Bin Laden and followers still long for attack on U.S. soil
Knight Ridder Tribune
Issue date: 11/17/04 Section: News
- Page 1 of 2 next >
KRT - WASHINGTON - While President Bush has argued that the U.S. fights terrorists abroad to avoid fighting them at home, Osama bin Laden's re-emergence in a new videotape recently was a chilling reminder of how much bin Laden still wants to wage his international jihad on U.S. soil.
In its way, bin Laden's reappearance cuts against the president's slogan - which was often repeated on the campaign trail but increasingly had been questioned by many observers, from terrorism experts to social commentators, even before the al-Qaida leader's latest video.
"It's very much a reminder from (al-Qaida) that despite all that's going on in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and everywhere else, they are still very much focused on executing an attack here," said Ben Venzke, chief executive officer of IntelCenter, which monitors terrorist groups and their activities.
Experts agreed that transnational and stateless terrorist groups, with their cells of operatives across the world, are quite capable of multitasking. "Believe it or not, al-Qaida can actually do two or more things at once," said Venzke.
"It would be rather silly to think that just because the war began in Iraq that they packed up their entire infrastructure around the world, the support cells and execution cells," he said.
What's more, al-Qaida has demonstrated that it is a patient organization with the ability to plan more than one attack at a time, he said.
"It has multiple operations planned and in place over a period of years," said Venzke, meaning that operations in the planning stages before the United States launched the Iraq war could still be on track.
Also, different al-Qaida members have various capabilities, with some jihadists trained to conduct insurgency and guerrilla operations and others more skilled at launching terror attacks in cities, Venzke said.
Brian Jenkins, a terrorism expert with the Rand Corp., also doesn't believe that the slogan stands up to the test of evidence.
In its way, bin Laden's reappearance cuts against the president's slogan - which was often repeated on the campaign trail but increasingly had been questioned by many observers, from terrorism experts to social commentators, even before the al-Qaida leader's latest video.
"It's very much a reminder from (al-Qaida) that despite all that's going on in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and everywhere else, they are still very much focused on executing an attack here," said Ben Venzke, chief executive officer of IntelCenter, which monitors terrorist groups and their activities.
Experts agreed that transnational and stateless terrorist groups, with their cells of operatives across the world, are quite capable of multitasking. "Believe it or not, al-Qaida can actually do two or more things at once," said Venzke.
"It would be rather silly to think that just because the war began in Iraq that they packed up their entire infrastructure around the world, the support cells and execution cells," he said.
What's more, al-Qaida has demonstrated that it is a patient organization with the ability to plan more than one attack at a time, he said.
"It has multiple operations planned and in place over a period of years," said Venzke, meaning that operations in the planning stages before the United States launched the Iraq war could still be on track.
Also, different al-Qaida members have various capabilities, with some jihadists trained to conduct insurgency and guerrilla operations and others more skilled at launching terror attacks in cities, Venzke said.
Brian Jenkins, a terrorism expert with the Rand Corp., also doesn't believe that the slogan stands up to the test of evidence.
