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RedditOsama bin Laden, the leader-in-hiding of Al Qaeda, announced today that his organization was shifting resources from Iraq to Afghanistan.
"Iraq is not the central front in the War of Terror," he said. "It is a distraction. By sending so many troops into Iraq, we've stretched our forces thin. As a result, I am shifting at least two brigades from Mosul and Diyala province to southern and eastern Afghanistan."
Analysts said that bin Laden is responding to critics within Al Qaeda who warned, in 2002, that entering Iraq would be a disaster for the terrorist group. "Bin Laden believed, wrongly, that Iraqis would welcome Al Qaeda with open arms," said Phineas McGill, a Brookings Institution terrorism specialist. "He was half right. Iraqi Sunnis welcomed him with arms." McGill said that a rebel faction in Al Qaeda accused bin Laden of saying that Iraq "would be a cakewalk."
According to MEMRI, a pro-Israeli terrorism watchdog group, bin Laden apparently believed, wrongly too, that he could get his hands on Iraqi chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. A captured Al Qaeda document, translated by MEMRI, quotes bin Laden saying: "Our people told me that Iraq had lots of WMDs that would be useful in our jihad, but they were wrong." Al Qaeda militants, including Ayman al-Zawahiri, are reportedly blaming bin Laden for being so gullible. When Al Qaeda weapons specialists got to Iraq in 2003, after the U.S. invasion removed Saddam Hussein's government, they expected to seize control of vast stores of sarin gas, anthrax, and perhaps half a dozen nuclear bombs. According to MEMRI, an Al Qaeda internal document provided to bin Laden in 2002 called the existence of Saddam's WMD stockpiles "a slam dunk." Bin Laden, however, may not have been influenced by that conclusion, because, although he is an avid soccer fan, he knows nothing about basketball.
Since 2003, Al Qaeda in Iraq has faced two increasingly strong sets of enemies. On one hand, a mostly Sunni Iraqi resistance movement has systematically fought Al Qaeda north and west of Baghdad. On the other hand, Iraqi Shiites -- many allied to Iran, Al Qaeda's deadliest foe in the region -- have brutally suppressed bin Laden's organization in Iraq.
"I'm proposing to withdraw one to two brigades of our brothers from Iraq each month," bin Laden concluded. "Within sixteen months, all of our combat forces should be gone from Iraq."
But, analysts said, Afghanistan is unlikely to be more hospitable to Al Qaeda. A new Afghan government, supported by Iran, India, Russia and their Northern Alliance allies, is strongly opposed to Al Qaeda's version of Islamic fundamentalism. And in neighboring Pakistan, where Al Qaeda has scattered into lawless redoubts, a new government in Karachi may be able to shut down the secret Al Qaeda support network within Pakistan's military intelligence service, the ISI, and dry up support for Al Qaeda there, too. "Our only hope," said an Al Qaeda spokesman, "is that the United States intervenes in Afghanistan even more clumsily. Unless America bombs a few more wedding parties, we're going to find it very hard to recruit there."
The Al Qaeda spokesman added, "We never could have gotten any traction at all in Iraq if it hadn't been for the American invasion in 2003. We were so happy then. So we have to cross our fingers and hope that the United States steps up its meddling in Afghanistan, too."
Rather wistfully, he said: "Of course, what we're really hoping is that the United States will bomb Pakistan, too. We're crossing our fingers."
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"Of course, what we're really hoping is that the United States will bomb Pakistan, too." (!!)
They must be praying daily for a McCain presidency, then... hey! Maybe they put him up?
Posted by mikecope at 07/20/2008 @ 3:05pm
Thanks, I needed that. Satire is in the eye of the beholder...It would be fun to run cartoons of this on one side and Bush & Co. on the other.
Posted by ramara at 07/20/2008 @ 3:07pm
we'll smoke 'em out!
Posted by ibbleblibble at 07/20/2008 @ 3:56pm
mr. dreyfuss:
the phoneme "o" doesn't exist in arabic.
usama.
Posted by frosty zoom at 07/20/2008 @ 4:23pm
Who cares what MEMRI - a self-described Israeli terrorist watchdog group - has to say about anything?
Posted by Metteyya at 07/20/2008 @ 4:40pm
Genius..........like all Ivy Leagues!
Posted by kdelphi95 at 07/20/2008 @ 5:05pm
frosty zoom....azzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz snooze..everybody knows...and when Canadians stop saying "aboot" and Asians stop sqying "l/r", I'll write Usama. Semantics. Frankly, I dont give alot worse than a damn.
Posted by kdelphi95 at 07/20/2008 @ 5:08pm
"Bin Laden believed, wrongly, that Iraqis would welcome Al Qaeda with open arms,"
WoW-- cHeney is bin Laden? Or was that Wolfy?
In any case, I can see a Obama/Gore strategy in Afghanistan eventually becoming focussed on converting the prime Afghan poppy trade into the renewable energy industry--per no oil there and since UBL/AQ sees where the future's heading!
Otherwise a little piece of Pakistan is all they's got. No money there.
It's too bad hsuB/cHeney did whatever UBL/AQ told them to do.
It'll be great to instead finally have a president that knows how to tell UBL/AQ what to do...
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/20/2008 @ 5:31pm
The point seems to subtly be that bin Laden is pulling out of Iraq, why aren't coalition forces?
Posted by VirDorolum at 07/20/2008 @ 10:27pm
Oh my! Most of the responses here are even funnier than Mr. Dreyfuss.
Posted by Radscal at 07/21/2008 @ 12:50am
"War on terror" is an American coined term.
I don't know if this is truly an Al-Qaeda spokesman. All I know is that AQ's only objective is to recruit people for their "Jihad", and that can be done in either Irak or Afghanistan. In the latter the strong presence of the Taliban gives them more leverage, that's all, whereas the Iraq Sunnis are much more nationalistic than devouted to a religious Jihad.
All that declarations don't seem to be very credible at all. If AQ would want something really is to have people in the West that can strike on our countries and thanks God they can't. Seems to me that we are manifying their potential and giving that group of assasins more importance than what they really have. Having said that, to straighten things in Afghanistan to our desire will be almost impossible.
Posted by Frank42 at 07/21/2008 @ 01:16am
This excerpt is really fascinating, but unfortunately there are only two conclusions that one could reasonably draw from it. The straightforward conclusion, the one you reach if you believe that the information being relayed is truth (bin Laden said it honestly and MEMRI relayed said information as such), is that the war in Iraq is succeeding. Why? Because al Qaeda is being defeated there. This would strongly undercut the defeatist rhetoric that still characterizes opposition to it. Though this could still be used to justify some form of withdrawal, it would be a withdrawal borne of success rather than desperation.
Quite frankly, I think there's only one other way to interpret this, and Zero hit it right on the head. The only way to avoid the implications I just mentioned above is to believe that this is somehow a fraud. Whether bin Laden is lying, or whether MEMRI was making up the claim that he said any of this to begin with, the only way you avoid the conclusion of al Qaeda's relative defeat in Iraq is to distrust some component of the source that's relaying the information. In all honesty, I wouldn't blame people for doubt; though I would very much like to believe what is being said here, I think that it's just a little too convenient. If bin Laden is alive, I can't believe that he would not only disclose his operational plans, but hand the US the keys to undercut his base of ideological support. This can be explained, it seems, only if his defeat is either obvious to people on the ground (so that there's no propaganda harm) or is fabricated at some level.
Though I'm reluctant to draw conclusions about this release, the most rational response seems to be a carefully balanced mixture of hope and suspicion.
Posted by Thrawn at 07/21/2008 @ 02:03am
a joke?
Posted by madlib at 07/21/2008 @ 05:08am
why, of course.
Posted by frosty zoom at 07/21/2008 @ 08:27am
Once again, proving the falsity of the claim that Saddam was in anyway allied with Al Qaeda....which WAS a major point (if subtle) used to push the invasion of Iraq.
Posted by Maskdelta at 07/21/2008 @ 08:56am
er, hsuB/cHeney is Al Qaeda...
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/21/2008 @ 09:47am
lol.... you guys do know this is a satire yes? Just checking....
Posted by jro555 at 07/21/2008 @ 11:33am
Bin Laden and AlQaeda only think Iraq is a distraction since they got their butts handed to them. They were bragging Iraq was the central war on terror a couple of years ago. We nailed them in Afganistan in 2001-2002 when they thought they could beat us. Basically, wherever we engage them we will gut them as long as we actually engage. I have little faith in Obama having the stomach to do what is necessary.
Posted by pyeatte at 07/21/2008 @ 2:15pm
I have little faith in Obama having the stomach to do what is necessary.
Posted by pyeatte at 07/21/2008 @ 2:15pm
Interesting. I don't share your doubts, however. Iraq was a waste of resources that should have been used in Afghanistan to erase Bin Laden from the earth.
Posted by k330k at 07/21/2008 @ 2:50pm
Mett, Zero, Thrawn,
IT'S A SATIRE!!!!!
Posted by cka2nd at 07/21/2008 @ 3:40pm
If all of al-Qaida goes to Afghanistan, there is no need for any American troops in Iraq.
Posted by P. J. Casey at 07/21/2008 @ 3:46pm
Hmmm...I just assumed the Nation was reporting accurately. If it's a satire..I've just been had.
Posted by Thrawn at 07/21/2008 @ 4:44pm
We've been "winning the war" ever since we arrived in Iraq, "Happy." To my knowledge, there has never been a year, and perhaps never even a month, during the entire occupation of Iraq, in which Iraqi casualties did not exceed our own.
The question has always been, and continues to be: Are we doing more harm than good, or more good than harm, by militarily occupying Iraq? Because really, when you've got a few thousand dead Iraqis every month or so in the "harm" column, it's pretty hard to explain, especially to Iraqis themselves, how the good that we do in Iraq outweighs this harm.
The so-called "surge" has succeeded in two ways: Firstly, by duping context-challenged people like you. Secondly, by seeming to improve various "benchmark" statistics by concentrating a larger number of troops over a smaller area and then ignoring what happens outside this area.
Not the the Iraqis much care about our "benchmarks." I imagine that most of them would prefer to solve their own problems rather than have us "manage" them for them, all the while helping ourselves to as much of their oil as possible, by means of hastily coerced contracts. Really, this is a playbook that the Iraqis have seen before: Divide and conquer, then help yourself to the natural resources. All over the developing world, people who have often been colonized before have come to recognize this program for the scam that it is.
What about us? The oil industry is doing wonderfully, but how are we consumers doing at the oil pumps? Shouldn't it now be clear to us all for whom and for whose interests this "war" is really being fought?
Posted by JakobFabian at 07/21/2008 @ 6:22pm
Happy. That could have easily been written 3 years ago. Or it could have been written when the the mission accomplished banner was hanging. We have won this war so many times now I wonder why we are not out already. You quoting this is about as useful as you quoting any of the people saying we won 3 years ago. This means nothing because "experts" have been saying it for so long yet we are still there. This isn't fact. This is a guess. Just like Bush guessed when he said the mission was accomplished. He guessed wrong. You should try waiting before you blow your load. You "we have won" folks have been proven wrong enough times during this war by now that you should have learned not to be so quick to jump to that conclusion.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 07/21/2008 @ 7:49pm
If all of al-Qaida goes to Afghanistan, there is no need for any American troops in Iraq.
Posted by P. J. Casey at 07/21/2008 @ 3:46pm
where to begin.......
Posted by frosty zoom at 07/22/2008 @ 12:55am
Satire , people. S A T I R E !
Posted by t.swift at 07/22/2008 @ 08:12am
In case YOU don't get it, that is an excellent sign of our (& Iraq's) victory! IF this ends up benefiting Obama politically, or Russia, or Iran, or China, whichever, then, that's the way the wind blows...despite my own preference for Iraq to stay tightly aligned with us......IT IS THEIR COUNTRY to nurture or tear apart. Posted by 2HAPPY at 07/21/2008 @ 8:11pm
Here we go again. Arrogance does not = intelligence.
When Maliki first started calling for troop withdrawals people like you were saying that he was only doing it because the militant factions were forcing him. What is different now. Why is it when he started calling for withdrawals it wasn't to be taken seriously but all of a sudden NOW it means victory is at hand?
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 07/22/2008 @ 12:33pm
Here we go again....history doesn't begin when you choose to notice!
Posted by 2HAPPY at 07/21/2008 @ 8:11pm
And like I said you arrogant moron I started paying attention to history when I was only 10 or 11. Maybe you should learn to read then you could have an understanding too.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 07/22/2008 @ 12:34pm
I'm an argentinian guy. I can't believe you trust yet Osama is alive! Please keep Fox away! No one outside US believe such lie.
Posted by rio4tense at 07/22/2008 @ 3:21pm
Posted by rio4tense at 07/22/2008 @ 3:21pm
perdón, pero no te entendí bien.
sin embargo, sigue posteando. es importante tener otras voces aqui.
Posted by frosty zoom at 07/22/2008 @ 3:30pm
I'm shocked -- shocked! -- that so many readers (at least those who commented) took this seriously. Of course it was meant as satire. Sheesh!
Posted by RobertDreyfuss at 07/22/2008 @ 3:44pm
Maliki IS a politician.....you and I can't vote for him....just remember that! Posted by 2HAPPY at 07/22/2008 @ 4:08pm
I would search for a post. But everything from that time has been erased from The Nation. So I can't even google to find a post from you. Maybe Mask can help me out. Otherwise it's unprovable. DAMN YOU NATION.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 07/22/2008 @ 6:57pm