100 Bin Ladens on the Way

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100 Bin Ladens on the Way
by Daniel Pipes
New York Post
April 8, 2003


"When it is over, if it is over, this war [in Iraq] will have horrible consequences," lamented Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak the other day. "Terrorism will be aggravated," he predicted. "[Instead of one bin Laden there will be one hundred bin Ladens.] Terrorist organizations will be united. Everything will be insecure."

Many others have echoed this dire prediction.

Mohammed Adwan, Jordan's information minister: "Rising militancy is going to be very hard to contain."

Ghazi Qusaibi, former Saudi ambassador to Britain: "There may be more terrorist attacks and violent displays of anger."

Magnus Ranstorp of St. Andrews University (Scotland): "This war is a major recruiting sergeant garnering foot soldiers for bin Laden."

Nubar Hovsepian of the University of Pennsylvania: "1991 produced one bin Laden, and 2003 will produce many more."

Actually, the precise opposite is more likely to happen: The war in Iraq will lead to a reduction in terrorism.

That's what happened a year and a half ago in Afghanistan.

Osama bin Laden then commanded far wider support among Muslims than does Saddam Hussein now: He was called "the greatest man in the world," his poster was paraded on streets and newborn boys were named after him. Emotions were inflamed by claims of an American grab for oil and talk of Afghans suffering a "crisis of Holocaust proportions."

The government of Pakistan was deemed on the verge of overthrow. Hostilities in Afghanistan were seen as inflaming rage against America. Some even foreshadowed Mubarak's prediction: "They can kill bin Laden," said a Palestinian interviewed in London's Guardian. "But there will be hundreds more bin Ladens." Well, it was not to be.

The Taliban collapsed in just two months and with them these predictions. Afghans expressed joy at being liberated ("We're being reborn in the world"), which caused Muslim anger at Washington to melt away.

This was one of my main reasons for being against the War.
It will do absolutely nothing to stop terrorism, and it will only increase it. This Administration surely cannot have believed otherwise, unless they really do have absolutely no idea how foreign relations work, which I have to say is becoming more and more evident, even more so since the famous 'who is the leader of Pakistan' interview? if that was possible.
(Uhhhhh General, em er... Mr General, that's it!)LOL!

But who am I to say these things? Might is right isn't it?
I mean there are no problems that can't be solved with a big enough stick and a sense of arrogance and righteous self importance to match, right?


[Edited on 9-4-2003 by kegs]

To not act on terrorism for fear of more terrorism is exactly the purpose of terrorism. Giving in to it will only justify its cause. They will always find a reason to hate. Take away the war and they will find another excuse.

So the way to get rid of it is to create more of it then?
Like the logic.

[Edited on 9-4-2003 by kegs]

Will this war create more resentment? probably...
Will it create more terrorists? probably....

But, what it will cut down on is this (and these are our biggest concerns)....High Profile, Well-Financed Terrorists. By the actions in Afghanistan, and Iraq, we have put the world on notice that no longer will we tolerate the shielding or aiding of such terrorists....effectively cutting them off. We've given notice, by freezing and siezing assets of terrorist front agencies, as well as commando-style captures, that we will stand for this no more... We've made it an extremely bad idea, for any state, to harbor these individuals.

So, will these create more terrorists? Yes. Will it create more Osamas? No. Because the average disgruntled would-be terrorist, isn't going to be capable of a 911 style attack. We chose to combat the bigger threat of well-financed, state-harbored terrorists instead.

Is that certain ? There are hundreds of private laboratories in the united states, probably just around the corner, where chemical or biological weapons grade material is being researched. Access to these weapons has never been that easy. And even if the war against terror manages to cut these scoundrels off the big bucks... Does it need a lot of money to bribe a security official from such a lab, preferably one threatened by disemployment ?

I think security is an illusion, the war against terror cannot be won with bombs. The only way we can prevent terror attacks is by unrooting terrorism together with its causes, abandoning the idea of an Israel/USA Diktat on the arab countries, and giving the palestinians what they deserve for forty years now : living in peace in their homeland
.

that isn't what the Palestinians want....

If it was, they could have had that during the Clinton era...when 90% of their demands were willing to be met by Isreal. Instead, they said not good enough....

They want a homeland alright, but they want the destruction of Isreal even more.

Back to the thread though....isolated attacks (such as the one you mentioned in your scenario) can and likely will still occur. But the goal here was to prevent the kind of large scale attacks such as 911, moreso than to prevent isolated attacks.

Is Bin laden's network the only one in existence? No.
Does Bin laden carry out any attacks personally? No.
The deluded minions that join these groups and will do in larger numbers now, do.

The amount of funding even the smallest terrorist group needs is enough for a bag of fertiliser and some chemicals. Only the high profile attacks like Sept 11 will have got any significant funding from Bin laden. The rest are told "attack in any way and on any front you can!"

Strange example here, but bear with me.
When the dance scene exploded in Britain, illegal raves in warehouses popped up in every major city. The police cracked down on this, did continuous raids on them, and that was the end of it. Was it? No.
People just moved further out, paid farmers to use their fields and created raves in the countryside, passing the info from person to person.
The scene is different now, I know, all mainstream and sponsored. I said it was a strange exampleÖ

Did the war on drugs work? No. All these 'crackdowns' do is move the operations underground, make the people more savvy on how to avoid the law and get away with what they are doing, and as the police in Scotland reported recently, make the operations harder to detect.

The same will happen with the terrorists. The numbers will grow, the networks will go even further underground, and public declarations of any intent will fade. They will not be dissuaded by any of this, the exact opposite will happen. Their resolve will only harden.

Violence will not cure all of these problems.

The only way to cure these problems is to tackle the root causes. If the core reasons for people becoming terrorists are still there, then there will always be terrorists. Sadly America's foreign policies over the years have been one (though not the only one) of the root causes of terrorism and the vilification of America in the eyes of Muslims. And this response to Sept 11 is just a concentration of the type of foreign policy that caused that in the first place.
The main reason for terrorism (and drug use) is poverty. The root cause of most ills in the world is poverty. That is what we should be waging a war on.
These actions may reduce the larger scale attacks, and the security at present in America and Britain may well prevent some attacks. In that case the terrorists will only turn their eyes to our poorer allies and those with ties to us and concentrate their attacks there. (Bali for example.) A lot of these countries are already on an edge and the last thing they need is more terrorism. Whoís to know what small but persistent actions it would take to plunge some countries into war? The dangerous precedent of a pre-emptive strike by America only justifies this course of action in the eyes of other nations, big and small and makes it more likely that the same course of action will be taken in other conflicts. (E.g. India and Pakistan, North Korea and Japan)

For the sake of a little home comfort and in the name of vengeance,
America has made the world a far more unstable and dangerous place.


[Edited on 9-4-2003 by kegs]

Couldn't agree with you more kegs. Now all it means is that we won't even have a figurehead to attack amongst these new terrorist groups. No doubt we'll just blame UBL, but the fact is that different people will be organising the attacks (and probably funding them too).

Besides, did UBL directly plan 9/11? No. He knew it was going to happen, and gave it his blessing, but he wasn't the one picking the 20 hijackers, and funnelling money to them through Germany etc... I'd love to know how much of that money was his, but didn't we just lock up someone for generating terrorist funds which ended up with the hijackers? Anyone seen articles talking about the exact level of funding for these attacks? I'm guessing it was peanuts anyway (<$1M).

Gazrok - to the people in the Arab world this will not dissuade terrorists. Most people outside the US understand that Iraq is not a sponsor of high-profile terrorism. All this war will prove is that it's the US you have to be frightened of...

Yeah right, like Bush and the CIA.....

that the War in Iraq will cut down on Bush's and the CIA's terrorism?

Hehe, two can play the words in mouth game

Bah, just funnin' is all...

So you are seriously saying that you think giving in to terrorism will prevent terrorism? Nice Logic there.

Noe one thinks that removing Bin Laden will remove all terrorism. No one thinks that terrorism can be ridded. But the same holds true for crime. Should we just stop arresting criminals because there will just be more? Should we stop crackdowns on drug dealers because it will jsut make them more angry and try even harder?

Bin Laden is the main target more for symbolism. He is like the spokesman for Terrorists and eliminating him would be a symbol of the world standing up to terrorism, not the end to it.

You simply can't say that standing up to terrorim is the cause of it. This is exacly how Terrorists want you to think. They want you to be afraid to act against them for fear of there being more terrorism. That's just the very nature of it.

It's a non-ending battle, but one that needs to be fought. These Islamic extremist terrorist may use immediate arguments to justify their cause, but in reality they won't stop until they have world domination. I don't even think Bin Laden gives a rats ass about Islam, but it sure makes a nice tool to get others to fight for you and happily give their lives in the process (thus helping the chances of success). If this wasn't the case, he wouldn't keep misqouting the Quran.

Not a hundred Bin Ladens!!! Oooh...I'm so scared!!!

Well sure, you live in NEW JERSEY what is there to blow up there? Some nice seaside communities, some lovely forests and a few garbage dumps... I figure you are pretty safe.

BTW I drove thru NJ for the first time this past summer. I got "Lost" and fell in love with one town I ended up in. It was really awesome., and now I can't remember the name of it of course.

there will be racism, this hatred will spread into others, and out of those few some will kill to rid themselves of the difference.

this is what we see in terrorism. the greatest threat to the people lies in the the US itself. we have enough freedom to protest, and out of those someone will act with force against it. they're making the patriot two to fight this and do more to restrict our rights that allow things like this to happen. terrorism will never be stopped, maybe prevented but the ideals will remain.

saddam and his cronies threatened terrorist attacks against the u.s. and her allies
after the 1991 gulf war. there is no credible evidence linking saddam's regime with
the major terrorist acts that have occured since then, including 9/11. even the cia
has shot down any possible connection between iraq and the numerous terrorist
plots that are swirling about throughout south asia and the middle east.

historically, saddam's intelligence services have proven their incompetence handling
terrorist activities overseas. their only major coup was giving a green light to abu
nidal to assassinate isreal's ambassador to great britian in 1982 which
precipitated isreal's invasion of lebanon. abu nidal was a stooge who saddam
allowed to live and operate out of iraq. saddam would unleash abu to fend off
yassir arafat when relations with the p.l.o. declined, as they did often.


and when abu no longer had a role to play, saddam had him axed. abu nidal was found
murdered in his apartment a year or two ago, the victim of an apparent burglary gone awry