Ex-CIA official: We will lose terror war
By Krishnadev Calamur
UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL
Washington, DC, Dec. 3 (UPI) -- The United States will ultimately lose the war on terror because of its policies in the Middle East and because of concerns over the human rights of militants worldwide, the former head of the CIA's team that hunted Osama bin Laden said Friday.
In a conversation with United Press International's reporters and editors, Michael Scheuer, newly revealed as the author of the bestselling book "Imperial Hubris: Why the West Is Losing the War on Terror," said bin Laden was now possibly the Arab world's most popular leader, adding al-Qaida's domination of the Internet in the Muslim world was leading to the United States losing its battle for the hearts and minds of Muslims worldwide.
Scheuer, who resigned last month from the CIA because of the agency's refusal to allow him permission to grant media interviews, added that before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington, the United States had between eight and 10 chances to kill bin Laden, but failed to because of inaction by the upper echelons of the U.S. bureaucracy. He said the Bush administration's claims that two-thirds of al-Qaida's leadership had been killed and destroyed were "ludicrous," noting the group functioned with terrorists, insurgents, financiers and administrators across the globe.
When asked if the United States could win the "war on terror," which was undertaken following the Sept. 11 attacks, Scheuer said: "No. It can't be won. We're going to eventually lose it. And the problem for us is that we're going to lose it much more quickly if we don't start killing more of the enemy."
This, he said, is part of the problem. Scheuer highlighted several instances of legal or bureaucratic hurdles that hampered the targeting of militant leaders, including bin Laden, before the Sept. 11 attacks. He said there were also difficulties with European countries and parts of the Muslim world. European law's prohibiting the transfer of terrorism suspects to countries that have the death penalty has affected U.S. chances of success in the region, he said. Arab countries, in turn, were hampered by bin Laden's popularity among their people.
Scheuer said al-Qaida was winning the propaganda war in the region, especially on the World Wide Web with regular political, military and religious discourses and justification for many of al-Qaida's actions. The core of the movement was made up of true believers and it was controlling the debate in the Islamic world. It also had suspected success in infiltrating U.S., Saudi and Jordanian military and security services.
"They've beaten our pants off, especially with their Internet capability," Scheuer said. "They dominate discourse on the internet in the Islamic worlds."
The intelligence community also faced constraints in working to capture or kill suspected terrorists because of U.S. law, he said, adding it was difficult to bring suspects to the United States unless there was an "airtight case" against them. So the CIA developed a policy called rendition where they would find a third country that would accept the suspect. U.S. law before Sept. 11, however, required that a legal brief be submitted along with pledges from all the concerned intelligence services that the suspect would not be tortured.
Scheuer recalled that on one occasion, when a plan had been put together to capture bin Laden, U.S. lawyers demanded that an ergonomic chair -- with oxygen and medical supplies -- be built for him so he would be comfortable. They also reviewed the type of tape that would be used to gag the al-Qaida leader.
"It's a gutless policy to force the directorate of operations to depend on that kind of process to defend America," Scheuer said.
Scheuer, who at the time of his resignation from the CIA was a senior analyst at the agency, said another problem the United States faced in fighting terrorism was its allies in the Arab world. Since many of those leaders were unpopular among their own people, it was difficult to persuade them to rally against bin Laden who enjoys wide support.
"They don't it, and it's because bin Laden is the only leader in the Islamic world," he said, "a heroic figure."
He said the war on Iraq, unpopular in the Muslim world, had further hurt U.S. efforts in bringing everyone to the same side, adding it was hard for someone in that part of the world to speak against bin Laden without seeming to support U.S. policies in the Middle East -- especially backing Israel -- the West's need for low oil prices, and the continuation of "tyrannical" regimes in the Arab world.
These factors, he argued, mandated a rethink of U.S. policy.
"Unless we change or at least consider changing our policies in the Middle East, the room for bin Laden or bin Ladenism to grow is virtually unlimited," Scheuer said.
He further dismissed Western assessments that bin Laden and his group targeted the United States and Europe because they hate Western culture. He said though they might not want a Western approach to life, their goals were policy-driven.
"They're attacking us because of our unqualified support for Israel. They're attacking us because we've helped cement on their heads tyrannies in the Arab world ... for the last 40 years," he said. They're attacking us because we're in the Arabian Peninsula and it happens to be a holy place for them."
When asked if the United States had an estimate of how many people belonged to al-Qaida, he replied: "No, which makes it ludicrous the claim that we've killed two-thirds of their leadership."
The head of the CIA team that hunted bin Laden until 1999, Scheuer said the United States needed to change tracks from viewing al-Qaida as a terrorist movement to seeing it as an insurgent group so it could recognize the order of battle that would allow the recognition of the organization's structure and composition.
"There's a great deal of fact-free analysis going on," he said.
Scheuer said al-Qaida served both as an organization and as an umbrella for groups with similar ideals worldwide, adding bin Laden's command and control goes very little beyond al-Qaida itself.
"His goal is to more or less get everybody moving in the same direction -- moving them away from, kind of a away from, a more nationalist orientation ... and get the focused on the United States," he said. "And frankly he's been only 60 or 65 percent successful in that."
He said there were a very small number of terrorists in the organization. Most of the fighters were insurgents who had seen action in Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kashmir and other places. A larger section of the group handled logistics, administration, fundraising, public media activities and religious indoctrinations. He said al-Qaida sent some field-grade officers or combat veterans to its affiliated groups, along with financial experts.
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