Learning from experience

Michael Scheuer, former head of the CIA's Bin Laden task force, has some observations about recent events:  God, Drunks, and America by Michael Scheuer. Antiwar.com 06/02/05.

In the past month, America has been blessed by two events that ought to put us on a better path toward defeating our Islamic militant enemies. The spontaneous and worldwide Koran controversy – as discussed previously in this journal – focuses a bright light on the deep religious motivation of our foes and their supporters. If this episode begins to put paid to the idea that America and its actions are under attack only by Islam's lunatic fringe of criminals and gangsters, the Koran-desecration issue will have provided us a hard-earned but invaluable lesson.

Scheuer is not a partisan of the Christian Right "Islam is an evil religion" approach.  But he stresses that the United States has a broad problem in the Muslim world based on things like the presence of US troops in the Middle East and US support of Israel.  He comes from the analytical side of the CIA, and one of the things I like about his writing is that he can clearly separate analytical understanding from policy prescription.  Too often in discussions of terrorism, the prescription drives the analysis.

In this case, understanding this point doesn't dictate a particular form of action.  But actions and policies should be informed by a more clear understanding than, "They hate us for our freedoms."

And I suppose it should come as no surprise at all to us that the following observation is completely missing from most news articles and commentary on al-Qaeda:

The second event is the wounding of al-Qaeda's commander in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The aftermath of Zarqawi's wounding provides two graphic, always available, but long-ignored lessons about how al-Qaeda works. First, the speculation that often emanates from Western officials and commentators that one or another major al-Qaeda leader is dead – be it bin Laden, Zawahiri, or someone else – and that the group is suppressing the news for morale reasons is, well, nonsense. From the most junior al-Qaeda fighter to bin Laden himself, their efforts are aimed at becoming martyrs while defending Muslims and fighting for Allah's word. Achieving martyrdom is thus a cause for celebration and an occasion for issuing a sad but congratulatory message upon the death of a fighter. In this regard, al-Qaeda's record bears irrefutable evidence: It has, to date, never sought to deny or disguise the death or capture of any of its leaders, from bin Laden's military commander Muhammed Atef, to 9/11 planner Khalid Sheik Muhammad, to leading WMD-procurer Abu Hajir al-Iraqi.

Yeah, why would our "press corps" or the Big Pundits bother to pay attention to one of the world's leading experts on al-Qaeda?  After all, Bush and Cheney say we're winning the GWOT (global war on terror), don't they?