[Population: One] <A HREF="http://popone.innocence.com/ar

[bryant]

A week ago, a French oil tanker in Yemen exploded; Yemen officials are now calling it a terrorist attack. Early evidence says it's an Al Qaeda action. The attack was very similar to the Al Qaeda attack on the USS Cole, in October 2000, and at least one American intelligence official was willing to make the link.

So: why would Al Qaeda target a French tanker right now? France is opposing the US resolution in the UN Security Council. This action will strengthen France's desire to fight terror, not weaken it. If anything, France will now be more willing to support the US. On the face of it, blowing up a French tanker seems really stupid.

Unless, and this is pure speculation, but unless Al Qaeda is not in Iraq. If that's true, it makes a ton of sense. If Osama wants the US to get distracted by Iraq, this is an excellent move.

Comments

[ex-meta.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but blowing up the WTC was pretty stupid too. It was guaranteed to increase US belligerence, hand Bush carte blanche to do whatever he wanted, and result in a bunch of innocent Arabs being bombed to bits.

The mistake you're making is thinking that Al Qaeda think logically and rationally.

[bryant]

IMHO, the evidence runs towards Osama being intelligent. What makes you think Al Qaeda has any issues with increasing US belligerence? Remember, Osama's goal is to unite the Islamic world in a single theocracy. Encouraging the US to become belligerent and convincing the US to bomb innocent Arabs is a great way to focus Islamic attention. He thinks we're evil. It's in his interests to make us look bad to the rest of Islam.

There are already signs of this. Saudi Arabia is not at all happy with us right now, since if we put a democratic government in Iraq then our dependence on Saudi oil will be greatly reduced. This would be a good thing in my book, but the Saudis hate the idea. Bear in mind that one of Osama's strong motivations is the US bases in Saudi Arabia, and that one reason he turned on the US was the Saudi decision to invite the US over to help when Iraq invaded Kuwait. Osama would love it if the US/Saudi relationship spoiled.

Note also that if I'm right (and I might well be wrong), Al Qaeda will be off the hook while we're busy with Iraq. If things go that way, then Osama's succeeded in pulling off the WTC bombings at the sole cost of getting kicked out of Afghanistan. And don't assume we're done over there -- you don't read so much about it, but Afghanistan is far from stable. Which means we're about to be fighting a two front war, one front in Iraq and one in Afghanistan while we keep the current government propped up.

Now, if the US succeeds in invading Iraq, installs a democratic government that'll last, and doesn't alienate other Islamic nations (particularly Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt), then we've done pretty well and provoking US bellicosity will turn out to be a mistake. I just don't see any guarantees of that outcome. From my point of view, Osama took a risk in provoking the US, but it wasn't a stupid risk, because there's a good chance it'll work out for him in the long term.

The biggest mistake you can make in a war -- and I think we're at war with Al Qaeda, and I think we /should/ be at war with Al Qaeda -- is to underestimate your opponent. The fact that Osama is motivated in a way that's difficult for us to understand makes it easy to write him off as insane. But I think that would be a bad idea. He's willing to do terrible things to achieve goals which make no sense to us; that doesn't make him nuts.