Yesterday Faisal Shahzad was indicted on ten counts related to the plot to set off a car bomb in Times Square. The details of the indictment appear to settle the argument between the sleepy ranking Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee Kit Bond, and Attorney General Eric Holder over the involvement of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in financing and planning the bombing. This is something of a new development, the TTP's evolution from a local insurgent faction to a terror group with international aspirations towards attacking the United States.
Brian Katulis, a national security expert with the Center for American Progress, says the TTP's new operational goals are likely a result of the use of drone strikes against TTP targets in Pakistan. "I’m one of those liberal outliers who’ve been supporters of drone strikes, but we do need to look at what potential blowback we’re creating,” Katulis says. “You always want to reassess the threat landscape, and I think it’s changed.” Newsweek reported that the attacks were likely "revenge" for the drone attack that killed TTP leader Baitullah Mehsud.
According to the indictment, Shahzad traveled to Wazristan, Pakistan, where he received training in bomb-making from the TTP. So what's the going market rate of a suicide bombing against the United States? Twelve grand, apparently:
In December 2009, Shahzad received explosives training in Waziristan, Pakistan, from explosive trainers affiliated with Tehrik-e-Taliban, a militant extremist group based in Pakistan. On Feb. 25, 2010, Shahzad received approximately $5,000 in cash in Massachusetts sent from a co-conspirator (CC-1) in Pakistan whom Shahzad understood worked for Tehrik-e-Taliban. Approximately six weeks later, on April 10, 2010, Shahzad received an additional $7,000 in cash in Ronkonkoma, N.Y., which was also sent at CC-1's direction.
So what implication does this have for the new, small bore strategy terrorist groups have adopted to compensate for a loss of strategic depth in the Af-Pak region? Spencer Ackerman writes that "It’s notable that so far, al-Qaeda and its allies have yet to find an American Muslim who’s been willing to commit an act of suicide terrorism," but this isn't accurate. There was Najibullah Zazi, who was willing to blow himself up on a New York City subway before he was caught. The al-Qaeda affiliated Somali insurgent group Al-Shabaab did find an American willing to commit an act of suicide terrorism, which was carried out in 2009. That attack was on African Union peacekeepers in Mogadishu, not against the United States, but it's still an issue of concern given Al Shabaab's uncanny ability to draw American recruits and AQ's tendency to skim from other groups when recruiting (in fact, that's how Zazi was recruited).
Still, I agree with Ackerman's larger point. Even counting Zazi, AQ and its affiliates haven't had much success recruiting, training, and aiming American Muslims back at the U.S. So far, even when they do, despite the ongoing existence of a "safe haven" along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, they've been unable to train any genuinely effective operatives. The deadliest recent al-Qaeda inspired attack involved someone who had been trained by the U.S. Army, not by terror operatives in Waziristan.
-- A. Serwer
