WHAT have six years of fighting and worldwide counter-terrorism achieved since the attacks on the World Trade Centre? Bomb plots throughout Europe, defeat in Iraq, a massive boost of the opium crop in Afghanistan, and Iran on the edge of getting nuclear weapons. And, despite a massive price on his head, the perpetrator of the 9/11 attacks is still strutting his stuff. Osama bin Laden’s recent video appearance — his first since 2004 — appeared to be an attempt to reposition himself: as no longer merely a warlord, but the wise spiritual leader of the al-Qaeda faith. His politics have become greener and his beard blacker.
But what is the military reality behind this makeover?
That he is still alive and waging war is a sad reflection on American military power and determination.
But his long-term endgame — the establishment of a global Islamic caliphate — looks no nearer than it did before 9/11.
Not a single Middle Eastern, north African or Asian Muslim regime has been toppled as part of the rebuilding of the caliphate, which al-Qaeda strategists are saying could happen by 2020.
The influential International Institute of Strategic Studies in London, in its annual strategic review published last week, said that the core leadership of al-Qaeda in Pakistan had increased its control and direction of jihadists, especially in western countries.
The institute argues that al-Qaeda has proved very resilient and can still plan terror spectaculars in the west.
Second, its franchises in Iraq and especially in north Africa have not only sworn allegiance but are beginning to move from parochial to global objectives. Worse, the large number of terror plots that have been discovered in Europe, Canada, the Arabian peninsula and the Maghreb display the growing radicalisation of Muslims.
But it is the home-grown terrorism in North America and Europe that is of most concern to western intelligence
agencies.
The institute’s report states soberly: “In sum, the US and its allies have failed to deal a death blow to al-Qaeda; the organisation’s ideology appears to have taken root to such a degree that it will require decades to eradicate.”
The 2005 bombings in London have directed attention to the 800000-strong Pakistani community in the UK.
Many young British Pakistanis have accepted al-Qaeda’s “single narrative” — that the sufferings of the Islamic world can be resolved only when the alleged oppression of Muslims at the hands of the unbelievers is brought to an end.
Pakistan is the key problem. The nuclear-armed military dictatorship is very fragile, and on the edge of civil war. The west has been obliged to bolster the regime, despite its deals with the Taliban and other jihadists in Afghanistan and in the ungovernable tribal areas nominally controlled by Pakistan.
But the alternative may be an Islamic regime that is even more amenable to al-Qaeda’s ambitions.
More than 400000 British nationals of Pakistani origin travel to Pakistan each year. Many of the UK-born terrorists trained there. And, for the US, these same British nationals can use the current visa-waiver scheme to freely enter the US.
British counterterrorism co-operation with the US and the European Union has brought an improvement in the intelligence flow, but the numbers required for comprehensive surveillance are challenging, not least because al-Qaeda has seduced an increasing number of “clean-skin” white converts. Arrests this month in Germany have again demonstrated this danger.
In the US, Muslims tend to be better off, better educated and better integrated than in the UK.
Nevertheless, since the attacks of 9/11, the FBI has investigated 12 home-grown plots. Increasingly, young American Muslims are describing themselves as Muslim first and American second.
Deradicalisation programmes, where they exist in Muslim countries, tend to accept the “single narrative” but then encourage nonviolent responses to the perceived injustices being done to their co-religionists in Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine/Israel.
In the west, governments have left deradicalisation programmes largely to the mosques, even though many have been subverted by extremists.
In prisons and universities, often breeding grounds for jihad, “moderate” Muslims are urged to dissuade their brothers and sisters; largely in vain.
Meanwhile, among the chattering classes of the unbelievers, pious debates about further integration and dialogue with Muslims have not worked either.
In Africa, in the Sahel states, the US is trying, via its Trans-Saharan Counterterrorism Initiative, to mix security training with economic and social development. This is the avowed policy of the US military’s new Africa Command.
In SA, the institute report says that while the country has not fallen victim to Islamist terrorism, it has become apparent that within the substantial Muslim population “there is a core of radicalised individuals engaged in facilitating the activities of extremists from other Islamic states, notably Pakistan”.
The republic has become a popular transit destination for al-Qaeda activists, who want to disguise their travel patterns.
South African passports also afford visa-free access to a wide range of destinations, a vulnerability recently acknowledged by Intelligence Minister Ronnie Kasrils.
Though there is a place for muscular military responses to al-Qaeda, while Iraq and southern Afghanistan are battle grounds, many young Muslims will not want to listen to any appeals for compromise.
The choice is stark.
Either a deal must be struck with al-Qaeda — withdraw all western troops from the Middle East and Afghanistan, and let Muslims decide if they want a caliphate. Their religion, their countries, their decision — and meanwhile most will want to sell oil and trade with the west.
Or a decision must be made: if this war is going to last decades, it must be won, but by different means. A concerted western ideological campaign must be waged akin to the strategy that won the Cold War. Soft power might do a lot better than the occupations in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The west’s cultural and economic power might succeed where its tanks and gunships have failed, provided the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and its allies show the patience, determination and unity which they have failed to display militarily in Afghanistan, for example.
Non-Muslims will have to take this war far more seriously, as seriously as Muslims do, if it is to be won.
A warning is necessary. If Washington sanctions an attack on the nuclear facilities in Iran, then all bets are off. Then double the duration of the long war and the difficulties in winning it.
And a side bet: Bin Laden will be killed by his fellow Muslims, not western forces.
Prof Moorcraft is the director of the Centre for Foreign Policy Analysis, London.
