Spencer Ackerman writes about al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula's latest venture, which is apparently a print magazine:
The magazine itself has a hefty feature well, reports The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder, consistent with what any ambitious editor would want to see in a rollout issue. Osama bin Laden himself offers his thoughts on “How to Save the World”: blow stuff up when people disagree with you about what’s Islamic! His deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri shares his insights on what’s going down in Yemen. But the anchor is a message from Anwar al-Awlaki, the New Mexico-born preacher who’s become al-Qaeda’s biggest draw as an online propagandist. So much so that the Obama administration reserves unto itself the right to kill Awlaki, a U.S. citizen, without due process of law.
And then there are some promising front-of-the-book experiments. “What to Expect in Jihad” is self-explanatory. “The AQ Chef” gives you a step-by-step on “How To Make A Bomb In The Kitchen Of Your Mom.” And that threads the needle for the apparent purpose of launching Inspire: getting frustrated Muslim youth to buy into al-Qaeda's holistic conspiracy theory that the crises of the modern era are attributable to a nefarious American/Jewish alliance against True Islam, and then giving them the tools to murder people.
Marc Lynch says it's not clear whether the magazine is legit, but if it is, I think the U.S. might have a big opportunity here. Osama bin Laden's stated goal was to lure America into various wars in order to "bleed America to the point of bankruptcy."
Sounds to me like making sure al-Qaeda continues to publish a print magazine is a chance to return the favor. Talk about your resource-sucking quagmires.
