Where does Al Qaeda stand now?

Experts say the terrorist network has rebuilt in Pakistan with inexperienced leaders and murky goals.

By Peter Grier | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

from the March 5, 2007 edition

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WASHINGTON - Hidden in the harsh terrain of Pakistan's tribal lands near the Afghan border, Al Qaeda's senior leaders have quietly been rebuilding their terrorist network – including lines of command to cells in other nations.

This resurgence does not mean the group has regained its old strength, say US intelligence officials and outside experts. Al Qaeda's top levels are now filled with inexperienced commanders, and its new camps can train only a fraction of the recruits the pre-2001 infrastructure in Afghanistan could handle.

Al Qaeda's goals also remain murky. It is not clear whether the organization has a specific plan to strike within the United States or whether it considers Europe, or Iraq, more important in its war to impose its vision of Islam on the Middle East.

"We have no evidence that they have a coherent strategy" to attack US targets, says Martin Libicki, lead author of a recently published RAND Corp. study on the subject.

The capabilities of a possibly resurgent Al Qaeda became a hot topic in Washington last week following Vice President Dick Cheney's surprise trip to Pakistan. During his visit, Cheney told Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf of US concerns that Al Qaeda is regrouping in Pakistan's tribal regions, and that the group's Taliban allies may mount a spring offensive into Afghanistan.

Regrouping along the Afghan border

In a Senate hearing last week, US intelligence officials reiterated that terrorist groups remain their greatest challenge. Al Qaeda still tops the list of single threats.

"Its core elements are resilient," said the director of national intelligence, retired Vice Adm. Michael McConnell.

Al Qaeda would still like to inflict mass casualties upon the US, and it continues to seek weapons of mass destruction, Admiral McConnell said.

In addition, it is "forging stronger operational connections that radiate outward" from Pakistan to affiliated groups in the Middle East, North Africa, and Europe, according to US intelligence.

Still, Al Qaeda remains a loose network of like-minded individuals, instead of a tightly controlled terrorist hierarchy. Three-quarters of Al Qaeda's pre-9/11 leaders were killed or captured, according to US estimates. Aside from Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri, many of its leaders are relative rookies.

Nor has Al Qaeda's new Pakistani infrastructure replaced the multiple camps it operated in Afghanistan, capable of training thousands of recruits at once. "The numbers are not the same, but there are volunteers who are attempting to reestablish [training grounds]," McConnell said.

That Al Qaeda is resurgent in its remaining small corner of the world should not come as surprising news, some outside experts say.

"It's been true for a long time," says Jessica Stern, a terrorism expert at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.

After all, US intelligence has long thought that Osama bin Laden disappeared into Pakistan's wild tribal frontier after the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan. The area is so remote that for centuries it has largely remained beyond the control of central authorities. Border security is nonexistent.

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