bin laden virus epidemic

Spread of Bin Laden Ideology Cited
Iraq Invasion Said To Alter Dynamics Of Local Militants

By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, April 4, 2004; Page A13


The U.S.-led invasion of Iraq has accelerated the spread of Osama bin Laden's anti-Americanism among once local Islamic militant movements, increasing danger to the United States as the al Qaeda network is becoming less able to mount attacks, according to senior intelligence officials at the CIA and State Department.

At the same time, the Sunni Triangle has become a training ground for foreign Islamic jihadists who are slipping into Iraq to join former Saddam Hussein loyalists to test themselves against U.S. and coalition forces, these officials say.

Islamic militant organizations in places such as North Africa and Southeast Asia, which were previously focused on changing their local country leadership, "have been caught by bin Laden's vision, and poisoned by it . . . they will now look at the U.S., Israel and the Saudis as targets," a senior intelligence official said last week. "That is one manifestation of how bin Laden's views are expanding well beyond Iraq," he said.

J. Cofer Black, the State Department coordinator for counterterrorism and a former head of the CIA's Counterterrorism Center, gave the same message to a House International Relations subcommittee last Thursday, saying that bin Laden's "virulent anti-American rhetoric . . . has been picked up by a number of Islamic extremist movements which exist around the globe."

The result, according to the senior intelligence analyst, is that the U.S. war on terrorism after Iraq "may transition from defeating a group to fighting a movement." Black said the spread of bin Laden's ideology "greatly complicates our task in stamping out al Qaeda and poses a threat in its own right for the foreseeable future."

He described "scores" of extremist groups such as Jemaah Islamiah that have "gravitated to al Qaeda in recent years where before such linkages did not exist." In the past, al Qaeda had given other groups training and finances in bin Laden's hope they would see the world in the same anti-American, anti-Israeli, anti-Saudi terms he saw, the senior analyst said.

Since attacks in East Africa, on the USS Cole, and on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, al Qaeda has lost its sanctuary in Afghanistan. Its once top-down control of terrorist operations now is in the hands of less experienced people.

That makes it less clear what roles al Qaeda played in recent bombings in Bali, Istanbul, Riyadh, Tunisia, Casablanca and Madrid. Authorities said that local extremists carried out these attacks, although Black said a possible al Qaeda leadership connection to Madrid is still under investigation.

Black and the senior intelligence analyst said it would be a mistake to believe the United States faces a monolithic terrorist threat. "Before Iraq, al Qaeda had some success with like-minded organizations conducting operations," the analyst said.

"It would be fair to say that we are seeing greater cooperation between al Qaeda and smaller Islamic extremist groups as well as even more localized organizations," Black said.

Adding to the threat are the limited numbers of foreign Islamic fighters, some with experience in Chechnya, Kosovo and Kashmir, who are slipping over the Iraqi borders intent on joining the fight against the United States and its coalition partners. Jihadists are seeking to use Iraq as a training ground for future battles, according to Black and others.

"These jihadists view Iraq as a new training ground to build their extremist credentials and hone the skills of the terrorist," Black told the House subcommittee. Aggressive U.S. military actions against the foreign fighters have not permitted them to organize, recruit and raise money as they had in the past, the senior analyst said.

"We will contain and defeat them in Iraq," he said, "but they will create a new Rolodex of fellow jihadists and people with whom they can work in the [Persian] Gulf in the future."

Black said the U.S. military recognizes the threat the extremists pose, and is aimed at ensuring "that al Qaeda and other terrorist groups will be unable to use Iraq as a training ground or sanctuary."

As the United States and its allies have systematically captured and killed almost 70 percent of the al Qaeda leadership, bin Laden and his top deputy, Ayman Zawahiri, are on the run and unable to provide operational leadership. Bin Laden's effectiveness as a plotter of terrorist acts has been "greatly reduced," Black said.

Black told the House panel that bin Laden maintains some contact with the remaining leadership but command and control is handled by younger and less experienced leaders. Bin Laden, Black said, "spends most of his time trying to figure out, you know, how they're going to come for me and is this going to be the day."

The CIA nonetheless still considers bin Laden "an important ideological figurehead," the senior intelligence analyst said. "His passing will be a signpost but not the end of the campaign. Others will be passing the torch and our next steps will be to discover the people who take over, and they won't definitely be the people around bin Laden now."


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