Affiliates Work - Inside Al Qaeda : Global Network of Terror

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Binding: Paperback
Format: Bargain Price
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 416
Publication Date: 2003-06-03

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Editorial Reviews:
Based on five years of research, it sheds crucial new light on Al Qaeda's role in financing and training terrorists in Asia, Africa, the Caucuses, the Balkans, and the West and assesses the terror network's future in the wake of September 11.

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Customer Rating:

Summary: Dated, But Still Good Background....
Comment: 2003's "Inside Al Qaeda" is the third edition of Rohan Gunaratna's extensive investigation of Osama bin Laden's extremist Islamic terrorist group. "Inside Al Qaeda" provides much detailed background information on the origins and history of al Qaeda. It documents how al Qaeda (AQ) organized and manipulated a global network of associated Jihadists to conduct terrorism around the planet.

Gunaratna opens with a biographical sketch of Osama bin Laden. He devotes a long chapter to a description of AQ's organization, ideology, and strategy. The bulk of the book is a long narrative describing the actions of al Qaeda's global network, including its array of points of contact and associated groups around the world. The final chapter assessed al Qaeda's status as of 2003 and projected both its future and a recommended response by the United States.

"Inside Al Qaeda" represents a signficant amount of unclassified research, and probably captures the lay of the land as it was understood at the time of publication. Gunaratna predicted that AQ would evolve in the face of US and allied countermeasures. Its sanctuaries in Afganistan are long gone, and its personnel and communications are under increasing pressure, but as he predicted, AQ was able to adapt as an organization and continue its mission of Jihad.

Time has moved on since this edition was published. New investigations have released much formerly classified material. Some of the gaps in our knowledge of AQ have been filled, in the process rendering poritions of Gunaratna's content out of date. Constant combat since 2003 in Iraq has also seen the waxing and the likely waning of a dedicated AQ effort to make Iraq the centerpiece of its strategy to restore the Caliphate. AQ's central staff is isolated and under pressure in the tribal areas of western Pakistan, while neither AQ nor its associated groups have quite managed to duplicate the stunning success of 9/11. Readers are cautioned that Gunaratna's writing style tends to mix assumptions, assertions, and facts in a manner that may be confusing to those without background on the topic.

"Inside Al Qaeda" is recommended as a good background document on AQ. It contains worthwhile information on a still evolving organization that continues to threaten the United States and its allies.

Customer Rating:

Summary: Good Overview
Comment: Rohan Gunaratna scrutinizes this worldwide terrorist organization and its theater of operations country by country. He examines Al Qaeda's reach, strategic and tactical threat, mind-set, and messianic culture. There are some suggestions of ways given on ways that the international community could counter this movement. The book is written based on five years or interviews, research, and travel.

Customer Rating:

Summary: Informative with one major omission..
Comment: Where's KSM?
The book overlooks Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the uncle of Ramzi Yousef, leader in the 1993 WTC bombing. There's no mention of his emergence into global terrorism, his efforts with Yousef in the Philippines (Project Bojinka, 1995) and his masterminding of the 9/11 attacks.

Perhaps the revised version includes him?

Customer Rating:

Summary: I had a class with Rohan Gunaratna...
Comment: Of course we had to read this book for the class, but for those of you who doubt his knowledge, let me just say this. There is no, and I mean no American who has the knowledge about Al Qaeda as Dr. Gunaratna has. That is why he was a debriefer for the CIA, he questioned Bin Laden's pilot, and also the former head of Al Qeada's Anthrax program, yes they had an Anthrax program. This book isnt writen by some guy listening to others, this is writen by a guy who was living it. I advise all of you, who want to know the truth about Al Qeada, and how they are no longer a group but a movement, to read this book like a bible. And of course, if your as lucky as I as to have him as a teacher, take any class he teaches, not only is he informitave, he is funny and witty as well...

Customer Rating:

Summary: A basic description of current events
Comment: I read this book in the summer of 2003. At the time it was probably the first book I read on the Al Qaeda and violent Islamic fundamentalism. I was initially impressed with the references, even though they interrupted the flow of the book and made it read more like a textbook. Since then every other book on the Al Qaeda and/or violent modern day jihadists has been more informative, both in the areas of description and in thought provoking conjecture and predictions.

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