US policy is bin Laden's 'indispensable ally'
Ex-CIA analyst says US policies in Islamic world have given boost to Al-Qaeda and its leaders.WASHINGTON - The former head of the CIA unit hunting Osama bin Laden unit said Wednesday that US policy in the Middle East has given a boost to Al-Qaeda and its leader.
"Today, bin Laden, Al-Qaeda and their allies have only one indispensable ally: the US foreign policy towards the Islamic world," said Michael Scheuer, who led the bin Laden unit from 1996-1999.
"Time is not on America's side. We're clearly losing," Scheuer told a government security conference in Washington.
"We're at a point where Al-Qaeda and bin Laden are changing into Al-Qaedism and bin Ladenism - a philosophy and a movement rather than a man and an organization," the former CIA analyst said. "More than any other factor, the US invasion of Iraq and the prolonged occupation of this country has produced this transformation."
Scheuer said bin Laden has focused on US policies in the Islamic world, such as the US military presence of Iraq and Afghanistan, its economic and military support to Israel and its "decades old support for apostate and tyrannical government across the Islamic world."
"The cumulative impact of several events over the past two years have gone a good ways towards increasing Muslim hatred for Americans simply because they are Americans," he said, pointing to the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal, the treatment of detainees at the Guantanamo prison camp and caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed printed in European and US newspapers.
"Each of these events are unfortunate but not terribly serious for the Western minds. But from the Muslim perspective they are deliberate and vicious attacks against the things that guide their lives and their faiths," he said.
Scheuer, who resigned from the CIA in November 2004, is the author of "Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror," which was published with the approval of the CIA despite its damning conclusion that US actions are inflaming a global Muslim insurgency.
Source : Here
posted by _H_ at 8:25 pm
2 Comments:
I am glad I live in Freeport Illinois It is A small City far way from The big Citys.I feel Safe. www.freeport-il.com
September 11th was carried out in order to provoke an attack on Afghanistan (see Jason Burke: al Qaeda). However, with mimimum forces on the ground, the US was able to avoid the mass anti-US hysteria and radicalisation that Osama Bin Laden would have hope for. (see Paul Rogers: Iraq)
But, the war in Iraq has given OBL what he wants. By invading Iraq (that was alwasy the goal) without public support or a UNSC resolution, the United States and its allies has created the environemt for radicalisation.
At this stage, it is important to add that radicalisaton does not necessarily mean the conversion to terrorism. Radicalisation is also the instigation of economic and political opposition - in this case to the US and its allies (Jihad can be waged in many ways, the 'sword' being but one method).
But, what confuses me is that they accept that Iraq has created radicalisation. Which means that they accept that radicalisation requires a political motivation. Yet the administration fails to comprehend the political motivations behind Osama Bin Laden and other of his pre-9/11 like-minded individuals. The contradictions are outstanding. Bush is happy to stand infornt of Congress and claim that 'terrorists' can only be stopped with bullets and can not be 'negotiated' with. Yet, in accepting that radicalisation has a predominant political side to it, the administration accepts that the motivations for radicalisation can be countered with political debate.
If only Orwell was still alive...
ut its obvious why Bush is not holding talks with predominant 'terrorist' leaders. A terrorist, in neoconservative language, is defined as someone who opposes the enforcement of American ideals uing violence as a tactic. In this sense, a terrorist sympathiser is someone who opposes American policies (Guilty). Hence, if someone opposes American ideals (who is not themselves American - only Americans are covered by the constitution) they are either a terrorist or a terrorist sympathiser. And why change a policy when its opponents can be 'legitimately' killed, locked up in Guantanemo as 'enemy combatants' or simply ignored?
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