Al Queda Shifting Focus to the "Near Enemy"?
Interesting symposium on the state of the Jihad.
One participant -- Bill Roggio -- claims Al Queda is shifting focus to the Middle East to form a caliphate, away from attacking the West directly.
Quote:
Until recently, al Qaeda's leadership has thought their goals would best be achieved by attacking the 'far enemy' – the U.S. and her allies - directly in order to force the nations to withdraw the support from the Middle East. This strategy has shifted over the past several years, as al Qaeda is now focusing operations and their organization primarily in the Middle East and the Muslim crescent. Al Qaeda's operations show it now wishes to focus its energy primarily on the 'near enemy.' This will the organization to consolidate power after forming their Islamic Caliphate, and set the stage for a final confrontation with the West.
This does not mean that al Qaeda is not engaging Western forces – they are doing so directly in Iraq and Afghanistan. But the purpose of the operations are to first drive out the U.S. and the West by destroying their political will to engage in the region, and then create the individual emirates from which neighboring Muslim countries can be attacked and absorbed. While direct attacks on Western countries have not been excluded – al Qaeda will take an opportunistic shot to strike the West if it believes it will further their goals – the primary focus is now on fighting the regional wars.
Agreed. I'm not even sure AQ can retain monolith
status; they might but the hold is shaky. I've always considered Hezbollah more potentially dangerous.
Obviously the loose networking between the various groups of Jihadis etc. has some potential but a Caliphate isn't one of them. My only real concern is that in their pursuit of that unattainable goal they do something really stupid on a massive scale and get Europe aroused.
The mood there may be broadly pacifistic and 'go along - get along' but if the French and Germans really get fired up that will have very significant reverbrations...
P.S.
Enjoy Kansas in late June... :)
Heh, I admit that today it's an extremely novel
concept but history says they are perfectly capable of playing harsh and dirty. :)
Do recall I said a really big and really dumb event. Conversations with serving folks from some of those nations indicate that that almost, not quite, a desire that something like that might occur (as a way of a resurgence and a problem eliminator) is present as a rarely and discretely discussed attitude. We all know Armed forces in Democracies are a little more right leaning than their societal norm -- but not much more...
Hopefully, I'm just mumbling in my dotage. :wry:
An allied topic; is it just me or do the Europeans do a better job of countering the media efforts of the bad guys than we have been able to do thus far? Your warning of the media battle from some years ago didn't click in establishment minds and we're paying a heavy price for that while they seem to be able to deflect or better respond...