>Thanks for posting it. You are right. My nitpick doesn't mean it
>is not, will not, be the playbook. As your piece points out, the
>idea is already propagating in at least China and the US.
i hadn't taken offense. i realized though that I'd gotten carried away with the snipping extraneous text and left out context. i clarified the POV of the author.
>How about some more excerpts? What are the tactics and strategy
>recommendations for the stronger conventional combatant in
>asymmetrical warfare?
>Chris
there isn't really a monolithic voice, as far as i know. the stuff i read generally tends to see the Sun Tzu's "Art of Warfare" as the playbook, ultimately. I'd suggest reading that. :)
but here's something else:
Preparing for a War on Terrorism Testimony before the Committee on Government Reform U.S. House of Representatives September 20, 2001 Jessica Stern Kennedy School of Government Harvard University
A war on terrorism must be fought on many fronts, using every tool at governments' disposal: diplomacy, intelligence and, when we identify the perpetrator, military strikes. But force is not nearly enough. Our goal should be to drain the swamps where extremists thrive, and that implies a combination of measures: stopping the flow of money to these groups, intelligence cooperation, and military force. But most importantly, it implies understanding that failed and failing states are important sanctuaries as well as sources of recruits for extremist movements. When we talk about Pearl Harbor, we should also be thinking of a Marshall Plan.
The desire for revenge at a moment like this is perfectly understandable: We are traumatized as a nation. But our goal must be to prevent future strikes by our enemies. We cannot afford to allow an emotional desire for quick retribution to override our long-term national security interests. It would not be difficult to make things worse rather than better -- through hasty, emotional or ill-planned military reaction or even through bellicose rhetoric.
We should be careful about rhetoric. We should avoid calling this battle against terrorism a crusade. The word crusade implies a war against Islam. Other than those who were killed in the strikes and their loved ones, the victims hit hardest in last week's attacks are peace-loving Muslims around the world. Through rhetoric of this kind, we could turn ordinary Afghans into Taliban fighters; and non-violent extremists into terrorists. Extremists in Pakistan immediately responded to the President's remarks by calling for a jihad against both Pakistan and the United States.
Several surprising facts about bin Laden's group came to light during the trials of the men involved in the 1998 attack against U.S. embassies in Africa. And those facts reveal how well organized, sophisticated and elusive a network we're up against. U.S. government officials estimate that bin Laden's organization, al Qaeda, has thousands of operatives who are active, or suspected to be active, in 34 countries, including in the United States. But the threat doesn't come from bin Laden's group alone. Many groups, such as the Egyptian Islamic Jihad and the Algerian Armed Islamic Group, are closely affiliated with al Qaeda. They train at his camps and carry out his objectives. Bin Laden is probably correct that if the U.S. government kills him, hundreds of "Osamas" are prepared to take his place.
The al Qaeda organization, and others like it that I've studied, have wings that handle finance, documents, public-relations and intelligence. They run businesses. They conduct surveillance of enemy targets. They cultivate journalists to ensure favorable coverage in the press. They have sophisticated websites for both fund-raising and recruiting.
Like any conventional business, the group includes both skilled and unskilled labor. A former Sudanese member of al Qaeda, Jamal Ahmed Al-Fadl, said that he was paid a monthly salary of $500, while Egyptian members of the group were earning up to three times as much. He said that he received a $10,000 bonus for arranging a deal to purchase uranium. Still, his anger about his monthly compensation led him to steal $110,000 from the organization and eventually, to become a witness for the U.S. government in the trial against the embassy bombers.
When he complained to bin Laden about the Egyptians' higher salaries, Al-Fadl said that bin Laden told him that the Egyptians traveled more, worked harder, and had alternative employers in their own country. "That's why he try to make them happy and give them more money," he said. In other words, bin Laden paid operatives based in part on their earning power in alternative positions.
Like other business managers, bin Laden also needed to recruit unskilled labor. K. K. Mohamed, for example, received no monetary compensation for his efforts, which involved acquiring a truck and grinding explosives, and given his role in the embassy bombing in Tanzania, will spend the rest of his life in an American prison. Other operatives reported undergoing training in engineering or to pilot planes. One talked about purchasing a plane with the goal of transporting equipment, including stinger missiles, from Peshawar to Khartoum.
This group and others like it that I have studied, have thought carefully about evading law-enforcement detection. A manual that came to light in the trial instructed operatives living in enemy territory to dress in such a way that they could not be identified as Muslims. They were told to shave their beards, to rent apartments in newly developed areas where people do not know one another; and not to chat too much, especially to cab drivers. The manual says that destroying the places of amusement and sin is less important than attacking embassies and vital economic centers.
Not surprisingly, what we know of last Tuesday's hijackers is that they followed these general instructions. They had no beards. They wore Western clothing. One business traveler, Roger Quirion, who flew on the first leg of a flight with two of the hijackers, told a Washington Post reporter that the "two men struck him as clean-cut, wearing slacks, dress shoes and causal shirts, and carrying dark shoulder bags. Their hair was closely cropped. They had no facial hair. In short, they looked like typical businessmen." These hijackers also spoke little to their neighbors and moved frequently. Neighbors noticed only one thing unusual about them: meetings in the middle of the night involving up to a dozen participants.
The most important aspect of training these militants is actually mental training. It takes relatively little time and effort to learn to fly a plane; many people can do that. But training someone mentally to carry out suicide mass-casualty attacks is more difficult. Clerics teach operatives that killing civilians is allowed. A former member of al Qaeda explained how charismatic teacher taught him not to fear killing non-combatants. If the innocent victim is "a good person," his teacher said, "he go to paradise." If he's a bad person, "he go to hell." Mental training of al Qaeda operatives includes videos and person-to-person contact.
The Taliban were actually borne out of extremist madrassahs in Pakistan. These schools function as orphanages. Families that cannot afford to feed their children send them to these schools where they are not only educated but also clothed and fed. In the most extreme of these schools, which Pakistani officials estimate to comprise 10-15 percent of its religious schools, children are taught to a distorted version of jihad. A child should be taught that jihad means doing your homework, helping the poor, and purifying the self. At these schools, children are taught about hate. Madrassahs I have visited had children from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Burma, Chechnya, Kuwait, Mongolia, Nepal, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Uzbekistan, and Yemen. In a school that purportedly offered a broad curriculum, a teacher I questioned could not multiply seven times eight.
Children that graduate from these schools are trained to be mullahs, but many of them can't find jobs. They are thus susceptible to their teachers' message that the best way to fulfill their religious duty is to fight on behalf of the Taliban or to join so called jihadi groups. The children are also taught that Osama bin Laden is a hero.
Pakistan is prepared to assist the international coalition on the basis of principle; it does not expect a quid pro quo, according to its officials. But still, now would be a good time offer assistance - because it is in US national security interests to do so. If we inadvertently turn Pakistan into a second Afghanistan, the results would be disastrous not only for India but also for the entire world.
How can we help Pakistan? Pakistan has long been seeking market access for its textiles. Opening our markets would translate into 300-400 million dollars per year, according to the Pakistani embassy, which could make a crucial difference to Pakistan's economy. We should also be considering debt relief. We need to help Pakistan especially in the areas of health care and education. Extremist religious parties and jihadi groups are already mobilized to fight the Pakistani government. It may make sense to make some of these efforts visible. The extremist groups are unlikely to change their minds, but we can reduce their ability to mobilize others.
The situation in Afghanistan is even worse. According to a UN report issued in April, "The life expectancy is less than 43 years, the literacy rate is around 25%, the mortality rate is the highest in the world and the GDP per head is estimated to be less than $700. Only a small minority of Afghans has access to safe water, sanitation, health care, and education. In addition, Afghanistan is one of the most mine-infested countries in the world."(FOOTNOTE: "The Battlefield," Economist, 21 September 2001.) Things have gotten worse since then, in part because of the worst drought in 30 years. If we attack Afghanistan, the situation is bound to get worse.
How can we fight this scourge, which is now spread, in tiny packets of fury and pain, around the world? Military might alone cannot win this war because we are fighting a movement, not a state, not even just a network. We may discover that bin Laden is not directly responsible, but instead, one of the groups he funds or inspires, perhaps together with a state or states. Thousands of so-called mujahideen have trained in Afghanistan, and they are now spread throughout the world. For example, 100 mujahideen from Afghanistan recently joined Laskar Jihad, a new jihadi group fighting in Indonesia. What is the target list in a situation like this?
Last Tuesday's tragic incident makes clear that we can no longer afford to allow states to fail and conflicts to fester. Extremists thrive when the state is no longer able to provide basic services, such as healthcare, education, and law and order. They also thrive on lingering conflicts, such as those in the Middle East, Afghanistan, Indonesia, and Kashmir.
We need to think about how to undermine these groups' appeal. Islam strictly prohibits targeting innocent civilians. Religious scholars need to get out the message loud and clear that bin Laden's version of Islam is a grotesque distortion of their faith. Those scholars should be speaking out, not just in America, but all over the world.
It is also important for leaders to come to terms with the fact that religion has often been used to justify conflicts. Religion has two sides: One is spiritual. It unifies people, transcending national and religious boundaries and promotes tolerance. The other side is all about boundaries: to be Catholic is to be not Protestant, to be Christian is to be non-Muslim, to be Muslim is to be not Jewish. Us vs. Them. Religious leaders should come forward to make clear that respect for human life is the most important aspect of religion. Extremists focus on the divisive aspect of religion, on the parts that divide us one from another, ignoring the spiritual, universalist aspects. Let's not fall into the same trap by calling for crusades.
Finally, we have to learn to dictate less and listen more, as Joseph Nye argues in a forthcoming book on America's soft power. We have a stake in the welfare of other peoples and need to devote a much higher priority to health, education and economic development, or new Osamas will continue to arise.