October 12, 2004
Nobody Knows... Let's take five with Moira Gunn. This is "Five Minutes."
They didn't just capture Mohamed Naem Noor Khan in Pakistan last summer; they captured his laptop. Described as the "alleged Al Qaeda computer expert," it's not clear if the "alleged" goes exclusively with the "Al Qaeda," or extends as well to "computer expert." Still, there's no doubt this fellow knows his way around a disk drive.
Homeland Security's Tom Ridge, speaking recently in London, indicated it was the largest amount of information they had ever seen — "potentially millions and millions of pages." And the intelligence community is hard at work dissembling every valuable morsel.
In the old days, they'd be looking to decrypt lists of names — not that they won't be trying to do the same here — but in the old days, they'd be looking for a command-and-control hierarchy: who reports to who, and how does the money flow.
But the Internet introduces the prospect of a whole new set of terrorists who never existed before.
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Think of the Howard Dean campaign. Think about how a whole bunch of people who never met each other and never will, spontaneously figured out a way to contribute $100 million. Once the Kerry folks picked up the strategy, their money woes were over. The point here isn't money. It's about creating a catalyst for presenting new opportunities for independent action.
Shortly after 9/11, I remember reading about an "Encyclopedia of Jihad" which had been found on CD-ROM. Some eleven chapters covered everything from sizing up targets of opportunity to detailed strategies for bioterrorism. Today, it's out there on the Internet.
It comes to mind with the train bombing in Madrid this past March. As reported, it had the earmarks of Al Qaeda all over it, yet no established links could be found. But notice this: the detonators for the explosives were built from cell phones, and detailed instructions on how to build these detonators have since been posted on the Internet.
Like an anonymous rumor launched in a company lunchroom, information like this floats free on affinity; it will infiltrate and find its receptive mark.
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Bloggers blog, chatrooms chat, and fringe websites spring up and disappear, but the ideas and information rise and evolve through them all. Individuals can even coordinate into a larger whole. There's meetup.com and the Howard Dean experience, once again. Thousands of people assembled at will — their own will. Not faceless sheep, waiting to be pointed to the nearest cliff. Smart, resourceful people, who were trying to bring about a new order.
The newest faces of Al Qaeda are no different.
Whether these are individuals act individually or in small, self-organized cells, the fact is Al Qaeda can recruit by proxy. No need for mountain training camps. It means little to ask: Are they really Al Qaeda? With shared intent and the damage they can do, does it matter?
In-place operatives know to go to cybercafés, pay cash for access, create a free email address, and send off one and only one message to another created-on-the-spot email address with a pre-ordained code. They must act — and know they must act — at the fringes of the network, lurking and ephemeral. But that's the command-and-control part of the organization. There's the other part that seeks to engender independent action.
The bottom line is this: Anyone who says we know exactly how many Al Qaeda operatives there are, doesn't know. You see, even Al Qaeda doesn't know.
I'm Moira Gunn. This is Five Minutes.
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