The Bolivarian-Islamist Narrative of Asymmetrical Warfare
Yesterday I participated in a Hudson Institute event on Populism, Islamism and “Indigenism” versus Democracy in Latin America. What came into focus there was the joint narrative of the Bolivarian populist governments (Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua) and radical Islamists, led by Iran.
It is hard, on the surface, to imagine what a secular revolution that allows women on the beach in bikinis, salsa music, racy soap operas and rum has in common with a theocracy that tolerates none of those things and believes that divine law should rule the world.
One of the primary unifying threads in the joint narrative is the utopian vision that a human system can be devised that will bring justice and peace. Hence, from this vision, both groups construct a narrative of heroic battling against the earthly forces of evil and corruption, and both have chosen the United States as its primary enemy, followed closely by other liberal democracies that, in their view, have failed to live up to the utopian ideals.
This is where, as I have written about before, the joint fascination with asymmetrical warfare and its desirability meshes with the larger story line. Both sides view themselves as small powers taking on vast world powers, a David and Goliath narrative that imbues a sense of inevitable ultimate victory with the need to find the weapons that will lead to the defeat of enemy.
The keynote speaker at the Hudson event, Spanish parliamentarian Gustavo de Arístegui, has written that those in this alliance, whether secular or religious, view themselves as “legitimate soldiers in an heroic battle within the context of an asymmetrical war of liberation. It is a theory that justifies any kind of violence, including terrorism, if it is used against the most powerful countries, the repressive forces of the West.”
This view of the heroism of the actions is in part what gives such a dangerously romantic view of suicide bombings, as espoused in the book Chavez has adopted as official military doctrine: Peripheral Warfare and Revolutionary Islam: Origins, Rules and Ethics of Asymmetrical Warfare (Guerra Periferica y el Islam
Revolucionario: Orígenes, Reglas y Ética de la Guerra Asimétrica) by the Spanish politician and ideologue Jorge Verstrynge. I have written about that more extensively in a previous post.
There is little doubt that this tactical alliance would shatter if either side were to gain significant ground. The Islamists have shown, particularly in the Iranian revolution that was viewed initially by many as triumph of secular, reformist forces, that it will eat the young revolutionaries for lunch.
But for now, the common view of the struggle against the West, bound by a narrative both can offer as an explanation for their actions, is sufficient. The common enemy is there, and the weapons for the struggle can be obtained.
One of the dangers of this narrative is not just the seduction it holds for messianic leaders like Chavez in Venezuela and Ahmadinejad in Iran, but the lure it holds for non-state armed groups like the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia), who increasingly find themselves isolated and without a coherent reason to continue the revolution.
Chavez’s willingness to embrace and help write this narrative means that he has shared with his allies in the FARC, and why his pro forma protestations of not supporting the revolutionary cause are meaningless, and will remain so. The FARC needs to articulate a reason for its continuation in the armed struggle. The narrative not only offers that, but well-trained allies (Hezbollah particularly) who can help them advance once a common agenda is established. And that is truly alarming.
West Africa in the New Cocaine Pipeline
Yesterday the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on Africaheld what Chairman Russ Feingold (D-Wisconsin) a wake up call on the growing threat of cocaine trafficking through West Africa.
I testified there on the ties of the emerging groups in West Africa to the FARC and my fellow CTB contributor Michael Braun testified as well.
I think it is a tremendously important development because, in the end, there are two major consequences for the United States: the money from that trade will strengthen the criminal pipelines in our hemisphere because most of the money comes back here and; the human cost of putting that much new money into the existing criminal pipelines in a region where there has already been horrendous violence surrounding far less valuable commodities.
The amount of money in play here is enormous, particularly given the weak state of governments, civil society, law enforcement, the judiciary etc. There is little that can be done to avert the wholesale implosion of the region.
One of the reasons for this is the dismal state of governance in West Africa is that since the early 1990s the region has suffered a series of conflicts centered on natural resources, particularly diamonds, timber, oil, and gold. Profits from these “honey pot” wars fueled the rise of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) in Sierra Leone with its child soldiers and unspeakable atrocities; fed the wars sustained by Liberia’s Charles Taylor; and contributed to the rampant corruption and weak or failed institutions in almost every country. These natural resources, while valuable, pale in comparison to the money the cocaine trade generates. For example, at the height of the “blood diamond” trade in Sierra Leone and Liberia, the total value of the diamonds being smuggled out was less than $200 million. The potential to fuel conflicts over the cocaine pipeline, the most lucrative commodity so far and one whose profits are several orders of magnitude larger than diamonds, is truly frightening.
Given Hezbollah’s long-established presence on the ground in the region and the closeness of its operatives to that community, it is also reasonable to assume that Hezbollah and the drug traffickers, operating in the same permissive environment, will cross paths. It is precisely this type of environment that allows for the otherwise unthinkable alliances to emerge. Most are short-lived, centering on specific opportunities and operations that can benefit both groups, but others are longer lasting and more dangerous.
More worrisome is the recent evidence of Chávez’s direct support for Hezbollah, including the June 18, 2008 OFAC designations of two Venezuelan citizens, including a senior diplomat, as terrorist supporters for working with the armed group. Several businesses also were sanctioned. Among the things the two are alleged to have been conducting on behalf of Hezbollah were coordinating possible terrorist attacks and building Hezbollah-sponsored community centers in Venezuela.
Given Iran’s ties to Hezbollah and Venezuela, Venezuela’s ties Iran and the FARC, the FARC’s history of building alliances with other armed groups, and the presence of Hezbollah and other armed Islamist groups in Latin America and on the ground in West Africa, it would be dangerous and imprudent to dismiss the possibility of an alliance of these actors. The history of these groups indicates that they will take advantage of the ungoverned spaces and corrupt and weak states of West Africa to get to know each other, work together, learn from each other and exploit areas of mutual interest. Unfortunately, the primary area of mutual interest is a hatred of the United States.
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New Paper on Bolivia: Into the Abyss
The International Assessment and Strategy Center has just published a paper I wrote on the rapidly-deteriorating situation in Bolivia: Into the Abyss: Bolivia Under Morales and the MAS.
The study outlines several of the more dangerous elements of the Morales government and his ties to Venezuela and Iran. Among them are:
o The systematic de-institutionalization of the nation’s fragile democratic structures, including the judiciary and independent auditing agencies;
o A complete restructuring of the military patterned after the Venezuelan model of integrating the armed forces into a host of civic and traditionally civilian roles;
o A radical restructuring of the military doctrine, endorsing the asymmetrical warfare tactics embraced and employed by radical Islamist groups and formally adopted by Hugo Chávez and the Venezuelan military;
o A complete restructuring of the nation’s intelligence apparatus, advised by Cuban and Venezuelan experts on internal security;
o Growing ties to the FARC and other armed groups in Latin America;
o Permanent confrontation, insults and attacks-verbal and physical-on members of the press, leading to numerous international expressions of concern.
Of greatest concern is the little-discussed endorsement of Chavez of the a doctrine of asymmetrical warfare against the United States based on the principles pioneered by radical Islamist groups.
Since 2005 Chávez has rewritten Venezuela’s security doctrine to scrub it of all outside, “imperialist” influences. To replace the old doctrine, Chávez and the Venezuelan military leadership have focused on developing a doctrine centered on asymmetrical warfare, in the belief that the primary threat to Venezuelan security is a U.S. invasion. One of the main books he has adopted is Peripheral Warfare and Revolutionary Islam: Origins, Rules and Ethics of Asymmetrical Warfare (Guerra Periferica y el Islam
Revolucionario: Orígenes, Reglas y Ética de la Guerra Asimétrica) by the Spanish politician and ideologue Jorge Verstrynge. Although he is not a Muslim, and the book was not written
directly in relation to the Venezuelan experience, Verstrynge’s book lauds radical Islam (as well as past terrorists like Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, better known as Carlos the Jackal)104 for helping to
expand the parameters of what irregular warfare should encompass—including the use of biological and nuclear weapons, along with the correlated civilian casualties among the enemy. Central to Verstrynge’s idealized view of terrorists is the belief that it involves fighters willing tosacrifice their lives in pursuit of their goals. Before writing extensively on how to make chemical weapons and listing helpful places to find information on the manufacture of rudimentary
nuclear bombs that “someone with a high school education could make,” Verstrynge writes:
We already know it is incorrect to limit asymmetrical warfare to guerrilla warfare, but it is important. However, it is not a mistake to also use things that are classified as terrorism and use them in asymmetrical warfare. And we have super terrorism, divided into chemical terrorism, bioterrorism (which uses biological and bacteriological methods), and nuclear terrorism, which
means “the type of terrorism uses the threat of nuclear attack to achieve its goals.”
Based on this book, Verstrynge was invited by Chávez to give keynote address to military leaders in a 2005 conference titled “First Military Forum on Fourth Generation Warfare and
Asymmetric Conflict” held at the military academy. Following the conference Gen. Raúl Baduel, the army commander and Chávez confidant ordered a special pocket size edition of the book to be printed up and distributed throughout the officer corps with explicit orders that it be studied cover to cover. In a December 12, 2008 interview with Venezuelan state television Verstynge lauded Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda for creating a new type of warfare that is “deterritorialized, de-stateized and de-nationalized,” a war where suicide bombers act as “atomic bombs for the poor.” Given the level of training Venezuelan military institutions are giving their Bolivian counterparts and the level of on the ground Venezuelan leadership and advising in Bolivia, it is highly likely that this doctrine is being transmitted from one military to the other.
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Rep. Wolf Takes on CAIR, and the US MB-Hamas Tie
Two interesting notes regarding the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood-linked groups in the United States over the weekend.
First, Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va), took the unusual and courageous step of directly tackling CAIR on the floor of the House last Friday. In his speech, also available on Youtube, Wolf laid out CAIR’s history in some detail and asked the FBI and the main Justice Department to clarify the status of their relationships with CAIR.
After reviewing the group’s history, Wolf identified one of their most effective tactics and why it is so dangerous:
Given CAIR’s genesis, its associations with known terrorist entities and individuals, and its tactics—namely attempting to discredit anyone who dares to speak out against its organization—their cries of victimization and accusations of religious bigotry appear disingenuous.
Wolf further noted that:
In a federal court filing from December 2007, federal prosecutors described CAIR as “having conspired with other affiliates of the Muslim Brotherhood to support terrorists.” The government also stated that “proof that the conspirators used deception to conceal from the American public their connections to terrorists was introduced” in the Holy Land Foundation trial.
In a footnote government prosecutors points out: “(F)rom its founding by Muslim Brotherhood leaders, CAIR conspired with other affiliates of the Muslim Brotherhood to support terrorists…”
Other elected officials, including Democrats like Charles Schumer and Dick Durbin and Republicans like Jon Kyle and Tom Coburn, have taken on CAIR, but Wolf’s call to the FBI and other U.S. government agencies to keep a healthy distance from the organization is both timely and important, as CAIR and other MB-linked organizations seek to influence the Obama administration.
The ties of some of these groups to Hamas is shown by this note in the Global Muslim Brotherhood Daily Report (free subscription required)
The posting notes that:
In a response to the recent President Obama speech to the Muslim world, Islamic convert Robert Crane makes the interesting admission that he is a “principal adviser” to Hamas leader Ahmed Yousef. In an article in the American Muslim, Dr Crane writes:
“The best approach was taken by Dr. Ahmed Yousef, for whom I served in the 1990s as Managing Editor of his scholarly Middle East Affairs Journal and for whom I have long been a principal adviser. As the Deputy Foreign Minister in Palestine’s legally elected government, and as one of the two intellectual founders in 1983 of the Palestinian Hamas, Dr. Yousef has authority as perhaps the world’s leading Islamist in the search for peace, prosperity, and freedom through compassionate justice”.Youssef serves as Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the dissolved government in Gaza but is usually described by the western media as a political adviser to Ismail Haniya, senior political leader of Hamas and one of two disputed Prime Ministers of the Palestinian National Authority. His Middle East Affairs Journal is published by the United Association for Studies and Research (USAR), part of the Palestine Committee of the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood and generally thought to be part of the Hamas infrastructure in the U.S.
Dr. Crane, who was very briefly U.S. ambassador to the UAE in 1981 and who converted to Islam in Bahrain during that year, has been a board member of the USAR as well as holding positions with the American Muslim Council and the International Institute of Islamic Thought, both also part of the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood. In 1998, Dr. Crane wrote that he had a “structure for Islamizing America.”
Shortly after 911, Dr. Crane published an article blaming the terrorist attacks solely on the U.S, and specifically on “active U.S. support of secularized and xenophobic Zionism”
In 2007 wrote that he looked forward to the collapse of the “American Empire” which he said would come about “only with the help of Muslims”:
The American Empire must eventually collapse, as John Whitehead predicts, and as all empires have. The challenge is to transform America so that it is no longer an empire and therefore can serve the intent of its founders to be a moral model for the world based on the universal wisdom of all the world religions. This transformation can come only with the help of Muslims who are pursuing the mission of educating their fellow Muslims for the good of America.Crane’s public acknowledgement of being a principal advisor to a leader of Hamas, as the GMBDR notes, may be a violation of U.S. law regarding the provision of material support for designated terrorist organizations, which is what Hamas is. At the least, it shows the ties between the legacy MB groups in the US and Hamas remain strong.
The Taliban's Continuing Foreign Support
Little noticed in the discussion of the Pakistan/Afghanistan Taliban issues are the points raised recently by Gen. David Petraeus about the continued use of charities and other external support for the radical Islamist group.
While there has been considerable attention paid to the revenue generated from opium trafficking in the Taliban’s financial structure, little has been relatively little attention paid to the continuing role of charities in skimming off money that benefits the Taliban and others.
“You have funds generated locally, funds that come in from the outside, and funds that come from the illegal narcotics business,” he said. “It’s a hotly debated topic as to which is the most significant and it may be that they are all roughly around the same level.”
Gen. Petraeus estimated that the Taliban raise a total of “hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars” each year from the three sources, and said the U.S. doesn’t have precise figures.
Charities, as we learned right after 9/11 are not only valuable for the money they can raise and distribute virtually undetected, but for the identification cards and travel facilities they offer radical operatives to move around with official cover.
(This was shown by both the Benevolence International trial and the recent Holy Land Foundation trial, where principals received stiff sentences because of their charitable support for Hamas.)
This points to one of the fundamental conundrums in dealing with the Taliban-the drug trafficking ties have shown been impossible to sever. And there is enough support for the jihadist movement to insure that, even if that revenue stream were cut off, that charities and other private donors could allow the group to continue to operate financially.
Charities are particularly difficult to deal with for a variety of reasons. Often they do provide legitimate humanitarian aid, while diverting a small percentage of the proceeds to the terrorists. Shutting the charity down does, in fact, hurt people on the ground . This means that by cutting off those funds one almost always antagonizes a significant group of people in need of aid.
So it is a win-win for the Taliban. The charities they have access to give them political and religious credibility among the local population. Shutting them down doesn’t hurt the Taliban, but furthers their story line that the West is out to hurt Muslims, no matter who or where they are.
Verification of charitable activities is not only time consuming but often futile. If someone claims to have bought 7,000 bricks for a clinic, but only purchased 5,000 and the remaining funds given to the Taliban, who would know? Who should know?
These are not easy questions. Islamist charities in this country, which has some capacity to enforce record keeping and transparency, were able to funnel millions of dollars to terrorist organizations. Pakistan or UAE has neither the capacity nor the will try to enforce even minimal standards.
The financial structure is adaptable. I find it hard to accept Petraeus’s premise that perhaps all three of the funding pools are equal. Opium can generate more than all the charities combined. How much the Taliban actually gets is a matter of debate, but I think it far outweighs the internal and charitable contributions.
But it does show just how difficult it is to hit the moving target of terror financing.
The Collateral Damage From the West Africa Drug Trade
I have heard recently in discussions with people on the Hill and in policy making circles that the exploding drug trafficking phenomenon in West Africa is not really a U.S. security concern because most of the cocaine that transits through that region is bound for Europe and not the United States.
There are several thing wrong with that perspective, I believe. The first is that the traffickers will (and already have) attack the fragile institutions and rule of law where they exist, and they are already incredibly weak. But in countries like Ghana and Mali, where notable progress has been made, and Liberia and Sierra Leone, struggling after years of punishing civil wars, some progress has been made.
Drug trafficking, which must rely on corruption and coercion because it is illegal, will make the possibility of establishing the rule of law in the region virtually impossible. That will translate into another round of instability and carnage in an area that has already suffered a great deal. But what will get broader attention is the fact that the region at stake produces close to 20 percent of the oil we use, and the production will plummet as the chaos spreads.
There are also other reasons to care about the massive inflow of illicit cash. Remember that Hezbollah, al Qaeda and other terrorist groups have funded themselves from illicit drugs, diamonds and timber, including activities in West Africa.
For a fascinating glimpse at the scope of the illicit money activities of Hezbollah in West Africa, see this OFAC announcement released today on the targeting of Hezbollah fundraisers in West Africa.
Abd Al Menhem Qubaysi is a Cote d’Ivoire-based Hizballah supporter and is the personal representative of Hizballah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah. Qubaysi communicates with Hizballah leaders and has hosted senior Hizballah officials traveling to Cote d’Ivoire and other parts of Africa to raise money for Hizballah. Qubaysi plays a visible role in Hizballah activities in Cote d’Ivoire, including speaking at Hizballah fundraising events and sponsoring meetings with high-ranking members of the terrorist organization.
Qubaysi also helped establish an official Hizballah foundation in Cote d’Ivoire which has been used to recruit new members for Hizballah’s military ranks in Lebanon.
Because the Lebanese expat community controls much of the import and export economy and access to the region’s financial structure, it seems highly likely that the South American drug cartels moving into West Africa will have to either buy or kill its Lebanese rivals. There is little likelihood that the violence will erupt, meaning the Hezbollah-dominated illicit networks will reap a windfall profit. And the extra cash is unlikely to be kept in Cote d’Ivoire!
A third element is that the worst non-state actors (RUF, UNITA etc.) thrive on resource exploitation, which enabled them to buy the weapons that fed their wars. Cocaine will become another commodity that will provide earnings far beyond that of diamonds and timber. The wars will likely rage even more fiercely than before. The millions of unemployed, combat-hardened veterans are still there, and ready-made army for whoever will pay them.
Drug trafficking through a region always leaves a growing addict population. Brazil, once a transshipment point primarily, is now the second largest consumer of cocaine in the world, after the United States. Traffickers will pay in kind rather than in cash if they can, and the trail that follows is not pretty.
So, the arc of instability, war, and humanitarian disaster is likely to follow. The risks are enormous. The other side of the equation is not pretty either. Most of the coke entering West Africa comes from Venezuela and Brazil. The FARC benefits from the Venezuelan trafficking, and the Bolivian and Peruvian cartels from the Brazil trafficking. The destabilizing effect of these routes in Latin America will be immense.
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Specks of Light in Dealing with Drug Crops?
Yesterday I had the opportunity to comment at the New America Foundation on the new book Seeds of Terror: How Heroin is Bankrolling the Taliban and al Qaeda, by Gretchen Peters.
What was interesting in the counter-terrorism context was what it would take to wean the poppy growers, or coca growers or other producers of illicit crops, to move toward alternatives.
We agreed on two basic points: There is little that can replace the real money the illicit crops generate; and most of the farmers engaged in the trade would rather not be in it because of the hassle, religious concerns in the case of the Muslim community, or other concerns. So the question becomes, what is the tipping point to move people to other activities.
The problem is that in order to find that tipping point, the government (or external forces) must be willing, and have the capacity, to step into the breach immediately to meet the felt needs of the community that is being affected. The measure of success is not the amount of crops eradicated, but the number of people and farmland that move to other activities because it is viable.
That means that, even if, from a macro-economic point of view building a hydro-electric project makes sense, what is really needed are the soccer fields, schools and public spaces that the community wants.
Of course, in order to do that, there has to be a sufficient level of security so that the projects can be built without being immediately destroyed, and the population can use them without fear of retaliation. In other words, the clear and hold model has to work.
So the Washington Post story on a new approach in Colombia is of interest because it is trying this approach, with some at least temporary success.
Under the Integrated Consolidation Plan for the Macarena, named after a national park west of here, the military first drove out guerrillas and other armed groups. In quick sequence, engineers and work crews, technicians, prosecutors, social workers and policy types arrived, working in concert to transform a lawless backwater into something resembling a functioning part of Colombia. All of it is coordinated from a compound, called the fusion center, on the edge of Vista Hermosa.
“We had to find a way to solve the security problem and the coca problem at the same time because they feed off each other,” said Sergio Jaramillo, vice minister of defense and an architect of the project. “It’s all one problem, and it needs a joint solution.”
It is a tricky business, with many moving parts. One could argue that such an approach is not yet feasible in Afghanistan because the Taliban, unlike the FARC, is not in retreat or badly weakened. This is true, and the clear and hold model has proved incredibly resource intensive and time consuming, and often fails if the insurgents mass a concerted effort to defeat it.
But, as Ms. Peters said yesterday, a recent study shows that the tipping point for many Afghan farmers (one assumes that this would be in a fairly secure area where the Taliban cannot strike with impunity) to move out of poppy and opium production, is $4 a day. That isn’t much.
Others at the event suggested buying the entire crop to avoid eradication efforts that often anger and radicalize the population, would be an option to consider.
What is true is that almost all of the alternative development programs have failed, in part because of policy flaws and design flaws, but most importantly the inability or unwillingness of the state to take immediate, visible action and provide protection.
Maybe the Colombians, as they have with many areas of fighting the criminal-terrorist nexus, can teach us a lesson in state building as well.
The Defeat of the Tamil Tigers and Waning Insurgencies
We are facing an unusual time in recent history. Two of the oldest and most successful insurgencies in recent times, the FARC in Colombia and the LTTE (Tamil Tigers) in Sri Lanka, are on the brink of complete military defeat.
Both have lost their most senior and charismatic leader and much of the top command structure, both suffered the effects of top level defections and morale, and both suffered the catastrophic loss of geographic space in which to operate. Both have existed for several decades.
Although neither is completely destroyed (and the FARC retains the capacity to launch military strikes and controls some territory), both will leave lasting legacies for non-state actors, whose repercussions are being felt today and likely will be for years to come.
My assumption is that remnants of the FARC will survive, and not be crushed in a total military defeat like the LTTE. However, more and more combatants will drift away other types of armed activities, and the movement as a Marxist, ideologically-driven movement, will disappear almost as completely.
I hope there are some serious studies going on regarding the lessons learned in these two cases, as well as comparative looks at the factors that let to the sudden reversal of fortunes for these two groups.
Even without benefit of extensive hindsight, one can look at the groups’ legacies.
For the LTTE, the lasting legacy is pioneering the use of suicide bombers and suicide belts, which have widely been adopted by radical Islamist groups and others. The specially trained and selected Black Tigers, the mystique surrounding them within the organization and the belief in the validity of the tactic have now been widely transferred to other terrorist organizations.
It is, as some theorists like to say, the “atomic weapon of the poor,” and a weapon that is tremendously difficult to defend against, especially when any constraints on killing the civilian population is lifted, as it was for the LTTE, as well as al Qaeda, Hamas and others who learned the lesson well.
The FARC has been a pioneer in turning an armed, ideological group into a transnational criminal organization. The adaptability of the group in the face of the loss of funding, particularly the ability to move beyond petty crime into serious and lucrative illegal activities, is no small thing. Again, it is something that is already being copied on a wide scale, from the Taliban in Afghanistan and other radical Islamist groups.
There is still a chance to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in both the case of the LTTE and the FARC, and history shows (see Sendero Luminoso etc.) that armed movements, in the absence of a negotiated end, are almost never over until they are over.
My CTB colleague Zach Abuza points out some of the dangers that remain from the LTTE, which are largely the same for the FARC.
In referring to the LTTE’s spokesman Selvarasa Pathmanathan often referred as Kumaran Padmanadan, Abuza noted that:
Pathmanathan continues to head the Tiger’s global operations and is often described in the media as the LTTE spokesman. But he was more importantly the Tiger’s chief arms procurement agent. While the LTTE political and military organization in Sri Lankan has been decimated, the international network of the LTTE remains fully in tact. And to be clear, what set the LTTE apart from other terrorist organizations, was the sophistication and breadth of its international operations. Pathmanathan was known to have procured weapons from Bulgaria, China, North Korea, Zimbabwe, Ukraine, and the Czech Republic, to name but a few. Pathmanathan also oversaw the organizations international fundraising, which included the notorious “Tamil Tax” as well as a plethora of legal businesses and criminal enterprises, including large human smuggling operations. In short, Pathmanathan oversaw a multi-million dollar a year operation, whose network of agents spanned the globe.
One should not expect Pathmanathan to fade quietly into retirement, and gently accept the Sri Lankan rout of the LTTE. He was Prabhakaran’s closest lieutenant. He will remain committed to the Tamil cause. It will take time to rebuild even a small organization. But, in the mean time, there is a new gun (merchant) for hire.
The same issue faces the Colombian government with the FARC. It has much to do to undermine the legitimate social grievances that have allowed the FARC to survive for more than 40 years, and without that, the risk of rebirth is serious.
The second issue is, as it is with the LTTE, that the financial and international structure is likely to remain relatively intact even as the FARC as an organization disintegrates. As long as there is the money coming in, someone will use that money for fighting the state, whether for economic profit or ideology.
So, success in the field of militarily defeating an insurgency is rare. We will see if either one of these situations can shed light on how to truly end the wars.
Hezbollah, Hamas-and the Muslim Brotherhood?
A senior Hezbollah official has now stated publicly for the first time that his organization has been providing Hamas with “every type of support” for a long period of time.
“We have always said that we supported the resistance in Palestine, but we have not mentioned how or given details of such support,” Naim Qassem, the deputy leader of the Lebanese organization, said in an interview published by the Financial Times on Wednesday.
“But Egypt has now revealed that we have given military support to Palestine. We have done so for a while, but we have not talked about it,” he continued.
It is one of the secrets of the resistance that we don’t talk about the details of our support, but suffice to say that we are giving them every type of support that could help the Palestinian resistance. Every type that is possible,” he said.
The statements are the clearest yet of the ability and desirability of Shiite Muslim armed groups (Hezbollah) to tactically ally themselves with armed Sunni groups (Hamas). This means the transfer of technology, lessons learned, tactics, intelligence etc. is well advanced among groups that have long and valuable experience in terrorism and irregular warfare.
While the intelligence community for years denied such alliances were possible, they have long been operative. One of the key bridges between the Sunni and Shiite world has been the Muslim Brotherhood.
The Brotherhood has mediated or attempted to mediate a host of disputes between Shiite and Sunnis, including the unsuccessful efforts by the International Muslim Brotherhood’s Yousef Nada to negotiate an end to the Iran-Iraq war.One of the biggest bones on contention between the MB in Iraq and the al Qaeda groups of Zarqawi was the latter’s insistence on targeting Shiite groups, while the MB units viewed that as a far lower priority than targeting the Americans.
The understanding of the structure of the Muslim Brotherhood has often been misunderstood in the United States, where it is often viewed as Egyptian organization. The international structure is largely ignored. It is also worth remembering (although it seldom is) that Hamas is, according to its own statutes-article 2-an organic part of the Muslim Brotherhood.
That means that Hamas cannot be acting in this regard without the knowledge of its “mother ship,” the MB.
The Global Muslim Brotherhood Daily Report (free subscription required)
has an interesting piece on the recent and rare public acknowledgement by a senior Brotherhood leader that such an international structure exists.
According to the GMBDR:
In a recent interview with London Al-Quds al-Arabi Online, Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Mohammed Mahdi Akef provided some new details about the composition of it’s so-called “International Organization.” In the interview, Mr. Akef discusses the International Shura Council as well as the International Guidance Bureau:
The Muslim Brotherhood (MB) Murshid-General (Guide), Muhammad Mahdi Akif, said that it is likely that his successor would be a non-Egyptian, but that depends on the internal elections in the Shura Council of the International Organization of the Brotherhood. He added in exclusive statement to Al-Quds al-Arabi that “the International Shura Council consists of 90 members from inside Egypt and 40 from outside, and it is they who elect the ‘murshid-general’.” As to whether the future ‘murshid-general’ can be a non-Egyptian, he said: “The brothers abroad have always preferred an Egyptian candidate out of politeness and love of Egypt.”With regard to the MB’s ‘international guidance bureau’, he said: “it consists of eight Egyptians and five non-Egyptians; whereas the Egyptian guidance bureau consists of 17 members, all of whom are Egyptians.”…With regard to the international organization, Dr Al-Halabawi said: “Representation on the Shura Council is for the countries with more members such as Jordan, Syria, the Gulf, Malaysia, Indonesia and Europe, and the candidate should be a prominent person.”It is important to note that Sunni-Shiite interests diverge and the alliance is tactical, and likely not long term. Still, it shows how networks and pipelines connect when the circumstances are right, and that is dangerous.
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A New Look at the AF/Pak Crisis
Now that the Afghan/Pakistan crisis if front and center, and the ties between organized crime and the funding of radical Islamist movements are clear, it would be well to understand the origins of this emerging threat and the magnitude of the danger.
One of the best at doing that is a new book by Gretchen Peters, Seeds of Terror: How Heroin is Bankrolling The Taliban and al Qaeda.
I have mentioned the book before, but it is hitting stores this week and provides a clear-eyed view of how we got to this point, and how international heroin trafficking is at the root of the new wave of Taliban advances.
Ms. Peters is a journalist, not an ideologue, and uses her 10 years of experience on the ground in the region to walk readers through myriad ties between the Taliban, al Qaeda and the heroin trade that has allowed the resurgence and spread of a group that was on the verge of complete defeat by the end of 2001. Now they are knocking on the doors of the capital of nuclear state.
It is the best case study to date of the criminal-terrorist nexus that is still so often dismissed in intelligence and senior policy making circles.
The result is not a pretty picture, particularly of the corruption in the Karzai administration, the lack of real progress in dealing with the deep seated social issues and poverty and the overall attractiveness of the drug trade in such dire conditions.
At the same time, the Jamestown Foundation notes the Europol report on the growing connection between the Afghanistan/Pakistan region and the Islamist terrorist threat in Europe.
Indeed, as the report states, “Afghanistan and Pakistan seem to have replaced Iraq as preferred destinations for volunteers wishing to engage in armed conflicts.” These recruits pose a threat to European troops deployed in Afghanistan. Germany, for instance, is particularly worried about the presence of several of its citizens (most notably Eric Breininger) in the region who are allegedly plotting operations against German troops (see Terrorism Focus, January 28).
When fighters return – such as members of the Belgian cell, or members of the Sauerland cell in Germany – they pose a direct threat to European security. As expressed by U.S. Director of National Intelligence, Dennis Blair, “the primary threat from Europe-based extremists stems from al-Qaeda and Sunni affiliates who return from training in Pakistan to conduct attacks in Europe or the United States.”
The threat is not just that radical Islamists will take over a nuclear power (and there are signs that the majority of Pakistanis, who are finally understanding the brutality and retrograde nature of this interpretation of Islam) but that the successes in Pakistan and Afghanistan help build the jihadist narrative.
Just as the narrative of divine intervention was central to success of the jihadist efforts against the Soviet Union, the devastating military loss of the Taliban in 2001 offered a chance for a new narrative to be written.
Now, with success on the battlefield again, the jihadists will not thank Western drug consumers for their resurgence. Rather, they will again weave the story of Allah’s blessing on the movement as a powerful recruitment tool in jihadi circles around the world.
The question is how to move at this late date. And no policy option offers anything like a silver bullet. Ms. Peters’ book makes that clear, as well as clarifying how late in the game we really are.
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