THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume V, Issue # 291, December 3, 2003
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
QUO VADIS, AL-QA'IDA?
WHERE ARE YOU GOING, & WHAT WILL BE YOUR FATE?
By Alan Caruba
It is the question that countless intelligence specialists, academics, and heads of state are trying to answer, quo vadis, al-Qa'ida? Whither
goest thou? It is not merely what it will do next, but whether progress is being made against this shadowy network and how long it will
take before it can be penetrated and destroyed?
The problem those in the West have in understanding al-Qa'ida is that it does not function from what we would deem a recognizable
political, economic, or ideological basis. It is not the identifiable ideology of Communism, nor the sheer quest for power of Fascism. It is
the nearly incomprehensible fanaticism of a religion-based belief that America, the Jews, and the West in general are a threat to Islam and
its “holy jihad” to rule the world.
Some things we know. According to a recent report, Osama bin Laden is now operating out of Iran with the blessings and assistance of its
oligarchy of ayatollahs. A look at the map reveals why. On one side of Iran is Afghanistan and on the other is Iraq. Those who argue we
should withdraw our troops and disengage from the struggle to initiate constitutional democratic governments in both nations are arguing
for surrender to al-Qa'ida, our sworn enemy.
The Islamic jihad began in earnest in Iran in the late 1970s, when the Shah was overthrown and American diplomats were taken hostage. It
escalated in the 1980s, when the Soviet Union was defeated in Afghanistan (with the assistance of the CIA) by a combination of local
warriors supported by many young Saudis who swarmed into Afghanistan and, in effect, took over the nation in the form of the Taliban.
At the heart of al-Qa'ida has always been Saudi Arabian involvement. So why is al-Qa'ida attacking within Saudi Arabia? Again, one has to
understand the roots of the jihad. It is Wahhabism, the strict form of Islam with which the House of Saud struck a bargain when it began its
conquest of the Arabian Peninsula in the last century. Bin Laden, a Saudi, is the living symbol of Wahhabism.
As Dr. Walid Phares, a professor of Middle East Studies, recently noted, the al-Qa'ida attacks within Saudi Arabia, previously directed
against Westerners (such as the 1996 bombing of the Dhahran U.S. military barracks) and now killing Saudis and other Muslims living in
the Saudi kingdom, has been designed to force the royal family to make a choice between “its traditional inclination to Wahhabism and its
realist ties to the United States.”
Dependent on petrodollars, the Saudis are playing a double game. Reportedly, it has been cracking down on al-Qa'ida wherever it can
find its members. Most telling was the statement by Crown Prince Abdallah, a rhetorical declaration of war against “clerics” who
protect al-Qa'ida and legitimize its resort to violence. He called them “intruders” and “enemies of the true path.” They are not intruders.
They are Saudis in the same way that virtually all of those who destroyed the World Trade Center on 9-11 were Saudis. Inside Saudi
Arabia, Wahabism still rules.
Pushing the Saudis in the direction of disassociating from the very fanaticism it has supported for generations, Michael Young, the
Chairman of the U.S. government Commission on Religious Freedom, said in late November that U.S. policy is that the Wahhabi brand
of Islam “is an ideology that is incompatible with the war on terrorism.” Addressing the question of whether “Saudi Arabia is a
strategic threat,” the Commission examined “the (Saudi) global propagation of intolerance.”
“The Saudi royal family has shown it has no inclination for real reform,” said Mai Yamani, a Saudi academic who has been threatened
with arrest if she returns home. Now the royal family must either divorce itself from its decades of funding the worldwide spread of
Wahhabism through thousands of mosques and madrasses or it must face its own extinction.
Despite events in Riyadh and elsewhere around the world, it is doubtful the Saudi ruling family will truly change course. Until and
unless that happens, any indication of change put forth as public relations “spin” should be viewed with suspicion.
Martin Indyk, a former Ambassador to Israel, said, “We’ve struck a Faustian bargain, turning a blind eye to Saudi Arabia’s domestic
policies … and we’ve turned a blind eye to Saudi Arabian efforts to export Wahhabism.” That U.S. policy, if the report of the
Commission on Religious Freedom is any indication, is dead. The Saudis know it.
This brings us back to Osama bin Laden, whose new headquarters can be found in Iran. The Iranians are Shiites. The Saudis are
Sunnis. The struggle for which branch will dominate Islam has been going on since the earliest years of Islam. Iran is being squeezed
now by U.S. military power in the Middle East. It is surrounded by nations that have aligned themselves with America and the West.
In addition to Iraq and Afghanistan, to its north is Turkey and to its south is Pakistan. It borders Turkmenistan, a satellite of the
Russian Federation, whose future is tied the development of its oil reserves.
Thus, al-Qa'ida, though capable of having cells at work in any nation, is now isolated in terms of its leadership. Add to this, what
must surely be a 24/7 search for Osama bin Laden to kill him and his associates, and one can begin to see the beginnings of the end
of this movement. That said, the end will likely not come soon. One can project this struggle out twenty to fifty years without risking
being wrong.
Its individual cells are essentially on their own. And the bombings, which are its primary weapon, have turned much of the world
against it. It is now killing Muslims. Bin Laden reportedly has trimmed his beard and taken to wearing the black clerical garb of an
Iranian mullah. He’s running out of friends and the Iranian Islamic Revolution is running out of time. Within Iran, the vast majority
of its population wants to oust the ayatollahs from power.
One factor remains as the ultimate threat, and that is the irrational devotion of the adherents of al-Qa'ida to wreaking terror upon a world
that is passing them by. Any group whose members are willing, eager, to kill themselves for its objectives remains a potent enemy.
One can only hope that, within Islam, there are Muslims who do not support its jihad and who will participate in its undoing.
Quo vadis al-Qa'ida? Not tomorrow or next year, but as surely as the Sun will rise, its days are numbered.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Islamism & Jihadism -- The Threat of Radical Islam
Page Three
Page Two
Page One
War & Peace in the Real World
Page Two
Page One
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
U.S. National Security Strategy
Alan Caruba is a veteran business and science writer, a Public Relations Counselor, Communications Director of the American Policy Center,
and Founder of the National Anxiety Center, a clearinghouse for information about media-driven scare campaigns. Caruba writes a weekly
column, "Warning Signs," posted on the Internet website of the National Anxiety Center
(www.anxietycenter.com). A compilation of his past columns, entitled Warning Signs, is published by Merril Press. In addition
to Warning Signs, Caruba is the author of A Pocket Guide to Militant Islam and The United Nations vs. the United States,
both of which are available from the National Anxiety Center, 9 Brookside Road, Maplewood, New Jersey, 07040.
Copyright 2003 Alan Caruba
Published with Permission of Alan Caruba
ACaruba@AOL.Com
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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