19 December 2001
FBI Experts Say Hundreds of Trained al-Qaida Terrorists at Large
(They brief Senate panel reviewing worldwide threat) (780)
By Ralph Dannheisser
Washington File Congressional Correspondent
Washington -- Hundreds of hard-core al-Qaida terrorists, backed by
many thousands of supporters around the world, remain poised to
strike, two FBI experts on terrorism say.
J.T. Caruso, acting assistant director of the bureau's
Counterterrorism Division, and Thomas Wilshere, deputy chief of the
International Terrorism Operational Section, made the assessment
December 18 in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee's Subcommittee on International Operations and Terrorism.
Wilshere told the panel that the number of al-Qaida members capable of
carrying out sophisticated bombing attacks and the like is "probably
in the hundreds," while members of affiliated terrorist groups like
the Egyptian Islamic Jihad may number in the "small thousands."
Their ranks are swelled by like-minded would-be terrorists -- ones
whose "skill level is not yet as high, but they have bad intent." That
element numbers "in the tens of thousands, and they are scattered
throughout the world," he said.
Asked by the panel's chairman, Senator Barbara Boxer (Democrat,
California), how deep the members' loyalty to al-Qaida leader Osama
bin Laden runs -- and whether their zeal would survive his elimination
from the picture -- Caruso responded, "You'll find individuals who run
the gamut with respect to commitment."
But Caruso stressed that just getting rid of bin Laden would not end
the al-Qaida threat. "We need to go beyond one leader and go down into
middle management, or at least upper middle management" to disrupt the
group's activities, he said.
"There's going to be a stuttering in the organization's momentum" upon
the death or capture of bin Laden, but the effect may be limited to
reducing the terrorist output by 40 or 50 percent, Caruso projected.
That echoed his comments in his prepared testimony, in which he traced
al-Qaida's activities back to its founding by bin Laden and others in
the early 1980s as a cog in the war effort in Afghanistan against the
former Soviet Union.
Given its long history and level of commitment, "it is one thing to
disrupt an organization such as al-Qaida, it is another to totally
dismantle and destroy it." That latter task "must truly remain an
international effort, with international cooperation at all levels, in
order to be successful," he said.
And, Caruso stressed, the fight must involve continuing diplomatic and
intelligence efforts in addition to the current military campaign.
Asked by Boxer whether any al-Qaida camps are known to exist in the
United States, Wilshere responded, "Other people involved in Jihadist
training have looked at the possibility of setting up training camps"
in this country. But he said they found locations in Europe "more
benign" for their purposes.
Besides those in Afghanistan, he said, there is known to be a
concentration of training camps operating in South Lebanon.
Another witness before the subcommittee, terrorism consultant Larry
Johnson, concurred that "apart from Afghanistan, there is no other
country that has as many terrorist camps, as many active terrorists"
as Lebanon.
"We've allowed Lebanon a pass, and that must come to an end," declared
Johnson, who served as deputy director of the State Department's
Office of Counterterrorism from 1989 to 1993.
More broadly, Johnson said, "While we may never be able to eliminate
or neutralize every terrorist cell willing to murder innocent
civilians, we know from experience that these cells cannot thrive
without the support of a state."
Michele Flournoy, co-author of a book on the U.S. campaign against
terrorism just published by the Center for Strategic and International
Studies, a Washington-based public policy research institution, said
the effort requires a four-pronged approach: destroying the terrorist
groups, eliminating state support for terrorism, advancing homeland
defense, and dealing with the underlying conditions that allow
terrorists to flourish.
This last component, in turn, has four aspects, Flournoy said:
-- addressing the problem of "failed states" and restoring "a measure
of a functioning state and stability."
-- reexamining U.S. Middle East strategy. "We are perceived as
supporting governments that are not as responsive as they should be to
their populations" and must "pressure them to modernize." She
specifically cited Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Pakistan as falling in this
category.
-- making better use of foreign assistance to further U.S. foreign
policy goals.
-- broadening public diplomacy efforts. "Over the last decade or more,
the mechanisms that allow us to get our messages out... have been
allowed to atrophy severely."
(The Washington File is a product of the Office of International
Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site:
http://usinfo.state.gov)
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