The United States looks at Korea through the prism of the Cold War: the filtered image we see is of a fledgling democracy standing alongside us on the “frontline of freedom.” 

But that era is over, and ending with it are the longstanding roles of “good” South and evil North. Korea is undergoing a transformation — of identity. What we describe as the problematic politics of reunification are really about the changing politics of identity.

1-A New Stage of Identity. The end of the Cold war also signaled the end of foreign domination. Both North and South were freed to discover new paths and possibilities.

• More than any other factor, the Korean ethos has been shaped by foreign domination and the relentless struggle of identity: for this identity to be realized along with a political state of national independence and autonomy.

• Establishing real Korean autonomy for the first time among dominant neighbors is implicit in ROK economic growth and now, military potential (with the US as midwife).

• But always hanging over the Korean people is the memory of abuse and enslavement followed in turn by “lackey” survival. In the context of such historical persistence, what is the true Korean identity, and how can it be realized on its own terms, and by itself? It cannot be the gift of a foreign dominator, even it that gift if altruistically offered.

2-The authority claim of the North

• The current relationship between North and South is often characterized as a “competition over legitimacy.” But it is perhaps better expressed as a negotiation over the path of Korea’s future identity. It is here that the North now has something important to say.

• We see an “evil” PDRK totalitarian regime, but many in the ROK, especially the young generation, see something different. They see the society of the South as being corrupted by decadent outsider values, while in contrast the North is something of a model for having remained “pure” and upright. This trope must be viewed in terms of the abiding Korean narrative of foreign domination. Add to this the aggressive practice of dominators — whether Chinese, Japanese, or American — to push their ways. Hence, the appealing image of the North speaking to fears of cultural impurity and the shame of long foreign domination.

• But how can such an argument possibly be believed? A “crazy” god-dictator seeking nukes is a picture-perfect cartoon of madness, with an accompanying vision of millions of slave-citizens at his eternal mercy. It is real life imitating Orwell’s art: a true prison civilization. How can such a horror be contributing to the formation of future Korean national identity?

• The secret dimension is religion. We call the PDRK a cult or a theology or a religious state. What is important is that the North’s “religion” — however strange and manufactured — represents a characteristic Korean spiritual framework. It is in its way “purely” Korean. By building on core models of it successfully appeals to Koreans in search of a new national identity. Moreover, its palette offers elements of a future national identity in iconic form not present in the South.

• What does this mean? What the PDRK calls Juche may be an original blend of core tropes in the Korean ethos, but it has very familiar cultural antecedents:

• Purity: more than ethnic nationalism, in part also a response to relentless foreign domination and forced submission — especially Japan.[1]
• Resistance:like the Tonghak revolution, and other symbolic stories of the relentless current of struggle, and both binds and gives shape to identity
• People’s needs: Chundo-gyo itself, flowing from Tonghak ideology, and just such an authentically syncretistic Korean religion is a sort of model
• Ancestor worship: the broader continuity of Confucian tradition is obviously carried forward in the cult of the Kims
• The collective whole: To belong is to be at one with the “River of Korea” (Saram). PDRK theology — however extreme it may appear to us — is at some level in harmony still with an ethos where the word for “person” suggests a state of spiritual oneness with the nation (danil han minjok — the “unitary nation”)[2]

3-Reunification as Narrative (Passage of Becoming)

• The North would not be able to play this potentially significant role without three developments. First, the end of the Cold War, freeing South Korea from the politics of a frontline client state. Second, the rise of ROK as a potential great power, creating rising expectations of a truly independent and powerful Korea for the first time. Three, North Korea was transformed in the mind of the South — because the threat of the PDRK no longer flowed from its strength, but rather its weakness. The North could now represent different things to the South.

• Thus the place occupied by the North in the South’s imagination was encouraged to change — and did so in unexpected ways. Because the North was now small and weak, it meant that the South could take the initiative: the Korean future was in its hands. But it also meant that what the North represented could be looked at from a positive perspective, in terms of the useful things it might offer to the prospect of a reunified Korea clearly dominated by the South.

• Subtly too this has meant a change for North Korean strategy. Paradoxically its new status as weak sister combines with its new and potentially positive contribution to an emerging new stage of national identity. The North now has a path to reunification on attractive, but subsidiary, terms. If it can no longer hope to bargain as even a titular equal, for the first time it brings something to the table that many in the South find valuable. Thus the nuclear element is not simply a status lever in the negotiation, but also part of the North’s ultimate contribution to a powerful and independent future Korea.

• This is the basic dynamic of the negotiation over reunification, where reunification has become a primarily symbolic instrument: to ratify Korea on the stage of the former dominant powers, but also Korea to itself on the stage of national identity. Thus the process of reunification needs to be orchestrated to achieve these goals. It cannot become a hasty, messy, and embarrassing event. In the centrality of symbolic politics the emergence of a new Korean identity can be compared to the original German unification. It is intended to differ however from the Bismarckian approach in part because of Korean historical traditions. The last thing Koreans want is to appear aggressive in a world of dominant powers. Thus it is best for reunification to become a natural, generational process, controlled by Koreans and achieved without violence.

• To Koreans themselves, however, the process must serve its own identity needs, meaning, reunification should take the form of a continually reinforcing narrative. The shared experience of reunification, in which all Koreas participate, will effectively serve as the passage of national identity from what was — subjugation, submission — to what will be — self-directed autonomy.

• The experience might best be approached as a reintegration of the “River of Korea” — in which the Saram of all Koreans is reestablished. Achieving this also equates naturally into a kind of spiritual renewal as well, for which there is great longing among Koreans. The significance of the relationship between the two Korean societies, and the dynamic that is now engaged, if the significance of national identity being both realized and reintegrated.

• The United States should recognize the power and the delicacy of such a profound cultural process, and also understand that we remain in the middle of it. We should be mindful thus that our situation vis-à-vis Korea has also been quietly transformed. We can do only so much to assist, but we can easily get in the way. To do so would at this point take the form of an unwanted reminder of the very legacy of foreign domination that an emerging Korean identity seeks to forever overthrow.

• Here are some suggestions then for US policy during this new era:

• Keep the nuclear issue diffused and quiet. The current “solution” — shutting down reactor production while leaving the current stockpile untouched — is a good one. We should expect a future Korea to be a sotto voce nuclear power.
• Continue to build up Korean military capability, especially high-end systems, like Aegis.
• Continue to make US forces in the ROK, “out of sight, out of mind.” Begin a gradual draw down.
• Describe our presence in Korean terms, rather than falling back unconsciously on traditional rhetoric: “freedom’s frontline,” etc.
• Do not expect a future US-Korean relationship to resemble either the British or Japanese “special relationship,” although for us that is a tempting prospect to push.

[1] Yi Kwang-su, a key figure during colonial rule, claimed that "hyeoltong" (bloodline), "seonggyeok" (personality), and "munhwa" (culture) are three fundamental elements of a nation and that "Koreans are without a doubt a unitary nation (danil han minjok) in blood and culture." Gi-Wook Shin, Director at Shorenstein Asia Pacific Research Center, “Korea’s ethnic nationalism is a source of both pride and prejudice,” The Korea Herald, August 2, 2006

http://aparc.stanford.edu/news/koreas_ethnic_nationalism_is_a_source_of_both_pride_and_prejudice_according_to_giwook_shin_20060802/

[2] A Korean guest stressed this connection to me personally.

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Like Dan Gouré I too resisted responding to this question. But Dan’s comment raises a fundamental issue — not just of how we think about Al Qaeda — but more revealingly how we treat the guiding belief constructs of other cultural systems.

Revealing, because it is clear that American and its Defense World prefer to live in the space of the operational/grand tactical and call this: “strategic.” We have had seven years and more to properly position Al Qaeda in the still-evolving belief system of the Ummah. We have had the benefit of every cultural resource that might take us to the key, the insight, the significance of Al Qaeda. But we are still talking “insider baseball” — the equivalent of terror and anti-terror RBI’s.

I took on Al Qaeda’s significance in 2003 with Terror’s Mask: Insurgency Within Islam and in 2004 in "The Muslim Renovatio and US Strategy."

Here is the significance I found: Al Qaeda reignited the sacred narrative of Islam. Their announcement on 9/11: A Muslim Renovatio had begun. Tremendous excitement rippled across the Ummah, rooted literally in the reawakening of deep narrative that had been all but lost. What was this narrative? Nothing less than a repeated, mythic and sacred story tied indelibly to the original awakening of Islam itself: of Muhammad and Al Ansar.

The surge of expectation from the (US-funded) Jihad of the 1980s in Afghanistan and the Brotherhood’s fighting call in Egypt abated in the 1990s — as Giles Kepel so archly noted. Al Qaeda knew this, and chafed at the Renovatio’s symbolic slippage, as their efforts in Kenya and Tanzania and the strike on the USS Cole showed all too clearly.

9/11 transformed the equation. If initial expectations of a true Renovatio were dashed in overwhelming American force in Afghanistan, then they were then rescued whole and given renewed authority in the US invasion of Iraq.

A beneficent United States condescended to give back to Al Qaeda both its proscenium and its stage. It was the opportunity of an era!

And Al Qaeda blew it. There is a long, long Islamic tradition of Ghazi fighting for the Ummah at the margins. But here is something most of us ignore. Historically in the “Golden Age” of the Muslim world, the Ummah used its Ghazi to sustain the vision of Jihad — maintaining the sacred narrative at the heart of Islam — while at the same time also banishing its passionate fighters to the margins of Muslim life.

The story is here: Roy Parviz Mottahedeh and Ridwan al-Sayyid, "The Idea of the Jihad in Islam before the Crusades," in The Crusades from the Perspective of Byzantium and the Muslim World, Angeliki E. Laiou and Roy Parviz Mottahedeh, editors, Dumbarton Oaks, 2001.

Hence in 9/11 Al Qaeda was able to breakthrough this tradition. It was able to seriously represent itself as the reawakening of the Ummah through Jihad, not at the margins, but at the center. It’s fighters raised the possibility-banner that once again a band of brothers — Al Ansar — might fulfill a true Muslim Renovatio. Thus in Afghanistan they could suffer and shrug off the slings and arrows of the United States. But in Iraq they showed in the end that they could not realize the very thing they sought. They needed to do much more than simply energizing a Renovatio. They had to truly lead it. Yet in the end they were poor leaders and narcissists. They betrayed the very thing they promised to fulfill.

Al Qaeda in Iraq was simply “not ready for primetime.” Every local opinion research barometer on their behavior after 2004 — whether in Iraq itself — or across the Ummah, tells a story of declining Muslim trust in Al Qaeda.

They were marginalizing themselves.

Hence today Al Qaeda is a fringe enterprise, thanks to its own self-delegitimation. The big question now is: Where can they go from here? How might they possibly retrieve their stature among the Ummah?

Moreover the truth is that other Islamist communities and movements have taken over the struggle. They have the authority and the Ju-Ju — whether Hizbu’llah or the Taliban and Deoband. And these are just the fighters. What of the quietist Islamists, the Muslim Brotherhood spreading its “good news” throughout the Gulf emirates? What of the tenacious proselytes venturing everywhere in the Trans-Sahel and beyond?

The Muslim Renovatio, in other words, is now in more capable hands. Our American focus — always mindful as it should be of the hurt that terror fraternities can inflict — should now resolve its energies to understand the true change agents in Islam.

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I had originsally chosen not to respond to this question because i thought it was puerile. No one among the list of gifted commentators has sufficient insight or knowledge regarding Al Qaeda's inner working or behavior so as to formulate a useful answer. In reviewing the contributions made to date, i am reassured in my original views.The observations offered by the various respondents have little to say about Al Qaeda or its tctics, but much to say about fundamental views of the current political-social environment.

 The responses reflect very developed, albeit often unacknowledged views regarding the struggle between the islamic world and the West, most significantly the United States. It is much more ihnteresting to read the responses for what they have to say about the authors'  views on the political and social situations in the islamic world (particularly Afghanistan and Pakistan, but also other parts of this sphere) and in the West.

Thus, the responses do raise a much more important question: what is the nature of the conflict in whivh we are now engaged? is it a fundamental clash of civilizations, another phase in the historic struggle within political islam between orthodoxy and radicalism, or a sign of the decline of the west and its political, ecnomic and military influence over the world? This questionis particularly peritnent in the contexct of the current globa economic crisis, evolving views on the role of "hard" versus "soft' power in international relations, changing perceptions of Western and American exceptionalism, and the shifting focus of internbational power from the Altantic axis to the Pacific.

For my part, I believe that the b attle with Al Qaeda is merely a metaphor for a much more important struggle for the soul of Western and American national identity and policy. The Obama Administratyion's interest in a deal with "moderate" elements of the Taliban are merely a practical reflection of how this struggle is manifest in current affairs. Moire broadly, this struggle is about our willingness to tolerate intolerance under the guise of multiculturalism or respect for other cultures, to moderate long-held political and moral principles n the interest of accomodating other world views and value systems, and to abandon the defense of a Western political and ethical order. Compared to this question, the tactics of the struggle with Al Qaeda is an irelevant concern.

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It truly is a wonder how confident and comfortable some people can be when they are living in the realm of what they want to see, rather than seeing what is on offer. Al-Qaeda has been crushed; its leadership beaten to death; the organization has been badly hurt. These are all surely possibilities, but only for those who know virtually nothing about al-Qaeda or the anemic U.S. war effort.

--Because al-Qaeda is an insurgent not a terrorist organization, its leaders always plan to be fighting a more powerful foe and so expect leadership losses. Succession planning therefore is a priority activity for al-Qaeda. In any successful insurgent organization leaders are expendable because combat leaders must lead from the front. Al-Qaeda is no more destroyed by leadership losses than a U.S. infantry division would be destroyed if its general and his staff was killed.

--Because this is war and not Hollywood or U.S. politics, poll results regarding personalities or organizations are largely irrelevant. The poll number that counts most is the one for Muslims who either oppose or support U.S. foreign policy. As long as the hate-U.S.-foreign-policy number hovers around 80 percent, Osama and his boys are only one attack away from being the toast of the Muslim world.

--How can anyone think that al-Qaeda and its allies are weaker when the U.S. military has proved definitively that -- because of its political masters’ moral cowardice -- it cannot win a war to save its soul? The best we can do as a military superpower to hurt the Islamists is to leave their sides aching from laughter after we have said we will withdraw from Iraq without winning; send a paltry 17,000 more troops to be their targets in Afghanistan; and when our new president wants to talk peace with the most irrelevant people in Afghanistan after Karzai and his cabinet -- the "moderate" Taleban. I wonder how Obama and his exquisitely ahistorical Harvard-Yale clique like being laughed at -- and deservedly so -- by Mullah Omar?

Overall, al-Qaeda has changed only marginally since October, 2001, and that in the direction of greater strength. America, on the other hand, has proven its military impotence and intellectual sterility -- as in depending on Pakistan to do our dirty work and looking for the moderate Taleban --and looks more and more like the once-beautiful hooker who can still wear the make-up and clothes but whose seductive powers are more comical and pathetic than erotic.

What has changed is that hard analysis of bin Laden, al-Qaeda, and their allies has been replaced by assertions that sound good -- but only if you say them fast. The top three howlers in this regard are the contentions that Dr. Fadl is destroying al-Qaeda via the rhetoric he issues from his cell in Mubarak's thumb-screw palace; that loose nukes are nothing to worry about; and that because no one has attacked the continental U.S. since 2001, we are safe and sound here at home.

Overall, al-Qaeda is a more potent threat to the United States than it was in 2001 not only because we have not annihilated the organization, but much more because we have failed to take it seriously; are losing the wars to Islamists in Iraq and Afghanistan; have pulled our military punches and thereby earned Muslim contempt; find U.S. and NATO political leaders and military commanders lining up to say the Afghan war is lost; and have compounded these disasters by democratizing Pakistan to death's door. When al-Qaeda and its allies are so clearly on the road to victory as they have defined it -- bankrupt America, spread U.S. military and intelligence forces to leave no reserves, and create political disunity among Americans -- there is no reason for them change strategy, and even less for them to run from a so far utterly feckless enemy.

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Al Qaeda has become many things and therefore must be assessed from different angles. Al Qaeda is the heir to a long tradition of jihad, the banner carrier and symbol of a radical expression of faith, the author of the world’s most spectacular terrorist attack, a tiny army holed up in Pakistan, a global network of like-minded extremists, the source of a persuasive narrative, an active communications system augmented by an on-line army, a brand name that still has value although it has been tarnished by its excesses in Iraq, a conveyer of individual and societal discontents, a magnet for the most violent jihadists, a legitimization of their violence.

Since 9/11, undeniable progress has been made in degrading al Qaeda’s operational capabilities. Its state protectors in Afghanistan have been replaced and its easily accessible training camps have been disbanded, disrupting its once large throughput of determined acolytes. Some of its key operational planners have been removed. Its leadership is on the run.  Its terrorist attacks after 9/11 in Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, and Morocco turned potentially passive spectators into active foes, prompting further crackdowns. Unprecedented international cooperation among intelligence services and police has made al Qaeda’s operational environment more dangerous. Many more terrorist plots have been uncovered and foiled.

Yet, al Qaeda has managed to protect its remaining top leadership; find a new secure base; reconfigure itself; communicate with field commanders, operatives, potential volunteers, and constituents; and continue its recruiting.

Whether al Qaeda central remains actively involved in operations or has been reduced to a handful of talking heads remains a matter of debate. Analysts also debate whether al Qaeda is a driving force or a minor auxiliary to the Taliban insurgencies in Afghanistan and Pakistan. It is not clear whether al Qaeda’s new strategies of decentralized struggle will succeed or merely reveal the organization’s dire straits. Although still popular among Muslims, al Qaeda remains unable to provoke widespread action.

The struggle against al Qaeda is a long, multifront conflict. The Taliban insurgency is expanding in Afghanistan. Pakistan seems unable to arrest the deteriorating security situation and growing radicalization on its side of the border. India faces a growing jihadist threat. New al Qaeda franchises in the Maghreb, Libya, Lebanon, and elsewhere give the illusion of an expanding global jihad. Ethiopia’s invasion of Somalia provoked an escalating and ultimately successful insurgency. Radical pro–al Qaeda elements are now fighting against less-radical insurgent leaders.

Al Qaeda’s media jihad, which its leaders regard as 90 percent of the struggle, has expanded. Its communications are more frequent and more sophisticated.

At the same time, al Qaeda suffered a huge reversal in Iraq and has been reduced from a large-scale insurgent force to a still active underground terrorist group. More problematic for the organization, its excesses in Iraq alienated many in the Muslim world. Al Qaeda has been defeated in Saudi Arabia. It has not done well in Southeast Asia. Since 2005, there have been no significant terrorist attacks in the West for which al Qaeda could claim credit. Outside of Afghanistan and Pakistan, the frequency of jihadist terrorist operations has declined. Those that do occur reveal quality-control problems. It appears that absent outside training, self-radicalized, self-recruited terrorist wannabes are barely competent.

Al Qaeda, of course, sees things differently. We see warfare as a finite undertaking; they see war as life. This is the eighth year since 9/11—a long time for us. Eight years means very little to those who see this struggle as beginning centuries ago, ending only on judgment day. We look for progress. For them, the struggle is process-oriented—participation is an obligation that brings its own rewards.

While al Qaeda leaders probably would admit that it has not been an easy seven and a half years since 9/11, they could boast having survived the infidels’ mightiest blows. Building an army of believers has always been more important than winning battles, and al Qaeda has transcended its historic organization to become an ideology, a global movement.

As for progress, the infidels, especially the United States, have suffered huge losses in blood, treasure, and morale—3,000 dead on 9/11, another 5,000 killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, hundreds of billions of dollars lost, a trillion dollars expended to fight in the wars there.

As a consequence, al Qaeda’s leaders might argue, the U.S. and Western economies are suffering their worst crisis since the 1930s. This is the crisis of materialistic capitalism predicted by Marxists and devout Muslims. We are, al Qaeda would say, witnessing the final days of the American empire. It will fall, al Qaeda will assert, just as the Soviet empire fell as a consequence of the blows it received in Afghanistan.

Before we dismiss any such grandiose pretensions as delusional, we must keep in mind that al Qaeda makes no distinction between its own efforts and divine intervention. The West’s economic catastrophe is, in the jihadists’ eyes, God’s will—a confirmation of their faith.

Determination of this magnitude is not easily dented. Al Qaeda’s leaders will persist. Al Qaeda will not in the foreseeable future graduate to a global insurgency, nor will it physically take over and govern a country—the caliphate will remain a virtual place. But its saga is too deeply embedded for it to be completely wiped out. It will survive as an ideology, an example, an inspiration, an excuse for violence. Locked in its own universe of discourse, however, al Qaeda may become increasingly irrelevant. But that could take many years.    

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Al-Qa'ida, the organization or constellation of organizations linked by sympathy, money and varying consensus, has been badly damaged.  They have lost leaders, bases and most importantly the belief in the minds of many in the Islamic World that somehow they constituted an effective counterforce to the industrial and military might of the West.   That belief is largely gone for the moment, lost in a demonstrated inability to strike decisive blows.  9/11?  We are still here, are we not?  The tide is flowing against the takfiri jihadis of the Sunni side of Islam.  They will be able to stage spectacular but useless attacks like the Mumbai affair, but that means little in the long run.  These particular groups will continue to be pursued by all those who have reason to dislike them.  They will grow weaker and weaker.  Their former allies within the Islamic World are now their potential enemies.

On the other hand, there is the underlying truth of the persistant Islamic tendency to seek comfort in revivalism and eschatological sects that pursue violent competition with non-Islamic forces in the world.  A broad view of Islamic history and its intersections with the history of other cultures points to the probability that such tendencies will surface again.  Global integration and the free flow of information will probably lead eventually to developments within Islam that will ameliorate violent revivalism as a dangerous phenomenon.   When?  Ah, well.

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The U.S. and its allies have knocked the hell out of the leadership of Al Queda for the past seven years.  We, in traditional nation state pattern,  bombed, strafed, and renditioned everything we could get our hands on -- and they are still there.  Still plotting.  And still popular enough to control regions in Pakistan and Afghanistan and have sympathy throughout parts of the Muslim world.  

However, they are not all powerful. 9/11 was about showing the Muslim world that they should rise up the West and its Muslim leaders who support them.  Whatever sympathy the Arab street has with their cause has been tempered by their bloody, cruel methods of attack on civilian targets. Still, the Al Queda "idea" provides a convenient rallying point for any number of greviences around the world.

The challenge the West has in dealing with Al Queda lies in areas that military power alone cannot touch.  We are in a battle of ideas with Al Queda and its "franchise" followers around the world. 

But, the Muslim world is also in a battle of ideas -- and this is more important than our battle with Al Queda.  In some ways, we are simply collateral damage in a long cultural war that will not soon end.

Al Qaeda has been crushed by continuous military pressure from the United States.  Much of this effort is invisible to outsiders, such as the continuous overhead monitoring of likely terrorist sanctuaries along the Afghan-Pakistani border and the cooperative efforts with Arab governments to cut off money from fundamentalist sympathizers.  George Bush and Dick Cheney may never get the credit they deserve for destroying a terrorist threat that was allowed to fester before they took office, but the simple truth is that Al Qaeda has failed to mount a major attack in years, and has never succeeded in repeating its "success" of 9-11.

It is important for the Obama administration not to confuse the danger poised by handful of malcontents like Al Qaeda with the broader, more diffuse challenges posed by tribal, sectarian and ethnic challenges in the Muslim world.  Iraq would be just as divided if Al Qaeda had never existed, and Afghanistan would be just as unruly.  Al Qaeda was just the latest radical movement to exploit gaps in local governance and the resulting frustration of the Arab masses. 

While America's military and intelligence agencies have pretty much wiped out Osama's clique of zealots, broader economic and cultural remedies will be needed to limit to emergence of similar gangs in the future.  Obviously, the current economic crisis is not helpful in that regard.  It will spawn a new generation of disaffected radicals, and not just in Arabia.

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Al Qaeda-Coming and Going

Al Qaeda has waxed and waned in its war against the United States. The debate over whether its stock is currently rising or falling is not nearly as important as ensuring al Qaeda gets dumped in the waste bin of history.

There is more than enough evidence to suggest that as long as al Qaeda has a sanctuary it will figure out a way to fight to get back in the game.

Indeed, Iraq proved that al Qaeda really is a problem. Despite the crushing defeat that ejected Bin Laden out of Afghanistan, he set up shop in Pakistan where his organization encouraged the terror campaign against the coalition forces in Iraq and tried hard to create an Iraqi civil war. That failed.

When al Qaeda’s operational arms were pretty much broken off, its leaders undertook an unprecedented psychological warfare campaign that included everything from the Internet to DVD sales. Luckily, the al Qaeda message has fallen on tough times. It continues to turn some to radical agendas, but a message that so far has only gotten many Muslims killed is increasingly less popular in the Islamic world.

Undaunted, al Qaeda turned on Pakistan, encouraging  groups like the Lashkar-e-Tayyiba (LET) to not just step up its war with India but turn on the Pakistani government as well. True, according to former CIA analyst Lisa Curtis, al Qaeda’s links with LET go back further than the attacks on Mumbai. Shoe bomber Richard Reid was allegedly trained at a LET camp. One of the London subway bombers spent time at LET facility in Muridke. Abu Zubayda was found at an LET safe house in Faisalabad. Still, the latest collusion between al Qaeda and LET shows the devil never stays idle for long. Encouraging LET to set Pakistan and India on fire is the latest in al Qaeda’s efforts to continue its war on the West.

As long as Bin Laden can hold out in Pakistan, his organization is a threat to innocents.

Crushing al Qaeda remains a worthy and laudable goal.

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Quite frankly, I lack the expertise to answer the specific questions about Al Qaeda and its affiliates capabilities and intentions. Instead, I’d like to examine whether our efforts to destroy Al Qaeda and its allies in Afghanistan and Pakistan may reflect good tactics but bad strategy. From open source reporting, we seem to be having a fair amount of success with the Predator strikes against Al Qaeda’s leadership in Pakistan. At the same time, we are invigorating our anti-narcotics program to destroy the drug networks that provide major resources to the Taliban elements we are fighting in Afghanistan. While both actions seem to be tactically successful, both also seem to be hurting us strategically.

As we succeed in striking Al Qaeda leadership in Pakistan, they and their Taliban allies have responded by moving deeper and deeper into Pakistan. They have expanded their control not just in the FATA but in the wider NWFP to include seizing control of Swat. This gives them access to better lines of communication, more resources and a much larger population to hide in. Even more ominous, their actions are creating major challenges for Pakistan’s government.

In the same way, our efforts to destroy narcotics networks in Afghanistan will have serious impact in Pakistan. While success against these networks may well reduce the resources available to the Taliban in Afghanistan, they will not destroy the drug trade. Quite simply, as long as there is a demand, someone will supply it. It seems logical that if the drug networks are driven from Afghanistan, they will move to Pakistan – probably the border region initially. So once again, our actions in Afghanistan will create major problems for Pakistan.

If Afghanistan were clearly the more important nation strategically, this would make sense. In reality, Pakistan’s 170M people and significant nuclear arsenal plus its long term conflict with India make it strategically much more important that Afghanistan.

In our efforts to defeat Al Qaeda and its allies in the border regions of Afghanistan/Pakistan, we are destabilizing Pakistan. The obvious question is whether al Qaeda or a fragmented Pakistan is more of a threat to US security. One can only hope that the recent strategic review will provide a clear answer and a coherent regional strategy that addresses Pakistan’s problems.

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Al Qaeda's obituary has been written often in the past seven-and-a-half years.

Each previous pronouncement or assessment has sadly proven unfounded.

Instead, al Qaeda has continually shown itself to be more resilient and durable than we imagined; capable of overcoming or obviating even our most consequential countermeasures.

The movement is, admittedly, but a shadow of its pre-September 11th 2001 self. But we should not delude ourselves into thinking that al Qaeda does not continue to pin its hopes and faith on some new spectacular attack that will that will catapult them back into prominence. But above all, al Qaeda is as opportunistic as it is pragmatic. It seeks wherever possible on the hand to fill vacuums of authority and governance where such conditions permit while on the other to take advantage of gaps in enemy defenses and then to strike when the situation presents itself.

Al Qaeda has always mixed and matched operational styles and varied its strategy depending on circumstances. That is how it has been able to survive the war on terrorism to date. It leaves no one clear footprint and remains as "top down" as it has always been "bottom up" with respect to either directing and guiding high-value terrorist operations or encouraging its affiliates and associates in their own violent pursuits. Right now, it is accurate to say that al Qaeda is active behind the scenes in Afghanistan and especially Pakistan but is likely laying low: content--for the moment--with the modest local and regional gains described in this week's question.

In Afghanistan, al Qaeda acts as a "force multiplier": strengthening existing capacity among indigenous insurgent groups. In addition, to tactical instruction and training as well as logistical and other assistance, Al Qaeda additionally provides overall strategic guidance and facilitates the coordination of operations between the Taliban and other jihadi insurgent groups. Al Qaeda imparts useful non-combat skills as well: teaching local jihadis how to plan and execute psychological and information operations, develop and cultivate new sources of funding and generally improve and strengthen operational expertise and organizational resiliency. Al Qaeda also delivers these same services to local jihadi groups in Pakistan. In particular, it has been pivotal in improving the Pakistani as well as the Afghan Taliban's information operations and propaganda. Once dismissed as techno-phobic Luddites, the Taliban movements on either side of the border are now displaying a newfound flair for twenty-first century communications courtesy of al Qaeda. Al Qaeda's overall strategy in both countries is subversive: designed to undermine governance and popular confidence in the authorities and to create instability and disarray beneath which the movement can thrive and grow.

But, if the September 11th 2001 attacks have taught us anything, it is that al Qaeda is most dangerous when it has a sanctuary or safe haven from which to operate--as it does now along the lawless border separating Afghanistan and Pakistan. For the present, it is therefore consolidating its presence there and biding its time for another opportunity to strike. The movement may be concerned about its declining popularity in important Muslim countries like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Kuwait (at least according to Gallup poll results); but is doubtless equally buoyed by more favorable ratings in other key countries such as Morocco, Indonesia, and Lebanon. Further, as unwelcome as declines in popular opinion may be for al Qaeda, there still remains a solid, hardcore base of support from which the movement can continue to draw upon for recruits and support. Appealing to this hardcore of like-minded radicals and extremists-- that has traditionally been al Qaeda's political base--is arguably today the movement's most important priority. Indeed, it is only when we have evidence that this core is eroding can the beginning of the end of al Qaeda be confidently proclaimed.

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U.S. and allied pressure have constrained al-Qaeda in several important ways, but the organization remains solid and its strength in Pakistan is particularly alarming, as Pakistan itself an important power (much more so than Afghanistan, al-Qaeda's last major base). This does not diminish the accomplishments of the United States in Iraq in the last three years and of several Muslim governments in weakening the organization in specific countries. But it should give us a certain degree of humility, as having a sanctuary from which to operate is perhaps the most important requirement for al-Qaeda's organizational success.

To read into these successes and failures a major change in al-Qaeda's strategy is probably a mistake for several reasons. First, the organization has always focused on Afghanistan and Pakistan: at times the United States has ignored this part of the world, but al-Qaeda has not. Second, Bin Ladin and his fellows have always demonstrated an impressive blend of focus and opportunism. When they have a chance to foster an insurgency or otherwise spread their cause, they do so - but at the same time they try to continue bloody "raids" against the United States and other Western countries and plot against several hated Arab regimes, such as Jordan and Egypt. A seized opportunity here or there may change the balance of overall operations temporarily, but the ultimate goals remain the same for now. Third, the regional and international approaches blend into each other. Killing Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan, in the eyes of Bin Ladin and his advisors, is both right and politically astute, as most Muslims see the Americans as occupiers. Creating instability in Pakistan weakens a U.S. ally and creates the potential in the long-term for an even bigger sanctuary, and perhaps (though he is a long way off) a powerful state controlled by jihadists. And killing Westerners heightens the focus on formerly obscure parts of the Muslim world (how many Americans had heard of Swat, outside those old enough to remember Babe Ruth's nickname?) and forces the United States deeper into the Muslim world, which Bin Ladin believes in the end will work to his advantage.

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