INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR---PAPER NO. 746
B.RAMAN
There is an air of nervousness all over the world
where there is a strong US presence regarding the dangers of Al Qaeda-inspired
attacks on US nationals and interests coinciding with the first anniversary of
the killing of Osama bin Laden by US
Navy Seals during a clandestine raid into his hide-out in Abbottabad in
Pakistan on May 2 of last year. A terrorist alert has already been sounded and
US intelligence agencies and security forces are already in a state of
preparedness to counter any attack.
2.The greatest danger is feared in the Af-Pak
region where there is considerable US presence offering tempting targets to Al
Qaeda and its affiliates. This is also an area where there is maximum anti-US
anger. The US is particularly concerned over Pakistan where the Army and the
Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) have not been
co-operative with the US in unearthing and neutralising the remnants of
Al Qaeda.
3.After seeing the impunity with which Osama bin
Laden had been living and operating from right under the nose of the Pakistani
Army in Abbottabad, one has reasons to fear that those remnants of Al Qaeda
that have escaped death from the US Drone strikes must be similarly living in
sanctuaries in the urban centres of Pakistan and biding their time for an
opportunistic attack on US targets.
4.Among those still believed to be living and
operating from Pakistani territory is Ayman al-Zawahiri, who took over as the
Amir of Al Qaeda, after the death of OBL. He is not as charismatic as OBL and
not as innovative in conceiving and having executed terrorist operations of a
catastrophic nature on a global scale similar to the 9/11 terrorist strikes in
the US.
5. Under his leadership, the anti-US PSYWAR
campaign of Al Qaeda is showing signs of losing some lustre. I have seen no
evidence to show that Al Qaeda under Zawahiri’s leadership is making as
effective use of social media networks as other traditional fundamentalist
organisations like the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt have been doing.
6.In fact, none of the six organisations that have
emerged as terrorist organisations with Al Qaeda like potential for catastrophic
acts of terrorism have shown a capability for imaginatively using social media
networks for promoting their ideological campaigns and terrorist strikes. These
six organisations are the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) of Pakistan, the
Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) popularly known as the Pakistani Taliban, al Qaeda
in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), based in Yemen; al Qaeda in the Islamic
Maghreb, based in Algeria and Mali; al Shabaab of Somalia; and Boko Haram, of
Nigeria.
7. The loss of momentum of PSYWAR operations after
the death of OBL has led to a decline of “lone wolf” terrorist attacks of the
kind witnessed in Glasgow in June,2007.
Individual Muslims inspired by online radicalisation and training
launching terrorist attacks on their own is no longer as dreaded as it was
before the death of OBL
8. Organised jihadi terrorism is still a major
threat to be reckoned with. The six organisations mentioned above have shown a
capability for sustained operations in their respective areas and sporadic
strikes outside their territory like the LET’s 26/11 terrorist strikes in
Mumbai and the AQAP’s failed attempt to blow up a Detroit-bound US plane on
December 25,2009. The death of OBL at the hands of the US Navy Seals was
followed by the death of Anwar al-Awlaki of the AQAP reportedly by a US Drone
strike in Yemen on September 30,2011.
9. OBL, a Saudi of Yemeni origin, Ramzi Yousef
of Pakistan, now in a US jail, Khalid
Sheikh Mohammad, another Pakistani now in the Guantanamo Bay detention
centre, al-Awlaki, a US citizen of
Yemeni origin, and Hafiz Mohammed Sayeed of the LET of Pakistan were the
conceptualisers and executers of well-orchestrated and imaginatively planned
terrorist strikes outside their traditional areas of operation. Of these, only
Sayeed has presently the motivated cadre and infrastructure to organise
trans-national terrorist strikes of Al Qaeda kind.
10.Zawahiri is more an expert on jihadi intifada, a
kind of regionalised insurgency in areas where there is a high level of
alienation as in Somalia, Algeria, Mali and Nigeria. Thus, after the death of
OBL, one sees two jihadi trends--- an intifada-cum-insurgency kind of a
regional dimension inspired by the thoughts and exhortations of Zawahiri and trans-national
terrorism of Al Qaeda inspiration
promoted by the LET and the TTP, either on their own or with the collaboration
of Al Qaeda and the Haqqani Network of Afghanistan.
11.Of the five conceptualisers of global or
trans-national terrorism, two---OBL and al-Awlaki --- are dead and two---Ramzi
and KSM—are in US custody. This leaves Hafiz Mohammad Sayeed as the terrorist
with the greatest lethal potential for global or trans-national operations.
Unless he is eliminated by India and the US—either acting alone or jointly---
the continuance of global or trans-national
terrorism of Al Qaeda kind will remain a major threat.
12.Al Qaeda and its affiliates are now operating on
two planes----regional and trans-national. The regional has its epicentre in
Somalia, Algeria, Mali and Nigeria. The trans-national has its epicentre in the
Af-Pak region and Yemen. While the neutralisation of the regional terrorism has
to be the responsibility of the States concerned with appropriate outside
assistance, that of the trans-national
kind has to be the responsibility of the international community with the US
playing the leadership role.
13.While the US is now convinced of the
trans-national dimensions of the threat posed by the LET, it is still hesitant
to mount against the LET a counter-terrorism operation, with no holds barred,
of the kind mounted against Al Qaeda and bin Laden. Unless it does so, the
threats emanating from trans-national terrorist groups and the remnants of Al Qaeda
operating from the Af-Pak region will remain as high as ever.
14. The magnitude of these threats could increase
after the thinning down of the US and other NATO forces in Afghanistan. The
implications of the continued non-cooperation of the Pakistani Army and the ISI
in dealing with the LET and the remnants of Al Qaeda and of a premature
withdrawal of the US and other NATO forces from Afghanistan are factors that
have to be carefully analysed in any assessment of the terrorist scenario after
the death of OBL. In its anxiety to thin down its presence in Afghanistan, the
US is not paying adequate attention to these factors.
15. The thinning out of the US and other NATO
forces from Afghanistan is likely to lead to a transfer of large quantities of
arms and ammunition of different kinds to the Afghan security forces by the departing
US forces. There are dangers of the leakage of many of these into the hands
of the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban, the
Haqqani Network, Al Qaeda, the LET and other Pakistani jihadi organisations.
16. The Af-Pak region is again likely to be awash
with arms and ammunition as it was before 9/11. There is a danger of some of
them finding their way into Jammu & Kashmir along with surplus trained
cadres of the Pakistani jihadi organisations. If India is not careful, it may face a repeat of 1989 when
surplus trained cadres and arms and ammunition from Afghanistan made their way
into Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir to assist in an ISI-organised proxy war to annex
J&K.
17. OBL is dead, but the threats emanating from the
region will remain as high as before until the jihadi terrorist remnants
operating from this region are neutralised and their sources of funding and
arms and ammunition are forced to dry up. ( 27-4-12)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd),
Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director,
Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre For
China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com Twitter : @SORBONNE75 )
