Al-Qaeda

I

Introduction

Al-Qaeda, international terrorist network, founded by Osama bin Laden. Al-Qaeda seeks to purge Muslim countries of Western—and especially United States—influence and install fundamentalist Islamic rule. Al-Qaeda, also spelled al-Qaida, is the Arabic word for “the base” or “the camp”—meaning the base or camp from which worldwide Islamic revolution will be fought.

Al-Qaeda was responsible for the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and on the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, across the Potomac River from the capital of the United States, Washington, D.C. That day, 19 terrorists hijacked four passenger aircraft soon after they took off from airports in Boston, Massachusetts; Newark, New Jersey; and Washington, D.C. Two of the planes were deliberately flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center. Both structures collapsed shortly afterward. A third aircraft was flown into the Pentagon, where the U.S. Department of Defense is located, severely damaging the southwest portion of that building. Meanwhile, passengers on board the fourth aircraft learned of the other attacks and struggled to subdue the hijackers. In the ensuing melee, the plane crashed into a field in rural Pennsylvania. The death toll in all four incidents totaled about 3,000 people.

Other significant al-Qaeda operations include the 1998 suicide bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania; the maritime suicide attack in 2000 on an American warship, the USS Cole, anchored in Aden, Yemen; and the commuter train bombings in Madrid, Spain, in March 2004 that killed more than 190 people and wounded more than 1,400.

II

Al-Qaeda’s Mission

Al-Qaeda seeks to incite a global jihad (holy war) to overthrow regimes with predominantly Arab or Muslim populations that al-Qaeda considers corrupt and anti-Islamic. It wants to replace these regimes with a single Muslim nation or empire strictly governed according to sharia (Islamic law). Al-Qaeda sees the United States and other Western countries as blocking this goal because they are allied with many of the countries al-Qaeda considers corrupt.

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Al-Qaeda also considers the presence of U.S. military forces in Saudi Arabia an affront to the Muslim people because Saudi Arabia is the location of Islam’s two holiest shrines, Mecca and Medina. Bin Laden has issued two fatwas (Islamic religious edicts) calling for the expulsion of these forces from the Arabian Peninsula and sanctioning the use of violence to achieve this objective. A 1998 fatwa, issued in the name of “The World Islamic Front for Jihad Against the Jews and Crusaders,” declared that “the ruling to kill the Americans and their allies—civilian or military—is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it.” Bin Laden regards the U.S. military presence as a continuation of the Crusades, a series of wars during the Middle Ages in which Western Christians sought to capture the Holy Land from Muslims.

In addition, since the September 11 attacks bin Laden has sought to exploit Arab and Muslim hatred of Israel, calling for the destruction of the Jewish state. He has also tried to portray al-Qaeda as the true defender of Islam and protector of Muslims everywhere. He has opposed U.S.-backed sanctions imposed on Iraq by the United Nations (UN) and the violence inflicted on Muslims in places such as Bosnia, Chechnya, East Timor, the Philippines, Sudan, and Somalia.

Al-Qaeda is arguably one of the world’s most formidable and resilient terrorist movements. Following the September 11 attacks, President George W. Bush approved the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda lost its training camps, operational bases, and command headquarters in that country. Thousands of its fighters and many of its leaders were killed or captured. Nevertheless, al-Qaeda has demonstrated a remarkable ability to continue its violent attacks.

During 2002, for example, terrorist incidents linked to al-Qaeda occurred in places as diverse as Tunisia, Pakistan, Jordan, Indonesia, Kuwait, the Philippines, Yemen, and Kenya. Its targets have included Australian, German, and Israeli tourists, and French engineers and a French oil tanker—as well as longstanding targets such as American diplomats and servicemen. Al-Qaeda has continued to use suicide-bombing tactics—on land and at sea. A group believed to be closely linked with al-Qaeda also kidnapped and subsequently executed an American journalist, Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl.

Commercial aviation remains a significant al-Qaeda target. In December 2001, for example, an alleged al-Qaeda terrorist with a bomb hidden in his shoe attempted to blow up a U.S. aircraft en route from Paris, France, to Miami, Florida. Eleven months later, a group in Kenya linked to al-Qaeda tried to shoot down an Israeli charter flight with a handheld surface-to-air missile.

III

Al-Qaeda’s Organization

Western intelligence agencies have learned much about al-Qaeda’s internal organization from defectors and informants, especially from the testimony of four men convicted in a federal district court in New York City for their role in the 1998 bombings of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. According to this information, al-Qaeda’s organizational structure incorporates both top-down and bottom-up approaches.

As part of the top-down approach, bin Laden is regarded as al-Qaeda’s emir-general. The emir-general provides spiritual guidance as well as strategic and operational oversight and is the preeminent leader of the movement, the most highly respected figure in al-Qaeda. As emir-general, bin Laden outlines al-Qaeda’s objectives and issues orders to ensure their implementation. A majlis al-shura (consultative council) addresses important policy and strategy issues, approving fatwas and authorizing major terrorist operations. Four operational committees, which are responsible for military activities, finance and business, fatwas and other religious matters, and publicity and media, report to the majlis al-shura.

At the same time, bin Laden also seeks ideas for attacks from below, encouraging creative approaches and “out of the box” thinking from al-Qaeda operatives and sympathizers. He then provides funding to those proposals he finds most promising. In this respect, al-Qaeda is unlike most other terrorist groups, which tend to be organized hierarchically—that is, in a rigid pyramidal fashion with a commander at the top issuing orders to the individual cells below. Instead, al-Qaeda was conceived as a flatter, less rigid network. Accordingly, some al-Qaeda operations—especially the most important and spectacular attacks such as those of September 11, the embassy bombings, and the attack on the USS Cole—were likely planned and ordered by bin Laden and the majlis al-shura. However, others—like the shoe bomb attempt and the handheld missile attack—may have been independently carried out by local groups inspired or motivated, but perhaps only indirectly assisted, by bin Laden and al-Qaeda.

Al-Qaeda is therefore less cohesive in membership than traditionally organized terrorist groups, with a more diffuse and open structure. This flatter, more networked organization is a key strength that likely accounts for the movement’s continued longevity despite the global onslaught directed against it. Individual terrorists or groups under al-Qaeda’s umbrella are able to operate without having specific orders issued from a central command authority. This loose structure means that al-Qaeda does not have one set method of operating or a single, identifiable footprint. This makes it that much harder for military and law enforcement officials to effectively fight and ultimately defeat al-Qaeda.

IV

Al-Qaeda’s Origins

Al-Qaeda’s origins can be traced to the 1979 invasion of Afghanistan, an overwhelmingly Muslim nation, by the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). Bin Laden, the son of one of the wealthiest men in Saudi Arabia, was among the many thousands of devout Muslims drawn to Afghanistan to help repel the Soviet invasion. He established himself as a patron of jihad (holy war) and together with Sheik Abdullah Azzam founded the Maktab al-Khidamat (MAK or “Offices of Services”) in 1984. The MAK functioned as a recruiting office and coordination center for the international Muslim brigade that fought in Afghanistan.

Over the course of the decade-long conflict, the MAK reportedly trained, equipped, and financed somewhere between 10,000 and 50,000 mujahideen (holy warriors) hailing from more than 50 countries. Although the MAK had branches around the world, including in Europe and even the United States, Saudi nationals made up nearly half its recruits. Other prominent members included Algerians, Egyptians, and people from other Muslim countries such as Yemen, Pakistan, and Sudan. Saudis made up the bulk of the recruits in part because of bin Laden. The prominence of his family's name and reputation in the kingdom gave him a stature that carried great influence. Saudi Arabia's strict interpretation of Islam also motivated many young men in that country to answer the call to defend Afghanistan and the Muslim world from “infidel” influences. See also Soviet-Afghan War.

Toward the end of the anti-Soviet struggle, bin Laden and Azzam quarreled. The dispute arose over whether MAK should focus on Afghanistan, as Azzam wanted, or global jihad, as bin Laden argued for. In this respect, bin Laden was greatly influenced by radical Islamic theologians such as Sayyid Qutb, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and Maulana Sayed Abdul A’la Maudoodi, an Indian-born journalist and intellectual who moved to Pakistan in 1947. They taught that jihad was a personal, individual responsibility and that it was therefore required of all Muslims to establish true Islamic rule in their own countries—through violence, if necessary. Western concepts of secularism (separation of government and religion) and democracy were deemed wrong, and the United States and the West were branded as enemies of Islam.

Although the broad outlines of al-Qaeda began to take shape during 1987 and 1988, it was only after Azzam was assassinated in 1989 that al-Qaeda formally split from MAK to become a jihadist movement in its own right. That same year, the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan. The mujahideen’s success in repelling one of the world’s two superpowers from a Muslim land had a significant impact on bin Laden. To his mind, the Soviet Union’s defeat set in motion the chain of events that resulted in the collapse of the USSR and the demise of Communism. Bin Laden, accordingly, concluded that confronting the United States would produce a similar result: causing U.S. withdrawal from the Arab and Muslim world and in turn toppling the corrupt, pro-Western regimes in those countries.

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