Yes

by Alvinbeo

Created on: August 29, 2009

Al-Qaeda is a global Muslim extremist organization which is striving towards the "talibanization" of the whole world. Which means that through terrorism in the name of jihad (the Muslim Holy War) aims to put the whole world under the strictest form of the Shariah Law in the form of a Caliphate. Al Qaeda came to be known so well as it is now globally due to the bold and massive attacks using hijacked conventional passenger airplanes to crash and effectively destroy the World Trade Center Twin Towers in New York City in 9th September 2001. Since then, the United States of America, as well as the whole world in general have been making huge efforts to curtail and eradicate the terrorist activities by Al-Qaeda or its affiliates. The global anti terrorism efforts that have been enacted since that fateful attack ranges from the beefing up of the securities in the airports (for example the prohibition of sharp metal objects and liquids on board) to the US led War on Terrorism, which is still going on right now. Fast forward 8 years to the present, the big question being asked is that is Al-Qaeda getting stronger after the implementation of the aforementioned global terrorism efforts? In my opinion, I do agree to an extent that instead of getting weaker, the presence of global efforts to curtail terrorism seems to strengthen Al-Qaeda's resolve and as an organization rather than discouraging and curtailing their efforts. In the following paragraphs, we are going to delve into the various reasons why.

First and foremost, we could see that the global crackdown on terrorism, while it is being carried out in the whole world, is not really tackling the roots of the problem, which of course have been embedded so solidly to be plucked out just like that. The appropriate analogy that can be used to describe the global anti terrorism efforts is just like trying to get rid of a very huge tree just by plucking the leaves out without touching the roots which are of course much tougher to remove as they are so deeply entrenched into the soil. Even with the beefing up of the securities worldwide, captures of terrorist suspects around the world, it still does not solve the problems as the figures being captured are just those who carry out the attacks for Al-Qaeda or any other organizations affiliated to them. Just like in the game of chess, it would not do a substantial damage by just capturing the small-time pawns. These "pawns" of Al-Qaeda have little use other than overcrowding prisons such as Guantanamo Bay. Information cannot really be extracted out of them even with torture methods such as sleep deprivation and water-boarding as they are happy to die for their cause. To them, to die while on their missions is a one-way ticket to eternal happiness in heaven. Such is their mentality and loyalty that no information would be leaked out. Even if they are dead or executed globally, despite the fact that they are only the "pawns" of Al-Qaeda, the organization can quickly classify them as "martyrs" who are killed by Western Aggressors which would only serve to strengthen Al-Qaeda's morale and resolve globally. This is also compounded the fact that the big guns of the organization such as those who bankroll the organization as well as the ever-elusive Osama bin Laden are still wandering around freely out there, evading capture and also conducting attacks globally such as the 2005 London Train Bombings and the 2008 Mumbai Attacks (carried out by Laskar-e-Toiba, an al-Qaeda affiliate) .

Secondly, the points in the previous paragraph would lead to the second reason why Al-Qaeda has only become stronger despite efforts made globally to eradicate them. When the aforementioned "pawns" f Al-Qaeda are captured or killed, the organization can very easily find new, fresh, and young recruits from all over the globe. The organization has many breeding grounds globally in various forms such as religious schools/institutes that are brainwashing children with radical and twisted Islamist teachings such as a few such madrasahs in Indonesia which were found to be such institutions. Al-Qaeda is also known to operate well-equipped training grounds to groom would-be jihadists loyal to Al-Qaeda worldwide from in Afghanistan to even the strongly Catholic Philippines. Besides all these, Al-Qaeda is also utilizing a very potent tool to recruit followers worldwide and this is by using the Internet. Besides grooming children in places such as Indonesia, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, they can now reach to vulnerable Muslim youths who are born in Western countries such as the UK and the USA and many of them are well-educated. This is proven in the 2005 London Train Bombings in which the personnel involved are actually ethnic-Pakistani youths who are born and bred in the UK but radicalized by Al-Qaeda teachings through the internet. This is also true for the case of a lawyer in Singapore called Abdul Basheer who was captured and found out that he had been radicalized through the internet by Al-Qaeda and he was about to go to Afghanistan to receive trainings. This further substantiates that Al-Qaeda is gaining stronger momentum each day.

Next, we are going to delve into the primary reason why it seems to be very easy for Al-Qaeda to recruit loyal soldiers who are willing to die for their cause. The reason is simply because of the fact that Al-Qaeda is utilizing religion. All of us have known that religion is a very powerful tool in which fanaticism among its believers may override even common sense and logic. This has been historically proven from the time when the Crusaders were so inclined to capture Jerusalem at all costs in the Middle Ages to of course what happened in Denmark last year just because of a simple cartoon. It is already widely known that the primary objective of Al-Qaeda is world domination, but it would not be so easy to find such loyal recruits if they brand themselves as a nationalist or ideological movement instead of being a religious movement. With religion, it is very easy to blur the judgment of the people (even well-educated ones) by notions such as fighting for God, to die for God, and so on and so forth. Thus, it is a very intelligent as well as disturbingly dangerous for Al-Qaeda to utilize religion to edge even closer to their aims. As long as it is about religion, Al-Qaeda would not find its flames dying as there are always fanatical people out there, whether brainwashed since childhood or self radicalized through the internet, who will fight and die for Al-Qaeda despite the very many efforts to eradicate them. Another way of putting it, every time one is killed, another one thousand emerge.

Having said all those, we have to give credits to the world for the efforts made to eradicate terrorism such as Al-Qaeda, and we could very well see that those measures in place have at least yielded desirable effects such as the de-talibanization of Afghanistan as well as the annihilation of organizations affiliated to Al-Qaeda such as the recent commendable efforts by Hamas (themselves labeled as a terrorist organization by the USA) to eradicate an organization claimed to be inspired by Al-Qaeda, as well as the general beefing up of security which reduces chances of an attack happening. However, even with the measures in place, security lapses are still bound to happen such as how the Pakistani terrorists slipped through to India and to Mumbai to carry out the 2008 attacks in Mumbai as well as more recently how the two suicide bombers managed to smuggle explosives and themselves to carry out suicide bombing attacks on JW Marriott and Ritz Carlton hotels in Jakarta, Indonesia.

In conclusion, what we could draw from here is that despite the largely commendable efforts globally to counter terrorism, the unfortunate fact is that Al-Qaeda, as an organization seems to be growing stronger and stronger each day with a seemingly limitless financial power and pool of recruits ready to fight to their deaths for the cause of the organization.

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