An original Jihad Watch article by Patrick Boylan.
Curing the symptoms – Ignoring the disease: An approach to fighting terror by intelligence and counterterrorism experts
On a one week tour of the various agencies responsible for Homeland Security, a simple question “What do you think is the cause of terrorism now?” put forward to a number of “terrorism experts”, got me various answers such as illiteracy, to believe it or not, American policy abroad, but Islam was definitely not the problem! Some of the “experts” who did part of the PowerPoint presentations seemed to be more impressed with themselves than with getting to the true cause of terrorism.
At the Department of Homeland (in)Security, four, yes four! “experts” had that “Deer caught in the headlights” look when asked the simple question, “What do you think is the cause of terrorism now?” The standard response was, “Our “Mr. “Expert” will answer that when he gets up here.” When Mr. “Expert” was in the hot seat he was put about by my simple questions about his presentation such as:
“Why do you have Conventional and Un-Conventional Terrorism on that slide, and what exactly does that mean?”
Mr. “Expert” answered “Well, I’m not sure. No one has ever asked me that question before.” Now that gave me a real warm fuzzy feeling.
One of Mr. “Experts” slides had the words “Takfirs = sleeper cells”, Of course I’m sure he meant Takfiri’s who are members of the extremely violent Al Takfir Wal Hijra whose more notorious and deadly members include Zawahiri, and allegedly Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Ramzi Youssef and Atta.
Another interesting word was “Shahida’a”. Your guess is as good as mine, but I will lay my money on “Shaheed”(martyr) or “Shahada”(Concept of Martyrdom).
At least Mr. “Expert” was honest in saying he had no idea how the words were pronounced and what they meant. Asked after the presentation by me if he had read the Quran, he said no, but one of his senior bosses was Ali Mustapha, as if having a Muslim boss was reason enough that Mr. “Expert’s” presentation, which he declared was not for the public’s viewing, was correct and educational. Far from it! He hadn’t read the Quran, but he was definitely sure that Islam was a religion of peace!
I wonder if “Mr. Expert” knew DHS policy director of the department’s Security Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Faisal Gill too? Gill a thirty three year old Muslim lawyer with no intelligence experience, was appointed to his position through the recommendation of Grover Norquist, buddy of White House power broker, Karl Rove. Faisal Gill is also a well known associate of Alamoudi, (close associate of Al Arian, on trial) now under indictment on terrorism related charges. This association of course was left out when Gill filled out his SF-86 forms for employment with DHS. Oops! Lots more to come.
Mr. “Expert’s” two lady assistants, I thought they said they were agents, who deferred any terrorism questions to Mr. “Expert”, were more interested in bragging about how the department had caught and fined an American chicken farmer $11 million for hiring illegal workers. With a flourish, one of the ladies even did the worn out “Ka-ching” hand pull. What a victory!
Asked whether any terrorists had been apprehended, there was that deer in the headlights look and quick response, “Mr. “Expert” will answer those questions when he addresses the group”. Of course! Oh yes, a fourth highly paid lady ran the computer. Good enough for government work I guess. The “expert” also said Al-Qaeda was degraded and had franchise operations. Does that mean they now operate like a convenience store franchise? And if they were “degraded” why would anyone want their franchise? These terrorists are getting really smart, like our intelligence agencies, and operating like corporate America.
At the FBI, another wonderful PowerPoint presentation with nothing you couldn’t find on the internet, except the fact that there are separate divisions, or cells, or groups or something like that, that study Sunni Terrorist Groups and Shia Terrorist Groups in the FBI’s war on terror. Of course the presenter whose knowledge of events was impressive, regurgitated the Islamic apologist line when asked what was the cause of terrorism now. “It’s a coupla’ things like poverty, some of those places are real hell holes, and lack of education, and resentment towards American policy in the Middle East.” (Then why the separate cells studying Shia terrorist groups and Sunni Terrorist groups? I wondered. I left that one alone, the young man was doing such a fine job!)
That line about American policy has been used so often, it’s even worse than the “ka-ching”. Of course I couldn’t leave that alone, maybe it was the pain killers I was on, maybe it was the ankle holster the agent wore (I’ve always wanted one of those) so I proceeded to give him a quick history about recent Islamic terrorism.
“…I don’t see American policy in the Jihad in Kashmir, where Muslims are killing Hindus, in Thailand where Muslims are killing Budhists, in Indonesia where Muslims are killing Christians, in the Philippines where Muslims are killing Christians, in Chechnya and Russia where Muslims are killing …” You get the idea?“Would you not agree Islam is a peaceful religion and extremists have hijacked the religion?” asked the agent.
“No” I answered. “Have you read the Quran sir?” I asked.
“No I haven’t”
“If you read the Quran, maybe that should be required reading, you will see it has nothing to do with extremists as we like to label them. It is in the very teachings of the Quran that calls for jihad and beheadings etc are made to all Muslims, not just to extremists.”
I knew then, I was not going to be offered a job there, maybe I should have asked Grover to put in a good word for me, but then again he refused to answer Paul Sperry’s question whether he was Muslim or not. Which tells me this Irish-Catholic-Jew would be left out in the cold for daring to mention the “Emperors new clothes.” What ever happened to Sensitivity Training? Maybe like all FBI agents who have to undergo “Muslim Sensitivity Training”, I should apply to undergo the same training and see how sensitive it is. You think?The CIA presenter seemed to be the only one who knew what he was talking about, but he didn’t tell us a thing. I knew asking him my standard question would get me a standard answer, so I kept myself busy looking for bugging devices or cameras etc, and couldn’t wait to get to the museum. I wondered why the intelligence community hadn’t moved forward from thinking of present Islamic terrorism as some progression of the 70’s and 80’s terrorism. Great advances had been made in the toys the CIA now employs, why not the same advances in getting to know the enemy without being Politically Correct?
The rest of the trip to DOS, DOD etc was the same. Bosses and underlings threw in a few Arabic words and names that sounded impressive to some, wrongfully claimed that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had been arrested in Karachi, Pakistan, that the Mujahadeen became AL Qaeda, and pompously stated that by keeping an eye on checking accounts(less than two percent of people in the Muslim world that spawns terrorism, have checking accounts) was deterring the terrorists from getting financial aid. Yes they had heard of the ‘Hawala” system but obviously believed that Islamic terrorists and their sympathizers were stand-up citizens and dutifully made large transactions through banks and traceable activity.
Seems some countries in South America and “other” places have a new scam to separate American tax payer’s from their money. Its becoming popular to claim Al-Qaeda activity in their backyards to coincide with visits by U.S. officials. Now that’s a winning scheme, maybe some of our own cities that got left off the DHS “Give Away of Millions” crap shoot should… Just a thought!
At the pentagon a presentation took on a dog and pony show, with no substance and nothing new revealed. Team work was impressive though. Clichés such as “When you’re up to your a– in alligators, its too late to drain the swamp” were used to brush aside my question “What did the NCTC (National Counterterrorism Center)Organizational Chart mean by Al-Qaeda and Sunni Affiliates Group. Why are they categorized as affiliates and not Islamic terrorist groups? And what happened to the Shia Terrorist Groups not represented on your chart?”
In one week an aware and somewhat knowledgeable student of Terrorism, would have learned that our intelligence community is no closer to understanding the Islamic terrorist mindset than it was before 9/11. It seems the ignorance and arrogance of some, in charge of keeping us safe, is only inflating their expanded egos and securing their over-paid jobs, while the terrorists like Osama are giving up millions and their comfortable lives to spread their religion of violence and intolerance throughout the world.