Thursday, 27 March 2003

The Curious Incident. It's been over a week since the start of the war. Coalition forces are within sight of Baghdad. The Iraqi army has been less a factor than the Iraqi weather. Saddam is missing. The world is watching. There has never been a better time to step out of the shadows and strike at the soft underbelly of Western civilization.

So why is Al Qaeda missing in action?

The obvious explanation is the gung-ho optimistic one: Our counter-terrorist activities have reduced their ability to mount attacks. They're on the run, and it's all they can do to stay hidden; even something as simple and direct as a truck bomb is now beyond their capabilities.

I don't think that's the case, though. An attack on the level of Kenya or Bali doesn't take a lot of resources; that's why they call it "asymmetrical." I can believe that targets like American embassies and warships were made much harder to hit after 9/11, and then secured even further as the Iraq war began—but every nightclub and hotel in Western civilization? Every bridge, power plant, water supply, and landmark on three continents? Unlikely.

I think the more likely explanation is that Al Qaeda is both less and more capable than we generally recognize. Al Qaeda lacks depth: They don't have a pool of operatives and bombs at the ready, standing by to strike on Osama's command; they've never had any capacity to mount timely terrorist attacks, not even to follow up the World Trade Center's destruction. If Al Qaeda had the resources to put a truck bomb on the Brooklyn Bridge anytime on or after 11 September 2001, then their failure to do so was, and is, inexplicable. (Of course, Al Qaeda's failure to follow through is partly explained by the fact that they're fanatical religious nutjobs: When the final step in your plan is "and then Allah smites the unbelievers and our brothers in the Middle East rise up in glorious jihad!", your backup plans may suffer.)

Where Al Qaeda has shown its capability, and why they're a serious threat, is that they can patiently nurture a plan that requires years to develop and implement. The 9/11 attacks were the product of a sustained effort, and somewhere in the world another Al Qaeda cell may be quietly working on a dirty bomb, or nerve gas, or some other asymmetric horror. If so, they likely won't have anything ready as specific retaliation for America's Iraq invasion—but they'll keep working, and their attack will come on some random day that happens to fit their plans.

I frankly expected there would be a rash of suicide bombings to mark the start of the war in Iraq, or at least one significant terrorist attack of some kind: America's embassy in Paris has been a rumored Al Qaeda target for some time, and a bombing there would be especially damaging now in light of the political situation. If there isn't a major attack in the next few weeks, we can assume that Al Qaeda's capabilities have been crippled to the point where they can't mount one—or that Al Qaeda, and other like-minded terrorist groups, will remain in the shadows until a time of their choosing.

- Posted by Scott Forbes at 5:29 am. comments.