Pakistani raid kills Al-Qaeda's chief of global operations
13 replies, posted
[Quote]ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan's military said Saturday that soldiers killed al-Qaida's chief of global operations during a raid in the country's lawless tribal region, a man indicted in the U.S. over a plot to bomb New York's subway system.
Adnan Shukrijumah was killed, along with two other suspected militants, in Pakistan's South Waziristan tribal area early Saturday, the military said.
"The al-Qaida leader, who was killed by the Pakistan army in a successful operation, is the same person who had been indicted in the United Stated," said a senior Pakistani army officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to talk to journalists.
Shukrijumah, 39, held a position that once was Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. The FBI lists the Saudi as a "most wanted" terrorist and had offered up to a $5 million reward for his capture.[/Quote]
[url]http://bigstory.ap.org/article/d18c410a91a94160a957b6f6eeda2ce8/pakistan-says-top-al-qaida-militant-killed-raid[/url]
Any day when one of these fuckers gets killed is a good day.
They have a chief of global operations as a position? Makes it sound like some huge, multi national EVIL corporation.
[QUOTE=Ignhelper;46651793]They have a chief of global operations as a position? Makes it sound like some huge, multi national EVIL corporation.[/QUOTE]Don't they even have a marketing department? Well, it's probably not called that, but they do push out a magazine and other things.
The problem is, they'll just shove another guy into his position
[QUOTE=Ignhelper;46651793]They have a chief of global operations as a position? Makes it sound like some huge, multi national EVIL corporation.[/QUOTE]
It's probably one of them who has a spinning globe and a red sharpie. When they find where they want to attack they just draw a circle around it. If they can't decide they just spin the globe and jab the sharpie at it.
[QUOTE=Mallow234;46651892]The problem is, they'll just shove another guy into his position[/QUOTE]
Yes, but will the next guy be as qualified? By this rate, the people that hold these kinds of positions cannot accumulate much experience before they are killed off.
[QUOTE=Ignhelper;46651793]They have a chief of global operations as a position? Makes it sound like some huge, multi national EVIL corporation.[/QUOTE]
A group of this scale runs like a business. Its actually pretty organized
[QUOTE=Mallow234;46651892]The problem is, they'll just shove another guy into his position[/QUOTE]
That's not the point. Every thread there is a comment like this for some reason.
[QUOTE=Ignhelper;46651793]They have a chief of global operations as a position? Makes it sound like some huge, multi national EVIL corporation.[/QUOTE]
It kinda is though at the end of the day, if you look at it one way all they are is a multi national franchised organisation.
Such articles pop up quite frequently and despite numerous commanders and chiefs getting killed, Al-Qaeda still works as usual. What's the point?
[QUOTE=uzikus;46655550]Such articles pop up quite frequently and despite numerous commanders and chiefs getting killed, Al-Qaeda still works as usual. What's the point?[/QUOTE]
They've gone from bombing US embassies (Nairobi and Dar-Es-Salaam), attacking US military installations (USS Cole), destabilizing north Africa (Al-Shabaab in Somalia) and harassing American operations in Afghanistan and Iraq to doing fuck-all without getting a Hellfire on their heads for it.
If by 'works as usual' you mean 'exists, even if it doesn't do anything noteworthy anymore' then yes. I'm not sure the international public realizes just how badly the US has reamed Al-Qaeda and the Taliban over the past decade. Most of the veterans from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Mujahideen fighters who led the anti-Western jihad, are dead, and in their place are inexperienced wannabes with dwindling public support.
[QUOTE=Bonde;46652011]Yes, but will the next guy be as qualified? By this rate, the people that hold these kinds of positions cannot accumulate much experience before they are killed off.[/QUOTE]Usually it works the opposite way. These organizations are fucking tight and efficient, especially ones that came from or are Al Qaeda. You kill the chief of global operations? His successor has been selected and groomed for that position, both of them probably have made names for themselves during the 80's and 90's so they're not idiots. Then the guy who fills that runner-up spot is also carefully groomed to take on more responsibility. Al Qaeda formed this sort of structure in response to the lessons learned by jihadists after the Israelis killed off anyone connected to the Munich attack. There was a sudden lack of bright individuals in the Palestinian networks that left a big mark on future endeavors in Islamic terrorism, [i]nobody[/i] wanted to be caught with their pants down like that again. These people aren't some dumb fuckers huddling in a cave, they're sneaky, crafty, and deadly smart guys who think [i]carefully[/i] about what they're going to do.
You would need to kill several "generations" in a position quickly enough to really put the hurt on them, which would be doubly effective because the top-heavy terrorist organizations (like Al Qaeda) need competent command staff to coordinate the independent cells and to provide resources to them. Many, many Al Qaeda operations would not have been possible without the hard thinking and hard work put in by the guys at the top, especially surrounding Osama bin Laden when he was alive.
[QUOTE=catbarf;46655691]They've gone from bombing US embassies (Nairobi and Dar-Es-Salaam), attacking US military installations (USS Cole), destabilizing north Africa (Al-Shabaab in Somalia) and harassing American operations in Afghanistan and Iraq to doing fuck-all without getting a Hellfire on their heads for it.
If by 'works as usual' you mean 'exists, even if it doesn't do anything noteworthy anymore' then yes. I'm not sure the international public realizes just how badly the US has reamed Al-Qaeda and the Taliban over the past decade. Most of the veterans from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Mujahideen fighters who led the anti-Western jihad, are dead, and in their place are inexperienced wannabes with dwindling public support.[/QUOTE]I agree, but I also disagree, the main reason why they're incapable of doing much is their network has been totally fucking smashed. I mean it's really impossible to say what happened when the USS Cole or embassies were attacked, but if [i]I[/i] were calling the shots I know I'd need a lot of pieces to be in play for it to work. You can't just go "hey, yo, yemen cell, blow up the cole" and then it happens. You need a bomb maker, a planner, guys to be groomed and prepared for the attack, a boat, I mean so many things go into just plowing a fishing boat into a ship that we don't normally think about. Then there's paying for all of this, hiding that money, shifting it around and laundering it several times, and finally smuggling in the raw materials (bomb stuff) that gets to the bomb maker in the first place.
Al Qaeda doesn't have that powerful omnipresent reach anymore, their connections to these cells haven't been shaken by striking their command and control, but instead by chasing down and smoking out the mid-level folks who do a lot of that moving.
[editline]6th December 2014[/editline]
Oh and this is why Baghdadi's Islamic State is so... random. They're easy to find, sure, but it's difficult picking targets because you don't know who's who until they surface briefly. Otherwise fighting them is a conventional war, which is simple enough.
Very fucking mixed bag with ISIS, they operate the old school terrorist/insurgent way, but they're also blatantly in the open as a military, but they also have roaming gangs that act as conventional criminal elements.
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