ROTFLMAO.... I have read Leaderless Jihad this should be interesting.
ROTFLMAO.... I have read Leaderless Jihad this should be interesting.
Sam Liles
Selil Blog
Don't forget to duck Secret Squirrel
The scholarship of teaching and learning results in equal hatred from latte leftists and cappuccino conservatives.
All opinions are mine and may or may not reflect those of my employer depending on the chance it might affect funding, politics, or the setting of the sun. As such these are my opinions you can get your own.
Hmmm ... if this is the case then I am due for an buttkicking from both parties. I followed up Sageman's article that was based on his book in Foreign Policy this month with one of my own that half agrees with him, but I argue both are correct. There is a leaderless structure that is spontaneous AND there is a robust and rested AQ senior leadership organization that still has loyal followers and a modern financial distribution system ... each side reaches out and touches each other at critical points in the global Jihad but thats no reason for Hoffman to savage Sageman. Play nice!
Last edited by Abu Buckwheat; 04-28-2008 at 07:23 PM.
Putting Foot to Al Qaeda Ass Since 1993
I think that Hoffman is discussing the company-owned branches and Sageman is discussing the franchise branches. AQ is part franchise and part multi-national enterprise. They license their name to criminal gangs in places where they lack the organizational ability and strength to assert themselves. In safe havens, they establish greenfield networks. Hoffman is right. Sageman is right (except for historical inaccuracies). Everybody wins! Well, except for victims of terrorism. But other than them...
A different review of Sageman's book and rather long. Makes a number of critical remarks, although mainly about the US scene: http://www.tnr.com/toc/story.html?id...2-41464a553c0a
davidbfpo
Hat tip to a Tweet. A new article by Professor Bruce Hoffman and his Spanish colleague / analyst Fernando Reinares, on a Spanish website (in English) and entitled 'Al-Qaeda’s continued core strategy and disquieting leader-led trajectory'.
Their conclusion:Link:http://www.realinstitutoelcano.org/w...ed-trajectory/Conclusions: Today the conventional wisdom argues that, much like bin Laden’s killing, the Arab Spring has sounded al-Qaeda’s death knell. However, while the mostly non-violent, mass protests of the Arab Spring were successful in overturning hated despots and thus appeared to discredit al-Qaeda’s longstanding message that only violence and jihad could achieve the same ends, in the years since these dramatic developments commenced, evidence has repeatedly come to light of al-Qaeda’s ability to take advantage of the instability and upheaval across these two regions to re-assert its relevance and thereby attempt to revive its waning fortunes.
The final chapter of al-Qaeda’s long and bloody history has yet to be written. Since the September 11 attacks to the killing of bin Laden in 2011, it has proved to be a highly resilient organisation capable of adaptation and adjustment that, despite grievous leadership losses and diminished resources, was still able to harness the energy of its constituent parts and marshal the powerful narrative and ideology that sustains the collective movement, to carry on the struggle proclaimed by bin Laden in 1988. These characteristics ensure both that the final battle against al-Qaeda has not yet been fought and in coming years the movement may assume new and different forms that could not have previously been anticipated or predicted and that therefore will require an entirely different approach and means to finally eliminate it.
davidbfpo
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