Plan C

Amir Taheri describe’s al-Qaeda’s “Plan C” in an article in the New York Post. Plan A, based on Osama Bin Laden’s assessment of the President Clinton’s reaction to the Blackhawk Down incident was that one short and sharp rap would send America tumbling down. But that didn’t work so well and so Plan B, advanced by Ayman al-Zawahiri, called for seizing power in various Islamic countries, such as Iraq. But since that didn’t turn out very successfully either, al Qaeda’s chief theoretician, Sheik Abu-Bakar Naji, has come up with a new and surefire scheme.

Since 9/11, Islamist terror movements have been debating grand strategy. Osama bin Laden had theorized that the “infidel,” led by the United States, would crumble after a series of spectacular attacks, just as the Meccan “infidel” government did when the Prophet Muhammad launched deadly raids against its trade routes. Yet the 9/11 attacks didn’t lead to an “infidel” retreat. On the contrary, the “Great Satan” hit back hard.

That persuaded some al Qaeda leaders that a new strategy of smaller, slower but steadier attacks was needed. Ayman al-Zawahiri, al Qaeda’s No. 2, has advocated such a strategy since 2003, arguing that the jihad should first target Muslim countries where it has a chance of toppling the incumbent regimes.

Now Naji takes that analysis a step further – suggesting that low-intensity war be extended to anywhere in the world with a significant Muslim presence. Islamists in the “wilderness” must create parallel societies alongside existing ones, Naji says – but not set up formal governments, which would be subject to economic pressure or military attack. … In a notable departure from past al Qaeda strategy, Naji recommends “countless small operations” that render daily life unbearable, rather than a few spectacular attacks such as 9/11: The “infidel,” leaving his home every morning, should be unsure whether he’ll return in the evening. Naji recommends kidnappings, the holding of hostages, the use of women and children as human shields, exhibition killings to terrorize the enemy, suicide bombings and countless gestures that make normal life impossible for the “infidel” and Muslim collaborators.

“Exhibition killings” is one of those sayings which bids fair to enter the lexicon of regrettable phrases, together with such gems as “suicide bombings”, kamikaze, and arbeit mach frei, not only because it is vivid but threatens to mark the start of a psychotic, but ultimately useless campaign. Whether the rampage a few hours ago of a bulldozer driven by a Palestinian on Jerusalem’s Jaffa Road, conveniently in front of the CNN office, is coincidental or inspired by Naji’s writings remains to be seen, but at least two persons have died and 20 others were injured in the attack.

Injured people sat dazed on the ground amid piles of broken glass and blood stains on the street. A baby had blood all over its face. The driver of the bulldozer was slumped motionless over the steering wheel.

“I saw the bulldozer smash the car with its shovel. He smashed the guy sitting in the driver’s seat,” said Yaakov Ashkenazi, an 18-year-old seminary student. Yosef Spielman, who also witnessed the attack, said the bulldozer picked up a car “like a toy”. “I was shocked. I saw a guy going crazy,” he said. “All the people were running. They had no chance.”

In a statement, police said a “terrorist” had carried out the attack.

Taheri’s article goes on to emphasize that the new al-Qaeda strategy aims to bring terror to very heart of the non-Muslim societies, which they believe are on the brink of rejecting the last few leaders determined to stand up against them. By spreading fear everywhere they will wrest the right to establish Islamic pockets and finally bring about the capitulation of society. Far fetched? Ask Mark Steyn.

Once parallel societies are established throughout the world, they would exert pressure on non-Muslims to submit. Naji believes that, subjected to constant intimidation and fear of death, most non-Muslims (especially in the West) would submit: “The West has no stomach for a long fight.”

The only Western power still capable of resisting is the United States, he believes. But that, too, will change once President Bush is gone.

‘Just a few more bulldozers driven into buses boys, and we’ll have the infidel on the run.’ Somehow I don’t think so. Personally, I think al Qaeda should resort to enumerating their plans along the real number line, so that they will never run out designations for their successive and hare brained bloodthirsty schemes. Plan C will fail, along with all the rest because it is fundamentally the same plan as the first two. Terror, fanaticism and stupidity can be combined in exactly 3! ways, though the fact may escape them. Sooner or later, after all the combinations of mayhem have been endlessly repeated, either an exasperated world of infidels or sane members of the Muslim community will ask the obvious question: what can you do to us that we can’t do to you?

Maybe they never thought of that. What a sad belief system. What pathetic villains. There is nothing that differentiates them from all the punks in history except the imagined distinction of their appearance and phraseology. The darkness they worship is ancient. But there too from the first was the light; and life will prevail against death, though hell may bar the way.

Tip Jar.