The New Dimensions of International Terrorism

Chapter Six Current International Terrorist Groups (p. 51-52)

This study will differentiate between terrorist organizations involved in activities pursuing to national liberation and those involved in terrorist activities in an international arena. This is of course a tall order, since there are those who view organizations such as ETA and the IRA as being international terrorist organizations, having carried out assassinations, kidnapping, and bombing outside of their immediate base area (of the country the wish to see liberated), and have killed foreigners not technically combatants in their respective struggle. For the purpose of analysis, this study will concentrate on the five terrorist groups that pose a threat to the U.S. European Command Area of Responsibility, defined as the 92 countries from Scandinavia to South Africa (minus the Horn which belongs to US Central Command), Western and Eastern Europe, and as of 1 October 2002, Russia. During an August 2002 briefing to Swiss Chief of defense Force, LTG Hans-Ulrich Scherrer, Deputy Commander in Chief of the US European Command listed five international terrorist groups that conducted terrorist activities in the AOR: al-Qaeda, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Hamas, Hizballah and 17 November. All five are currently active and have had a long and established record of violence against U.S. interests and allies.

6.1 Al-Qaeda

Al-Qaeda (the base) was established by Osama bin Laden circa 1984 as a support organization for Arabs (later referred to as the Afghan Arabs) fighting against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda helped recruit, transport, finance, and training Sunni Muslim extremists to fight the Soviets, mostly alongside the Afghan Mujaheddin factions. The current goal of al-Qaeda is the establishment of a pan-Islamic Caliphate throughout the world, working with other like-minded groups to overthrow regimes deemed as un-Islamic and expelling non-Muslims and Westerners from Muslim countries. In February 1998, bin Laden issued a statement under the banner of "The World Islamic Front for Jihad Against the Jews and Crusaders", stating that it was the duty of all Muslims to kill American citizens and their allies everywhere. In June 2001 al-Qaeda merged with like-minded organization Egyptian Islamic Jihad.

Major activities conducted by al-Qaeda include the 9-11 attacks, claiming almost 2800 lives, the bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen on October 12, 2000, killing 17 sailors, and the August 1998 bombings of the US Embassies in Nairobi and Dar Es Salaam, with a combined casualty toll of 301 dead and 5,000 injured. Al-Qaeda further claimed (almost nine years after the fact) that shot down US Army helicopters and killed US Army soldiers in Somalia in 1993, and conducted three bombings targeting U.S. troops in Aden, Yemen in 1992. Al- Qaeda is also linked to the planning of the following activities that were never carried out: the planned assassination of the Pope during a visit to Manila in late 1994, the planned assassination of President Clinton during a visit to the Philippines in late 1995, the midair bombing of a dozen U.S. airliners trans-Pacific in 1995; and then planned bombing of Los Angeles airport on the Eve of the Millennium.

In December 2001, suspected al-Qaeda operative Richard Reid was arrested after attempting to ignite a shoe bomb on a transatlantic flight from Paris to Miami. Al-Qaeda is also suspected of involvement in a series of nightclub bombings in Bali, Indonesia, in which over 200 mostly foreign tourists perished.3 Al-Qaeda is also suspected of involvement in suicide bombings in Iraq in Autumn 2003 against the UN headquarters and the International Red Cross in Baghdad, the truck bombing of the Mosque in Najaf and a series of bombings of two Synagogues in Istanbul on November 15, 2003, followed only two days later by twin bombings of British interests in the same city.