Al-Zawahiri's letter to al-Zarqawi

In We're Winning II: What the Other Side Thinks, I mentioned a letter that American intelligence had intercepted, sent by Usama bin Laden's deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who is in charge of Al Qaeda operations in Iraq. At the time, the actual letter had not been released, so I depending on a Washington Post account of how a "senior administration official" described the letter to the Post reporter.

Earlier today, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released the text of the letter. You can find it here in both English and Arabic.

Several things seem apparent from my read of the letter.

1) Just as the Post reported, the goals of Al Quada are to first "Expel the Americans from Iraq," second, to "Establish an Islamic authority or amirate, then develop it and support it until it achieves the level of a caliphate- over as much territory as you can to spread its power in Iraq". Third, "Extend the jihad wave to the secular countries neighboring Iraq." Last but not least, the "the clash with Israel" will occur.


2) They recognize that in order to achieve their goals they must win the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people: "The strongest weapon which the mujahedeen enjoy...is popular support from the Muslim masses in Iraq."


3) Ayman al-Zawahiri seems to think that the United States is on the verge of leaving Iraq. "Things may develop faster than we imagine", he says, and they goes on to draw a parallel to Vietnam.

The writer is either delusional, is so locked into an ideology he can't see reality, is watching too much CNN (joke alert there, liberal readers), or desperately trying to encourage al-Zarqawi, who he fears may becomming disillusioned.


4) In perhaps the most revealing part of the entire letter, al-Zawahiri fears that they are losing the battle:

I say to you: that we are in a battle, and that more than half of this battle is taking place in the battlefield of the media. And that we are in a media battle in a race for the hearts and minds of our Umma.

According to Wikopedia, Umma is defined as "the entire population of Muslims", and that "Umma is often cited by Muslim extremists as the path or the reason they engage in their struggle", where in the end "everyone converts or is converted to Islam."


5)The reason why they fear they are losing in the media becomes apparent in another part of the letter, where al-Zawahiri recognizes that many or most Muslims abhor their attacks on civilians:

>Among the things which the feelings of the Muslim populace who love and support you will never find palatable - also- are the scenes of slaughtering the hostages. You shouldn't be deceived by the praise of some of the zealous young men and their description of you as the shaykh of the slaughterers, etc. They do not express the general view of the admirer and the supporter of the resistance in Iraq, and of you in particular by the favor and blessing of God.

Although the language is couched in the best diplomat-speak, the true meaning is clear; we've got a public-relations problem among Muslims, who as supposed to be their supporters. Worse, they have no idea how to solve it. al-Zawahiri ends up blaming it on "the malicious, perfidious, and fallacious campaign by the deceptive and fabricated media." In other words, "damn the people, they don't 'get it'"


6) Al Qaeda sees the Shia as heretics, or as they put it, as "People of discernment and knowledge among Muslims know the extent of danger to Islam of the Twelve'er school of Shiism. It is a religious school based on excess and falsehood whose function is to accuse the companions of Muhammad { of heresy in a campaign against Islam...." However, they also recognize that their attacks on ordinary Shia civilians are creating problems. Al-Zawahiri warns al-Zarqawi that "Muslim admirers amongst the common folk are wondering about your attacks on the Shia", and that this really becomes a problem when mosques are attacked. Zawahiri raises many questions in the letter, but does not come to any real conclusions on the matter. He ends by simply warning Zarquai not to let his "eyes lose sight of the target", and that he is too far from the scene of battle to have all the facts.

7) The letter concludes with most of the flowery rhetoric we've seen in past writings, but also with a warning:

Please take every caution in the meetings, especially when someone claims to carry an important letter or contributions. It was in this way that they arrested Khalid Sheikh. Likewise, please, if you want to meet one of your assistants, I hope that you don't meet him in a public place or in a place that is not known to you. I hope that you would meet him in a secure place, not the place of your residence.

In other words, "the Americans have damn good intelligence."

Concluding Thoughts

Strange, then, this war. we who support our efforts blame our media for getting it wrong, and so does Al-Qaeda. We think that our media is putting a negative spin on the news, they think it's virtually an arm of the US government. Either way, apparently Al-Jazeera isn't doing a good enough job.

Further, we need to take care and not simply consult our own sources of media when trying to reach conclusions about this war. I should do more of this myself, the only other Al Qaeda document I wrote about was Osama bin Laden's 1996 Fatwa.


Other Analysis

John Hinderaker of Power Line takes down the NYT's editorial on the letter and provides his own analysis. Hinderaker concludes that

Zawahiri's letter is a valuable document. It lays out al Qaeda's strategy for victory in Iraq and the world. It demonstrates al Qaeda's growing unpopularity, its weakness and its vulnerability to American intelligence. And it protests feebly against al Qaeda's descent into unalloyed nihilism and sadism--the ultimate destination of all totalitarian creeds. The Times says that it doesn't know whether Zarqawi received Zawahiri's letter or not, but it doesn't matter. If Zarqawi got it--or if he read it in the newspaper--he tossed it into the wastebasket.

Austin Bay, as usual, has important insights: "Strategic Analysis and Discussion, and "Zarqawi's Losing Strategy"(which I linked to yesterday). Money quote:

Zarqawi's murder spree has revealed fissures among Al-Qaida fanatics. Last week, the United States released a letter coalition intelligence believes Al-Qaida's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, sent to Zarqawi. Zawahiri describes Iraq as "the greatest battle for Islam in our era." But Iraq has become a political and information battle that Zawahiri realizes Al-Qaida may be losing.

In February 2004, Zarqawi acknowledged a democratic Iraqi state would mean defeat for Al-Qaida in Iraq. To defeat democracy, he has pursued a strategy of relentless, nihilistic bloodbath. It's a brutal irony of war: In doing so, he is losing the war for the hearts and minds.

If you're not reading Bill Roggio you simply don't know what's going on. His coverage of the ground campaigns in Iraq simply cannot be found elsewhere. Roggio is cautiously optimistic:

Today's news of a compromise over the constitution must come as chilling news for al Qaeda high command...This constitutional compromise can drive a stake through the heart of al Qaeda's "hearts and minds" approach in Iraq. Al Qaeda's short-term goals of establishing a base of operations in Iraq and striking out at the greater Middle East may have to be pushed back to a mid or long term goal.

Lastly, CENTCOM weighs in on their website, providing "official" commentary and analysis.


Update

Apparently some people have started to speculate that the letter is a fake. Andrew McCarthy, writing on NRO, doesn't think so, and offers five reasons why:

First, the letter is dated July 9, but we don’t when it was intercepted. For obvious intelligence reasons, there is always a delay between interception and public release — as there was when a letter from Zarqawi to Osama bin Laden was intercepted in early 2004.

Second, al Qaeda has been collaborating with Shiites (such as Hezbollah) for over a decade, and — as Zawahiri stressed to Zarqawi — has reason to fear a backlash from Shiite Iran if it overdoes the sectarian violence because the mullahs are harboring scores of high-ranking al Qaeda members (probably including one of bin Laden’s sons).

Third, Zarqawi has always gone his own way and often had uneasy relations with al Qaeda’s hierarchy. They embraced him because he is ruthless and effective, not because they are crazy about him. Moreover, he has long had his own relationships with Iran and Hezbollah, and thus has his own ideas (which may differ much from Zawahiri’s) about how far he can go against the Shia without risking Iranian reprisals. (The Iranians may not like the anti-Shiite terrorism, but they will abide it to the extent its effect is to cause problems for the American occupation, which is militant Islam’s goal.) Plus, Zawahiri acknowledged in the letter that Zarqawi was on the ground in Iraq while he was not, and thus Zarqawi knows the situation best.

Fourth, while al Qaeda’s leadership is on the run (and thus not easy to send a check to), worldwide jihad fundraising is pouring into the site of the great battle, Iraq — where it is undoubtedly being pooled with piles of Oil-for-Food money. It should thus come as no surprise that Zarqawi’s circumstances allow him to dispense funds while Zawahiri’s are desperate.

Finally, the ostensibly strange “send greetings to Zarqawi” is easily explained. The substance of the 6,000-word letter leaves no doubt that Zarqawi was the intended recipient. But the letter ends by telling the unnamed addressee to say "Hello" to Zarqawi in Fallujah. This plainly is misdirection. Zawahiri probably does not know where Zarqawi is, and was plainly trying to confuse anyone who might intercept the letter. Plus, to lock onto Lawrence’s theory for a moment, if someone was trying to forge a letter from Zawahiri to Zarqawi in order to help the Bush administration (Lawrence’s transparent bottom line) why would that someone sow doubt about whether the letter was really intended for Zarqawi in the first place? That would defeat the purpose of the purported fraud.