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The London Bombings and the Broader Strategic Context Area: International Terrorism - ARI Nº 100/2005 20/07/2005 The London Bombings and the Broader Strategic Context Magnus Ranstorp ∗ Theme: Prior to the London bombings British counterterrorist agencies believed that an attack on the UK was in all likelihood inevitable; they also believed the terrorists might well be home grown. Summary: The UK was uniquely prepared for the challenge of an Islamist terrorist attack in having built an impressively integrated intelligence architecture while pursuing a comprehensive counterterrorism strategy that hinges on making London and British society resilient and in minimising the risks of terrorism. Despite this preparedness the bombers went unnoticed and got through the security dragnet. The London bombings show that the asymmetric threat of terrorism is not going to go away in the near term – instead it is likely to be enduring in nature and potentially deeply divisive within our democratic societies–. Analysis: The investigation into the London bombings is unravelling at a lightning pace. Two weeks before the terror attacks, British counterterrorism officials repeatedly told us that intelligence kept on streaming in to the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre (JTAC) –a self-standing and integrated intelligence coordination centre involving representatives from the 11 different agencies involved in counterterrorism–. The threat assessment was consistently grim: in all likelihood an attack was inevitable. They also underscored that they expected that the terrorists carrying out any attack would be home-grown, involving young 2nd or 3rd generation British Muslims. This home-grown factor was deeply worrying for them as they have hundreds of suspects logged in their database, derived from domestic investigations and from foreign investigations with arrests and links traced back to British nationals. Countering a backlash against British Muslim communities became crucial as expected xenophobia, racism and even retribution would only serve to widen the potential recruitment pool of young and disillusioned British extremists. That three out of four London suicide attackers came from Leeds in West Yorkshire only confirmed what everyone had been expected. It was also no great surprise that there would be a foreign connection to the home-grown bombers as the tentacles stretching from al-Qaeda’s senior leadership at large in Pakistan repeatedly had emerged in past investigations and arrests of terror sleeper cells within the UK. Last year the British security service had detected the Pakistani jihadist tentacles on at least two occasions. In March 2004, the British authorities launched Operation Crevice and arrested eight British-born ethnic Pakistanis in a raid that revealed over half a tonne of ammonium nitrate that could be used to manufacture explosive devices. The current London bombing investigation is focusing on any links between the four bombers and the suspects arrested in Operation Crevice. In August 2004, following the arrest of ∗ Director of the Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at the University of St Andrews and Visiting Professor at the Centre for Asymmetric Threat Studies at the Swedish National Defence College 1 Area: International Terrorism - ARI Nº 100/2005 20/07/2005 Mohammad Noor Khan, a communications specialist for senior al-Qaeda members in Pakistan, the British authorities arrested several other British residents of Pakistani origin who had been monitored through their e-mail communication with Khan. This secret joint British-Pakistani security and surveillance operation emerged after senior US officials disclosed to the media that Khan had been arrested. It is very clear that British-Pakistani security service cooperation has been successful in the past, principally through arrests in Pakistan of individuals with links to local British suspects. For example, Pakistani officials claim that their security actions prevented a major attack during the British general election in May. The security dragnet in Pakistan has also yielded the arrest of over 800 suspected al-Qaeda associates since 9/11. This success, however, masks the systemic problem of tackling the religious madrassas (Islamic seminaries) under the control of banned extremist Islamic parties within Pakistan. Officially Pakistan has 7,300 madrassas but the real number exceeds 13,000, catering for an estimated 1,7 million pupils. The Pakistani government has made only marginal inroads into regulating them, monitoring their finances and reforming their curricula. Equally, the Pakistani dimension has been underscored by the presence and arrest of senior al-Qaeda leaders, most notably Abu Zubayda, Khalid Sheikh Muhammad, Ramzi Binalshib and Farraj al-Libbi who all sought a clandestine haven in several of Pakistan’s sprawling mega-cities. It is, however, clear to most initiated analysts that Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, would never be caught in Pakistan as it would ignite massive social upheaval within Pakistani society. It has now been established in the British investigation that three out of four London bombers spent over three months in Pakistan between November 2004 and February 2005. Investigators will be establishing their movements within Pakistan and the extent to which these suspects were present at specific madrassas and whether they were recruited and indoctrinated during their stay. It is now known that one of the four bombers, Mohammad Sidique Khan, was in contact with a banned Pakistani militant group, Jaish-e-Mohammad, an extremist jihadi group which is actively participating in the Kashmiri conflict. More importantly, Pakistani authorities will seek to establish whether there was an al-Qaeda affiliated command and control structure in place that supported the London bombers in their preparation and execution of the attacks on 7 July in London. The Pakistani dimension to the London bombers is in many ways a different and more serious problem than the Maghrebi cells and networks activated in Madrid and other European terror cells. The Spanish and French authorities have a relatively good grip on Maghrebi-linked terrorist cells and networks operating in the European theatre. The Madrid cell had only indirect and tangential links to extra-regional al-Qaeda sources. In 2004, the French authorities arrested 101 terrorist suspects, followed by 120 arrests made in Spain. These security crackdowns will yield a new harvest of investigative avenues. However, both the French and Spanish authorities are concerned about a Pakistani terrorist dimension, a potential source of extremism that they are less capable of tracking and disrupting in comparison with the North African networks. The Pakistani connections have surfaced in Spain following the disruption of a 10-man terror cell in Barcelona last year that carried out surveillance on the 40-storey Mapfre Tower. The foreign hidden hand behind the London bombers may temporarily deflect away from the home-grown aspect, specifically in reference to the problem of radicalisation and recruitment of a new generation of European nationals rallying behind a new revolutionary 2 Area: International Terrorism - ARI Nº 100/2005 20/07/2005 flag –al-Qaedism as a self-perpetuating salafist-jihadi ideology–. Some research has been done on the patterns and trends of jihadi recruitment within Europe but much more needs to be conducted as this issue has become a strategic priority within the EU and for its counterterrorism coordinator, Gijs de Vries. More research resources need to be invested across Europe, comparing the lessons learnt by the Spanish authorities with those of the UK and other EU partners if we are going to make any strategic inroads against this menace. Where then does recruitment occur? Beyond a purely foreign dimension, three areas have been identified across Europe as to the conversion processes from radicalisation to active recruitment: (1) the role of radical mosque environments and private study groups; (2) prisons; and (3) the role of cyberspace in spreading the ideology of al-Qaedism and its parallel recruitment role. The radical mosque environment came to the fore after the 9/11 attacks, especially as the British capital became commonly known as Londonistan –a geographically specific ideological magnet for extremist views to which home-grown and foreign radicals flocked–. In these radical mosque environments, talent-spotters and recruiters identified likely candidates, who they approached and invited to private study groups. In these closed-door meetings, potential recruits were educated by jihadi veterans as to the necessity of defending fellow Muslims under siege in conflict zones, from Chechnya and Kashmir to Algeria and Iraq. Graphic and gruesome videos were shown from these battlefields stirring the emotions of the recruits while the legacy and example of Abdallah Azzam became the ideological sustenance to support the jihadist cause –to become the elite of the elite spearheading the reawakening of Muslims everywhere–. These recruitment processes were sometimes combined with foreign visits to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia and elsewhere and even lead some to participate in jihadist struggles abroad. Most Western intelligence services are cognisant of the potential ‘blowback’ effect of the Iraqi conflict as a select number of European residents travelled there via Syria to actively participate in the conflict alongside other foreign insurgents. French intelligence sources estimate that over 80-100 nationals have disappeared
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