Interesting, insightful commentary from all. I'll attempt to address Schmedlap's statement.

Quote Originally Posted by Schmedlap View Post
I disagree that "funding sources, recruiting bases, technical skills, and support networks and infrastructure decline." Rather, I think they will just do what the author asserts - they will shift to another social network that we have less knowledge about.
During the 1980s, the AQ/Taliban provided an outlet for "the call of jihad" for disenfranchised or adventurous Muslims to fight the Russians. They had advertisement and recruitment, transportation, funding (ironically from us), training camps, indoctrination, and employment. Most importantly, they had an established ideological backing.

During the 1990's, AQ/Taliban extended that fight into Kashmir and eventually began targeting the far-enemy.

From 2003-2008, AQ put out the call for Jihad in Iraq.

Now, that call is back to A'stan, Pakistan, etc.

While dispersed in social networks, this infrastructure and support networks are manpower and resource intensive. If we destroy them, then it will take a long time to recover.

An example of this could be SWJ. This site is well recognized as the place to go to study small wars. If someone publishes in another site or printed publication, it will normally be cc'd here. If SWJ was shut down tomorrow and the entire database deleted, individuals could venture to other sites, but the collective mojo would be lost for awhile until another site picked up the slack. At that point, LE could shut down that site.

I guess I'm just saying that we should take away AQ's mojo .