There are two noteworthy components to this story. One is that the US government has expressed particular concern about home-grown jihadists in the West. The other is how the notion of al Qaeda as the source of jihad ideology puts blinders on the policymakers overseeing the "War on Terror." In fact, Rep. Hoekstra appears to use the name of al Qaeda and "Islamic extremism" interchangeably in his assessment below, and the result is confusion over where all these "self-radicalized terrorists from Europe, with no criminal records and no formal links to al Qaeda" are coming from.
From the Washington Times: "Hoekstra warns of European terrorists"
The chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence is warning that "self-radicalized" terrorists from Europe, with no criminal records and no formal links to al Qaeda, are quietly infiltrating the United States to proselytize, raise money and possibly plan attacks.
Rep. Peter Hoekstra, [Michigan] Republican, said that the United States has to quickly adapt to the ever-changing threat if it is going to win the global war against Islamic extremism.
Terrorists coming to the United States from Western Europe "are difficult to identify because they are self-radicalized," Mr. Hoekstra told the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) at a breakfast meeting with reporters Wednesday.
"They may have no formal association with al Qaeda, no criminal record. There's nothing in their past to draw the attention of law-enforcement officials to the individuals," he said.
He released a committee report titled, "Al Qaeda: The Many Faces of an Islamist Extremist Threat," which described how the nature of the threat has changed against the United States since the September 11 terrorist attacks.
The war is now one against entities inspired by al Qaeda, including homegrown terrorist cells composed of second- and third-generation radicalized Muslims in the United States, the report says.
"Radical Islam has changed the way that it operates," Mr. Hoekstra said. "Al Qaeda has moved into a decentralized entrepreneurial organization."
He said that by setting out a clear vision, objectives and providing resources, al Qaeda has empowered its appendages "to carry out actions independent of centralized control and then get out of the way."
"They develop a very simple message [that] is appealing to the young generation of Muslims," Mr. Hoekstra said. "They keep their message simple and they keep it consistent."
The intelligence committee chairman insisted that the United States has to overhaul its approach on the war against Islamic terrorists and learn to be as nimble and adaptable as its enemies.
AEI foreign policy analyst Michael Ledeen argued that al Qaeda is not as all-powerful as Mr. Hoekstra suggested.
"They are not 10-feet tall, and they are not that terrific," Mr. Ledeen said.
The question of al Qaeda's relative strength is immaterial when the subject at hand is how the current crop of jihadists planning and executing attacks in the West has little or no association with al Qaeda. But on the basis of Ledeen's assertion that al Qaeda is "not that terrific," there must be something else motivating "self-radicalized terrorists": The ideology of jihad, rooted in the Qur'an, ahadith, and Sunnah.
But you can't say that out loud in D.C.
"They may have no formal association with al Qaeda, no criminal record. There's nothing in their past to draw the attention of law-enforcement officials to the individuals," he said.
If they have a koran,then they have a formal tie to al Qaeda.
Just how reliable are these polls? How many Muslims give the "right" answer as a form of taqiyya? On the other hand, 40% did say that they wish to see Sharia in Britain, so perhaps they're answering truthfully. Or maybe 40% is actually far less than the real number. Who knows?
It's annoying how whenever there's a Muslim attack, the media is always looking for a link to Al-Q. They still don't get it. Or just don't want to say it out loud - not just in DC but everywhere.
Al-Q just created an Awakening for Islam. An inspiration. Set it back on its true murderous path. It woke up slumbering Muslims and showed them what being a Muslim is really about.
From a previous post:
"They are not 10-feet tall, and they are not that terrific," Mr. Ledeen said.
INDEED they are NOT. Even I could think up more devious plots and have been amazed for years about their lack of imagination. 9/11 is basically from the Bruce Willis Movie "Die Harder".
Our worst enemy is POLITICAL CORRECTNESS. Always seeking fault with ourselves.. creating restrictive laws and "Rules of Engagement". See the 160 or so Taliban our Military was prevented from taking down because they were at a "funeral".
Whether they were burying their dead or not - HOW does such an order to desist affect the morale of Our Fighting Men and Women?
does ANYONE doubt that this missed opportunity to annihilate our enemies will cause death and harm to our troops in the future? WHO can guarantee that NONE of these 160 or so Taleban won't do future harm to the Men and Women over there who are putting their lives on the line for all of us? HOW are they supposed to feel after hearing of such a grievious lack of resolve on the part of our armchair "leadership"?
Does anyone even remotely think that these our enemies would have similar consideration for any of Our troops or for any of us present civilians?
We MUST value the lives of OUR OWN and especially those who are doing the fighting and the dying over there MORE than anything - MOST of all we must value their lives and their safety and wellbeing higher than that of this ruthless foe whom we all face these days.
I may be too old to fight given today's standards.. but when the time comes and things get serious.. I will be there!
The one lesson l have come to respect from the Rush radio shows, is that you never trust so called experts. These pin headed elites look so deeply that they cannot see the trees from the forests. The cause of terrorism from muslims is the koran and acccompanied books hadiths,etc. its so plain and simple answer if is invisible to the elites.
When I was a kid in my early 20s, I played music in NYC alot, like up to 5-6 nights a week. This was 2 years before, until about 3 years after the 1st bombing of the world trade center(93). The word on the street back then that I would here from the Mo's (i.e. cab drivers, bodega employees, waiters in eastern cuisine resteraunts...etc.) was always of the coming war. I would go back to my home in southern New England and mention what I heard to my friends, family anyone who would listen. Pretty much everyone told me "ahh...you party to much, you are just paranoid." Written off,whatever. I witnessed an instance of some arabic looking men hanging around a reservoir(which had a news story of arabic looking men taking pictures of it a few weeks previously, supposedly they were admiring the sunset)Anyway, I drove by a few times to make sure I was seeing everything correctly. My last pass I took down the license plate #, the guys saw me, jumped in thier vehicle and left the scene. I drove to the local police department at that moment to let them know what I saw. The cop at the front desk took my info but laughed at me and did not take me serious. This reservoir services a large number of communities north of New York City where many NYC executives live. This reservoir thing happened about a year after 9/11... and I wasn't taken seriously. How difficult would it be to have a truck "accident" near this reservoir where the trucks payload could contaminate the reservoirs water? I don't understand why law enforcement seems to take inormation given with a grain of salt..... are they afraid of a CAIR lawsuit. Me personally, I would rather be sued and have my life, then go for a glass of water and die....No muslim likes death more than I LOVE life.
I don't think the majority of politicians or bureaucrats have made the distinction yet. We have no idea how many Jihad networks there are, be they loose in structure, or even "lone wolf" types.
Of course most of us here know it's the Ideology, but with the TC/PC drivel on the airwaves it's just not going to sink in until another "radical" or "extremist" group attacks us.
Of course most of us here know it's the Ideology, but with the TC/PC drivel on the airwaves it's just not going to sink in until another "radical" or "extremist" group attacks us. - amana39
Its too bad the citizens are more hip to whats goin down before our "intelligence" agencies.
Mohammed said, "I have been made victorious with terror."
--- behavioral instruction of the Sunnah from Bukhari Volume 4 Book 52 Number 220
* 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 *
I shall terrorize the infidels. So wound their bodies and incapacitate them because they oppose Allah and Mohammed.
--- God referring to himself in the third person in Koran 8:12
* 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 *
The infidels should not think that they can get away from us. Prepare against them whatever arms and weaponry you can muster so that you may terrorize them.
--- God commanding terrorism in Koran 8:59
* 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 *
The Koran and other Islamic scriptures amount to a terrorism manual.
* 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 *
George W. Bush, a known dumbass (Yale, Harvard) had the ignorant gall to insert the Koran into the White House library --- after nearly 3,000 Americans were murdered in the name of the Koran, according to the explicit instructions in the Koran, on Sept 11, 2001.
It don't get no stupider than that, now do it? Duh.
* 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 ** 33:21 *
We need leadership. Looking at 2008, leadership is not in the offing. Our ability to grow leaders is constrained by the MSM and the Fictive Reality it imposes upon us.
Greenleaf, Idaho -- All Americans have the right to bear arms. Some towns have even gone as far as to require each household to have a gun. Now a small Idaho town is contemplating a similar idea-- it's called the Civil Emergencies Ordinance.
I think this is an example that more towns ought to follow. If the authorities can't or won't protect us, then the right to bear arms is all the more meaningul--for purely defensive purposes.
Our military is doing a great job despite some of the bureaucratic thinking they have to fight. However when it comes to homegrown terrorists, then the answer is the homegrown defense.
The only folks I trust is our military, My grandpas fought in WWII. My gramps always was for gun ownership. While our brave men and women are overseas, its up to us to protect home.
Found this article, by Charles Krauthammer, and have to say his is on the mark on all counts:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2006/09/no_sense_of_irony_in_the_islam.html
If you have read history, or even a general overview of European history, you realize that each group has blood on it's hands from some time period, but the only group in contemporary times that repeatedly holds to the "My God or you die" is the "minority" of Muslims that have "hijacked" their otherwise "peaceful" religion.
Or to paraphrase Krauthammer, you better call it peaceful or you die.
There doesn't have to be a link to al quaeda, the link is the koran. It's the glue that holds the serial killers together. Monkey see monkey do. If the koran didn't teach bloodlust, I don't think there would be so many different groups of murderers. The muslims themselves would have taken care of bin laden and his merry followers of evil.
Dear Republican representative Hoekstra of Minnesota:
According to my local Newspaper, your state is about to elect a Democrat Muslim to congress. Keith Ellison, a hyphenated, African-American Muslim. The paper mentions that Ellison's victory marks a turning point for American Muslims, according to community leaders such as Ali Khan of the American Muslim Council. "It says, 'Look, you are part of America.'"
Ellison, 43, was raised Catholic in Detroit and converte to Islam as a 19-year-old student at Wayne State University before moving to Minnesota for law school.
Pollster John Zogby, a Lebanese-American, says Ellison's victory is a win for an eclectic group that ranges from Pakistani immigrants to native-born blacks.
"American Muslims are now a political constituency," he says, "not just simply a growing group."
Well Representative Hoekstra, it seems like there's a lot of dumb-ass going around. I can see why you don't understand the connection. I really don't think you ever will. I'm sure with all of the political correctness and now with a Muslim about to be helping make our laws thing could get a lot worse.
Hoekstra represents Michigan (his district is in the western part of the state), NOT Minnesota- an error from the original article in the Washington Times.
O.T
Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Fuels Terror
The conflict spreads extremism and serves as a laboratory for deadly tactics, says a bleak analysis by 16 U.S. intelligence units.
"Things like the Iraq war have given the terrorists recruiting tools and places to ply their trade and a training ground."
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-intel24sep24,0,2161892.story?coll=la-home-headlines
S - many thanks for catching the Washington Times' slipup there. I've put the correct state in brackets in place of the original.
Three Problems for the Price of One
http://hesperado.blogspot.com/2006/09/three-problems-for-price-of-one.html
Thanks Marisol!
The whole report can be found here:
http://intelligence.house.gov/Media/PDFS/ExtremistThreat.pdf
It seems to me the only way to deal with muslims is by direct action. One way could be to spread pig's blood over their graves, one their houses, shops, cars etc. Do it to our own homes etc so they will be permenantly defiled and no muslim will want to buy it at any future date. If we make life hard for them they will want to leave for home.
Another piece of the puzzle are the Fourth and Fifth Generations of Warfare (4GW and 5GW), which are unconventional in nature.
In Review: (From Winds of Change Archives)
First Generation Warfare involved massed manpower, and lasted until the machine gun and indirect fire made such tactics suicidal.
Second Generation Warfare was based on massed firepower. Tactics relied on fire and movement, with heavy reliance on indirect fire from artillery. It was different, but still essentially linear.
Third Generation Warfare was based on maneuver and real time communications. It was best exemplified by World War II's "Blitzkrieg". The attack relied on infiltration to bypass, cut off and collapse the enemy's main combat forces rather than seeking to close with and destroy them.
Fourth Generation Warfare is based on dispersion and communications that remove the battle front entirely. Attackers rely on cultural/media attack and coordinated violent actions to and paralyze or collapse the enemy's political will, rather than seeking decisive combat.
Fifth Generation Warfare can be called Secret War. Part of it involves directing other groups to attack for you, providing a measure of deniability. More at http://www.tdaxp.com/archive/2005/07/18/go-deep-ooda-and-the-rainbow-of-generational-warfare.html
My bottome line is that it will become easier and easier for small, ideologically parallel, but financially and physically independent groups to launch attacks limited only by their imagination, and ability for rational thought.
Ideology will be the only common denominator for these groups, and with foresight, that too, can be hidden. We are doomed to fail unless we defeat the enemy within our own civilization in the sphere of public opinion because they are driven by an ideology of revolutionary defeatism as discussed here ===> http://westernworldpolitics.blogspot.com/2005/10/revolutionary-defeatism-key-to.html
I apologize for taking up so much space, but I felt the need to focus everyone's attentions on who is hindering us from engaging the real enemy.
Here are a few wise words from Ephraim Karsh, Professor and Head of the Mediterranean Studies Programme, King’s College, University of London, which appear in his book “ISLAMIC IMPERIALISM: A HISTORY” (Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 2006)
Writing in his Introduction, Professor Karsh contrasts Christianity and Islam, “The worlds of Christianity and Islam, however, have developed differently in one fundamental respect. The Christian faith won over an existing empire in an extremely slow and painful process and its universalism was originally conceived in spiritual terms that made a clear distinction between God and Caesar. By the time it was embraced by the Byzantine emperors as a tool for buttressing their imperial claims, three centuries after its foundation, Christianity had in place a countervailing ecclesiastical institution with an abiding authority over the wills and actions of all believers. The birth of Islam, by contrast, was inextricably linked with the creation of a world empire and its universalism was inherently imperialist. It did not distinguish between temporal and religious powers, which were combined in the person of Muhammad, who derived his authority directly from Allah and acted at one and the same time as head of the state and head of the church. This allowed the prophet to cloak his political ambitions with a religious aura and to channel Islam’s energies into ‘its instruments of aggressive expansion, there [being] no internal organism of equal force to counterbalance it.’” P. 5
And here is a highly important quote from the Epilogue of Professor Karsh’s book, which I doubt the moonbats will bother to wrap their heads around:
“Contrary to widespread assumptions, these attacks, [reference here is to 9/11/2001] and for that matter Arab and Muslim, anti-Americanism, have little to do with US international behavior or its Middle Eastern policy. America’s position as the pre-eminent world power blocks Arab and Islamic imperialist aspirations. As such, it is a natural target for aggression. Osama bin Laden and other Islamists’s war is not against America per se, but is rather the most recent manifestation of the millenarian jihad for a universal Islamic empire (or umma). This is a vision by no means confined to an extremist fringe in Islam, as illustrated by the overwhelming support for the 9/11 attacks throughout the Arab and Islamic worlds.” P. 234
I've mentioned this before, but more and more I get frustrated with the fixation on Al-Qaeda. This seems to be an especially American form of short sightedness, I suppose because of 9/11. Of course, any association with Al-Qaeda is extremely alarming and must be pursued. But it is just one head of the Hydra.
Often American Intelligence or law enforcement seems actually bewildered if terrorists have no overt links to this group. And this, five years after 9/11! Not only are there many other terrorist gruops, but there is plenty of "homegrown" extremism.
Sometimes all you need are a couple of potentionally violent guys and a catchy moniker like "Swords of the Holy Prophet of Islam Brigade". Hell, sometimes all you need is a guy with a lot of unfocused rage and an SUV.
It's ISLAM, Stupid!*
_____________________
*The term "Stupid!" applies to him or her who wonders how there can be jihadists that are not members of al qaeda or any group on the official government "terrorist" groups list
My thanks to ThunderPig for the 5GW link. I've written on Islam v. Christianity as well
http://www.tdaxp.com/archive/2006/09/23/jesusism-paulism-part-v-the-people-of-the-book.html
http://www.tdaxp.com/archive/2006/09/19/islamic-persecution-of-christianity.html
germaninamerica:
Since the invention of firearms, no one is too old.
americanmadestrat:
A while before 9-11, Moslems on the internet were talking about the "big bang." I played along as if was in on it. "Oh, then you know about the big bang too?" I was asked (I was using a Moslem name).
I reported the "big bang" to the FBI.
As there is never any followup reply from them, I do not know if my report was investigated.
Americanmadestrat, that was a very interesting story. I had something similar happen 2 months after 9/11. I met a guy on South Beach who was visiting from Canada. He said he was Italian/Jewish, but looked Arab and had no accent. The odd thing is that he was very hateful and kept saying how the Jews control our media, the cause of our problems and reason for the attack, and how our freedoms our taken away now. But he said it all with such hate. It was odd to say those things especially after we had just been attacked. I told my friends and they said I needed to report him to the FBI, so I did, and guess what....they weren't interested and said people are allowed to have their own views. That guy had the probability of being a terrorist and since I didn't have explicit facts on a terror plot, FBI wasn't interested. This is why I now investigate terrorism on my own, because I can't trust our government to do their job. We'll probably get hit with another attack because the bureaucrats ignore everything that isn't explicit, just like they ignored the FBI whistleblowers in Arizona right before 9/11. Even I could have told them we were going to be hit by Al Qaeda the summer of 2001, but I'm just an average citizen, so my opinion isn't important. The Goobs is even a much better investigator than agents in the FBI!
The so called leadership in Washington just doesn't get it. Al Qaeda is just part of the big picture-smashing it would be nice but it's not the end of it all.
True leadership in this war requires clear thinking. Washington lacks it. This website and the vast majority of its posters have it. The wrong people are "leading" this war.
unicorns62000 and Bonniea - Those where 2 interesting stories, I wonder how many other people have had witnessed and reported unusual activities? I do have to be honest, I'm not dumping on the FBI, I don't doubt the loyalty an agent would have for his/her country. The same goes for local law enforcement, even though the officer at the front desk that day didn't seem interested, I hope he is the exception to the rule. To me, it seems to be a p.c./beauracratic(sp?) thing.