New Al Qaeda tape hints at frustration

Al Qaeda has marked the fourth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington with a warning of future strikes in Los Angeles and Melbourne, and this rebuke to the American people: You don't get what we're fighting for.

The 11-minute message, purportedly from Al Qaeda and produced by its video production house As-Sahab, was delivered to ABC News in Pakistan and seen by the Monitor in Kabul. In the video, a masked combatant identified as Azam al-Amriki, or Azam the American, speaks in American-accented English; Arabic subtitles are included.

Mr. Azam says Western leaders have misled the public about Al Qaeda's motivations.

"Four years after the blessed raids on New York and Washington, we find the people of the West continuing to speculate about their causes and objectives," he says. "We see no acceptable excuse for this continuing uncertainty, especially since the mujahideen have been unambiguous in stating their methodology on justice and the reasons for their armed struggle against the crusaders, and they have not heeded anything."

For some US analysts, the frustration expressed in the most recent tape is more a reflection of the failings of Al Qaeda since the success of their Sept. 11 attacks than of the world's inability to understand their cause.

"Once again this expresses Al Qaeda's complete naivete about the real impact of their actions," says Michael O'Hanlon, a military affairs analyst at the Brookings Institution in Washington. Most terrorist organizations have internal debates about their tactics and appear to adjust them based on results, Mr. O'Hanlon says. But not Al Qaeda.

"If you look at the terrorist groups targeting Israel, you see they debate what targets and means are legitimate, there is some indication of a debate about the ethics of terrorism. But we don't see any of that in Al Qaeda," he says.

Rather, recent statements by Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, suggest that it is the lack of debate in the West about the political aims behind Al Qaeda's terror attacks that seems to be bothering Al Qaeda.

In a November 2004 message to the American people, a yellow-robed Mr. bin Laden sought to play more statesman than terrorist, explaining the roots of his wrath towards the US and suggesting his goal was to bankrupt Washington through costly wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

A Sept. 1, 2005 statement by Al Zawahiri, meanwhile, went even further, calling the British people "idiots incapable of understanding."

In the latest tape, Azam, flanked by two automatic rifles, demands a withdrawal of foreign troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as changes in Western governments.

"Rid yourselves of your current leaders and governments and their anti-Islam, anti-Muslim policies or suffer the consequences," Azam says.

Unless Western leaders "heed the mujahideen's demand for justice" in the Muslim world further attacks can be expected, he says. "Yesterday, London and Madrid. Tomorrow, Los Angeles, and Melbourne, Allah willing. At this time, don't count on us demonstrating restraint or compassion."

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