Islamic Terrorists

Understanding Jihadi Networks
Strategic Insights, Volume IV, Issue 4 (April 2005)
by Marc Sageman, M.D., Ph.D.
http://www.ccc.nps.navy.mil/si/2005/apr/sagemanApr05.asp

Sageman has the previous Work experience with Salafi Terrorists to compel a rich definition of the Terrorist network structure--undoubtedly accurate. The Jihadi networks utilize the same basic formula as Sects of the order of Jim Jones of Guyana massacre. Membership of Terrorist cells rely on College-educated Males (average age 26 when they join), who possess Occupational or Professional skills, but exhibit little success in their personal endeavors. They are often isolated from their families, where they had previous close relations; many Recruits come from Time spent as foreign Students studying Technical skills away from the close family unit. They turn inward in Group pattern, in a rejection of an alien society. They are a Group banding together, and become ideologically inbred, adopting Spiritual values to escape the apparent lack of success in the alien society (remember they come from above-average Income families in their original Countries).

Sageman rightfully defines the Salafi Terrorists as possessing no real Central leadership since the 9/11 Attack, which led to a Worldwide response fracturing al Quada financial and training organizations. Recruitment to these networks is not as Self-generating as he implies, and depends not upon only localized mosques of perhaps a Dozen, but on the presence of malignant mullahs throughout the Muslim world. These mullahs are embedded throughout Islamic society--whether Native or foreign enclaves--who pressure their contempories not to disavow Terrorists and Terrorism, while preaching a philosophy of hatred. The article, though, is of high quality, and should be read to understand the nature of Islamic fundamentalist terrorism.

Some Quotes:

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan internationalized the militant Islamist movement. Sheikh Abdallah Azzam preached a traditional jihad against the Soviet invaders. Many militants from all over the Muslim world answered his call. As the Soviets withdrew, Azzam extended the defensive jihad into a more global one. He preached that all former Muslim lands dating back to the fifteenth century, from the Philippines to Spain, had to be liberated from the infidels.

they held intense discussions about their failure to capture a core Arab state and transform it into an Islamist state. Some militants, led by Osama bin Laden, argued that this failure was due to the United States propping up the local regimes.

About two-thirds of those who joined the jihad did so collectively with their friends or had a long time childhood friend already in the jihad. Another fifth had close relatives already in the jihad. These friendship or kinship bonds predated any ideological commitment. Once inside the social movement, they cemented their mutual bonds by marrying sisters and daughters of other terrorists---lgl