Al-Qaeda's Rope-a-Dope Strategy Revealed
Via Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, a German paper uncovered a high-level strategy paper drafted by what's left of al-Qaeda's leaders in the Afghan-Pakistan border:
According to information obtained by Der Tagesspiegel, terror organization al-Qaâ??ida plans to fight a war of attrition against Germany and other Western states. Security sources say that a strategy paper drafted by the al-Qaâ??ida leadership based in the Pakistani-Afghan border area suggests that a combination of smaller and larger attacks â??will drive the enemy to despair.â? Other documents describe the taking and subsequent killing of hostages, the use of toxic substances, and how to give cover to fighters smuggled in.Al-Qaâ??ida expects that growing fear among the general population and increasing reprisals on the part of the security authorities will marginalize Muslims. As a result of such escalation, Muslims will join the Holy War in ever larger numbers, security sources quote from the papers.
Gartenstein-Ross observes:
[T]his strategy paper shows that the group continues to depend on the Westâ??s reactions to advance its objectives, demonstrated by its expectation that â??increasing reprisals on the part of the security authorities will marginalize Muslims,â? thus causing more Muslims to flock to al Qaedaâ??s jihad. I wonâ??t reiterate the idea of al Qaedaâ??s rope-a-dope here, but it is worth being cognizant of to understand how the jihadi group used American reactions to strengthen its own hand over the past decade.
