decade has been the mostly-ignored violence inflicted on parts of Uganda, Sudan and the DRC by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), led by a person who speaks directly to God and has been responsible for the kidnapping of thousands of children, the mutilation of many more, and other crimes against humanity.
The LRA is a terrorist organization that increasingly has proved to be a destabilizing factor across several countries in a region that is already reeling from criminal, terrorist and state-sponsored violence. Like the RUF in Sierra Leone and the Small Boy Units of Charles Taylor in Liberia, the LRA preys on children and women, primarily. Women are used as beasts of burden and sex slaves, the abducted children are turned into killers.
The LRA leader, Joseph Kony, gave his first interview ever to a journalist earlier this week, where he denied the undeniable and claimed the atrocities blamed on him were part of a propaganda campaign against him. Indicted by the International Criminal Court, along with most of the LRA leadership, Kony said he was fighting for "freedom."
"We want the people of Uganda to be free. We are fighting for democracy," Kony said. 'We want our leader to be elected - but not a movement like the one of (Ugandan presdient) Museveni."
Was he also fighting for the Ten Commandments? "Yes, we are fighting for Ten Commandments," he replied. "Is it bad? It is not against human rights. And that commandment was not given by Joseph (Kony). It was not given by LRA. No, that commandment was given by God."
But, in a tacit recognition that his forces have taken a beating in recent months by government forces, Kony agreed to peace talks with the government, and the government sent a delegation to meet with Kony's representatives in southern Sudan.
Ending the LRA's existence is imperative, as is ensuring that Kony and his senior commanders face justice at the ICC for the atrocities they have wreaked on innocent people for more than a decade. Strong international support, including from the United States, are vitally important in insuring these twin objectives are met. The arrest of Charles Taylor and the demobilization of the RUF show this is possible. What is needed is the international commitment to see it through.
The LRA is a terrorist organization that increasingly has proved to be a destabilizing factor across several countries in a region that is already reeling from criminal, terrorist and state-sponsored violence. Like the RUF in Sierra Leone and the Small Boy Units of Charles Taylor in Liberia, the LRA preys on children and women, primarily. Women are used as beasts of burden and sex slaves, the abducted children are turned into killers.
The LRA leader, Joseph Kony, gave his first interview ever to a journalist earlier this week, where he denied the undeniable and claimed the atrocities blamed on him were part of a propaganda campaign against him. Indicted by the International Criminal Court, along with most of the LRA leadership, Kony said he was fighting for "freedom."
"We want the people of Uganda to be free. We are fighting for democracy," Kony said. 'We want our leader to be elected - but not a movement like the one of (Ugandan presdient) Museveni."
Was he also fighting for the Ten Commandments? "Yes, we are fighting for Ten Commandments," he replied. "Is it bad? It is not against human rights. And that commandment was not given by Joseph (Kony). It was not given by LRA. No, that commandment was given by God."
But, in a tacit recognition that his forces have taken a beating in recent months by government forces, Kony agreed to peace talks with the government, and the government sent a delegation to meet with Kony's representatives in southern Sudan.
Ending the LRA's existence is imperative, as is ensuring that Kony and his senior commanders face justice at the ICC for the atrocities they have wreaked on innocent people for more than a decade. Strong international support, including from the United States, are vitally important in insuring these twin objectives are met. The arrest of Charles Taylor and the demobilization of the RUF show this is possible. What is needed is the international commitment to see it through.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Tuesday December 19, 2006
Two New Books for Summer Reading
For those who are interested in terror finance, stateless areas, intelligence reform and thoughtful insights, there are two new books out that should be added to the summer reading list even if they do not get the authors on Oprah or 60 Minutes.
I do not do book reviews on this site, but these two help add to an understanding of the issues on this blog and the community that follows these. For full disclosure, both main authors are friends of mine, with whom I have dealt extensively in recent years. However, I would read these books regardless of personal ties.
Neither book tries to answer all the questions, but at least they ask many of the right questions and help map out serious areas of weakness that remain almost five years after the 9-11 attacks. You may not agree with everything in here (I do not), but thought-provoking, intelligent analysis is bound to lead to thoughtful dissent and discussion. These two books fill that role.
The first is John Cassara's "Hide & Seek: Intelligence, Law Enforcement and the Stalled War on Terrorist Finance," (Potomac Books) which is timely, given the current debate over how the war on terror finance is actually going. Like my colleague Vic Comras, I tend to view the effort as too tied to the formal financial structures of the West and too little focused on the Islamic banking structure, commodities and informal value transfer systems. John gives an account of his career and the ultimate frustration of a professional dealing directly in this area.
The second is by Richard Shultz and Andrea Dew: "Insurgents, Terrorists and Militias: The Warriors of Contemporary Combat" (Columbia University Press), which looks at the changing nature of the wars the United States and its allies are fighting and will be fighting in coming years. An example of how poorly we do things is the recent triumph of radical Islamists in Somalia. It is an academic look at the challenges the armed forces and intelligence community face in trying to combat the modern threats that are no longer centered on nation-states, but on the transnational actors that have proved to be effective in the new type of asymetrical warfare that is now reality.
It is still amazing to me that almost five years after being attacked by a nonstate terrorist group, operating out of a failed state, the Pentagon and others are only now seriously trying to understand and come up with strategies for dealing with these inter-related phenomena. Yet it is true. In my dealings with some of the new principal actors, it is surprising how little literature they have read and how little effort has been made to find those who really understand these issues. These are conflicts we will be fighting for the next generation. It is time to get serious about understanding them, and Shultz and Dew provide a good basis to start the debate.
I do not do book reviews on this site, but these two help add to an understanding of the issues on this blog and the community that follows these. For full disclosure, both main authors are friends of mine, with whom I have dealt extensively in recent years. However, I would read these books regardless of personal ties.
Neither book tries to answer all the questions, but at least they ask many of the right questions and help map out serious areas of weakness that remain almost five years after the 9-11 attacks. You may not agree with everything in here (I do not), but thought-provoking, intelligent analysis is bound to lead to thoughtful dissent and discussion. These two books fill that role.
The first is John Cassara's "Hide & Seek: Intelligence, Law Enforcement and the Stalled War on Terrorist Finance," (Potomac Books) which is timely, given the current debate over how the war on terror finance is actually going. Like my colleague Vic Comras, I tend to view the effort as too tied to the formal financial structures of the West and too little focused on the Islamic banking structure, commodities and informal value transfer systems. John gives an account of his career and the ultimate frustration of a professional dealing directly in this area.
The second is by Richard Shultz and Andrea Dew: "Insurgents, Terrorists and Militias: The Warriors of Contemporary Combat" (Columbia University Press), which looks at the changing nature of the wars the United States and its allies are fighting and will be fighting in coming years. An example of how poorly we do things is the recent triumph of radical Islamists in Somalia. It is an academic look at the challenges the armed forces and intelligence community face in trying to combat the modern threats that are no longer centered on nation-states, but on the transnational actors that have proved to be effective in the new type of asymetrical warfare that is now reality.
It is still amazing to me that almost five years after being attacked by a nonstate terrorist group, operating out of a failed state, the Pentagon and others are only now seriously trying to understand and come up with strategies for dealing with these inter-related phenomena. Yet it is true. In my dealings with some of the new principal actors, it is surprising how little literature they have read and how little effort has been made to find those who really understand these issues. These are conflicts we will be fighting for the next generation. It is time to get serious about understanding them, and Shultz and Dew provide a good basis to start the debate.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Tuesday December 19, 2006
More Signs of Trouble in Somalia
The decision of the Islamist militias controlling Mogadishu to name a designated terrorist and known al Qaeda collaborator as its leader is another strong indication that, while the group may try to talk a moderate line, it has no intention of moderating it's radical, Taliban-style agenda.
Hassan Dahir Aweys was designated a terrorist supporter under Executive Order 13224, and has a long history of associating with Osama bin Laden and other Salafist groups. The International Crisis Group has the best field research available on him and his past activities.
The appointment could mean the marginalization of those within the Salafist movement and a reassertion of the most hardline elements. It is notable that the move was made while more international attention than usual is focused on the ebbing conflict in Somalia, where so far the Salafists have won in a rout. It could be interpreted as showing the newly-triumphant Salafists are willing to take whatever in-you-face moves necessary to consolidate their grip.
Last week, the group's previous leader, Sharif Ahmend, agreed to halt military activities and recognize the weak and ineffectual U.N.-backed interim government. He seemed to back away from the goal of imposing sharia law on the entire country, saying he was willing to "abide by the will of the people."
That may have been to much for the old-line jihadists who have struggled since the early 1990s to install an Islamist state in a country that has virtually ceased to exist. Aweys is one of the most outspoken leaders of that old guard. ICG identifies him as the the protector and mentor of Aden Hasi'Ayro, the young, Afghanistan-trained leader of the hardline Islamists.
Since the failed international intervention there, led by the United States, the world has tended to disengage from the violent area, where complicated clan and tribal loyalties are little understood and history is often unread or misunderstood. Controlling no strategic assets except its location, it is easy to see why Somalia has attracted so little attention.
The other reason is that there are no good options. The U.S. effort to arm the counter-Islamist militias was a signficant failure. There is no support for boots on the ground.
There is no government to sanction or trade embargo to be imposed. No targetted list of individuals with signficant assets outside the country. Multilateral counterparts like the African Union have been paralyzed in Darfur and are even less active on Somalia.
The traditional tool box is virutally useless.
Yet the risks are too high to ignore. Another al Qaeda haven, or refuge for the numerous regional groups that are springing up pledging loyalty to the concept of jihad against the West is unacceptable.
This is a challenge that will emerge again and again in coming years. Finding the answers and getting it right-or at least partially right-is of true national signficance. Failure to do so will open the door for al Qaeda to replicate the so-far successful experiment again and again.
Hassan Dahir Aweys was designated a terrorist supporter under Executive Order 13224, and has a long history of associating with Osama bin Laden and other Salafist groups. The International Crisis Group has the best field research available on him and his past activities.
The appointment could mean the marginalization of those within the Salafist movement and a reassertion of the most hardline elements. It is notable that the move was made while more international attention than usual is focused on the ebbing conflict in Somalia, where so far the Salafists have won in a rout. It could be interpreted as showing the newly-triumphant Salafists are willing to take whatever in-you-face moves necessary to consolidate their grip.
Last week, the group's previous leader, Sharif Ahmend, agreed to halt military activities and recognize the weak and ineffectual U.N.-backed interim government. He seemed to back away from the goal of imposing sharia law on the entire country, saying he was willing to "abide by the will of the people."
That may have been to much for the old-line jihadists who have struggled since the early 1990s to install an Islamist state in a country that has virtually ceased to exist. Aweys is one of the most outspoken leaders of that old guard. ICG identifies him as the the protector and mentor of Aden Hasi'Ayro, the young, Afghanistan-trained leader of the hardline Islamists.
Since the failed international intervention there, led by the United States, the world has tended to disengage from the violent area, where complicated clan and tribal loyalties are little understood and history is often unread or misunderstood. Controlling no strategic assets except its location, it is easy to see why Somalia has attracted so little attention.
The other reason is that there are no good options. The U.S. effort to arm the counter-Islamist militias was a signficant failure. There is no support for boots on the ground.
There is no government to sanction or trade embargo to be imposed. No targetted list of individuals with signficant assets outside the country. Multilateral counterparts like the African Union have been paralyzed in Darfur and are even less active on Somalia.
The traditional tool box is virutally useless.
Yet the risks are too high to ignore. Another al Qaeda haven, or refuge for the numerous regional groups that are springing up pledging loyalty to the concept of jihad against the West is unacceptable.
This is a challenge that will emerge again and again in coming years. Finding the answers and getting it right-or at least partially right-is of true national signficance. Failure to do so will open the door for al Qaeda to replicate the so-far successful experiment again and again.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH