The other wilayat were less clearly defined, with the pledges from Saudi Arabia and Yemen signed simply as from the muhjahideen of each country. Neither specified where the wilayat were located, nor did they indicate that they represented existing groups. But evidence of ISIS’s presence in the Arabian Peninsula soon emerged from an unlikely source—al Qaeda.
In a statement issued November 21, 2014, AQAP’s top religious official, Harith bin Ghazi al Nazari, issued a statement sharply condemning ISIS for its declaration of the caliphate and its announced expansion into Yemen. In the statement, al Nazari accused ISIS of “dividing the mujahideen” around the world and in the Arabian Peninsula. He also called on Baghdadi to recant its claim on Yemen and other regions, a step that would not be necessary unless Baghdadi’s call to join ISIS had been heeded by a significant number within the al Qaeda affiliate’s ranks.36
In some ways, the announcement was the debut of the first ISIS affiliates, but more accurately, it appeared to be an expansion of the proto-state itself beyond contiguous borders. Where al Qaeda’s affiliate system had emerged in fits and starts over time, with little evidence of a clear agenda, ISIS was making a definitive statement about both expansion and control. Al Qaeda was not well structured to support and control the affiliate system, and as a result, the affiliates had nearly undone it.
ISIS would not make the same mistakes. It was creating an “archipelago of provinces,” in the words of jihadism scholar Aaron Zelin, who was early to assess the implications of ISIS’s plan. The wilayat abroad would share connective tissue of control and governance, but would exist in noncontiguous spaces.37
Precisely how ISIS intended to control these remote territories was unclear at the time of this writing, but subsequent statements indicated that the wilayat designations were only extended to those groups that had demonstrated they had implemented the infrastructure of control.
Given the large number of smaller groups that had pledged ISIS without being designated wilayat, the selective designations strongly suggested that a formal architecture existed for the new concept of governance.38
It was dawn of the era of distributed warfare, in which affiliated insurgent armies could arise in geographically distant regions but still answer to a single authority.
The full ramifications of the new paradigm were still nebulous at the time of this writing, but the unlikely coalition that had arisen to fight ISIS was able to function largely on the basis of an extremely limited engagement.
The new wilayat held territory and conducted operations on the sovereign soil of coalition members. Direct military confrontation between the West and ISIS in nations like Saudi Arabia and Egypt would be virtually impossible, and efforts to conduct such a war would further destabilize the region.
THE OLD GUARD
As of the writing of this book, ISIS had still not managed to score an outright win over al Qaeda in its core network—the official affiliates and the most prominent jihadi scholars—despite its considerable gains and the weakness signaled by AQAP in its November 21 statement.
All the top leaders of al Qaeda’s affiliates had sworn bayah to Zawahiri, and for as long as he lived, they were religiously obligated to maintain that loyalty.
Some ISIS supporters advanced arguments about when such an oath could be rendered void, but this was a slippery slope. If the leaders disrespected their oaths to Zawahiri, their own followers might feel free to disrespect them.
There was legitimate cause for concern about opening that door. The increasingly spectacular fragmentation of the Pakistani Taliban in 2014, along several different lines of dispute over tactics and leadership, demonstrated both the fragility of many established jihadist organizations and the opportunities they afforded ISIS.
“Our groups were in crisis; now [ISIS] has provided them with a powerful framework that is transforming their narrative,” Muhammad Amir Rana, director of the Pak Institute for Peace Studies, told the New York Times in November.39
Within the al Qaeda affiliates, as well, ISIS had sown deep divisions, or highlighted dissent that already existed.
In Syria, where literal shots had been fired and animus toward ISIS was arguably greatest, the al Nusra Front struggled with a loss of enthusiasm from the broader global jihadist support network and a string of defections from the lower ranks. (The calculus of defection was complicated, as moderate rebels deserted or defected to and from both al Nusra and ISIS, and concrete numbers were impossible to determine.)40
Al Nusra was plagued by a steady stream of rumors and disinformation about a possible merger with ISIS, which were greeted with a credulousness that spoke volumes about al Nusra’s weakness. While most of the rumors were sourced to Syrian rebel factions with well-known axes to grind, there were some contacts between the groups, which appeared to end unceremoniously when ISIS demanded al Nusra simply submit and swear loyalty.41
Further afield, each of the affiliates issued statements after the declaration of the caliphate that split the difference, affirming allegiance to Zawahiri, with stronger or weaker language, while noting and sometimes praising the successes of the Islamic State, reflecting fears that too strong a stance opposing ISIS would split their own organizations down the middle. Pleas for reconciliation among the factions appeared with clockwork regularity from al Qaeda’s partisans and were just as regularly ignored by ISIS.42
The razor’s edge walked in these statements was sharpened when it became clear that the United States was preparing to take military action against ISIS, making it even more difficult to criticize the would-be caliphate.43 The pressure built throughout 2014, finally cresting in the November 2014 AQAP statement, the first time an affiliate unequivocally condemned ISIS’s actions.
Despite pressures from every side, Zawahiri received apparently unsolicited declarations of loyalty from Mokhtar Belmokhtar, leader of a terrorist faction separated from AQIM in Africa, and the Caucasus Emirate, a Chechen insurgent group. These were unqualified wins for the al Qaeda leader but did not represent great strength, especially in regards to the Caucasus Emirate, many of whose former members had joined ISIS as fighters in Syria. (The group began visibly splintering over ISIS in December 2014 as this book went to press.)44 Zawahiri had not acknowledged either group as a formal part of the al Qaeda network by the end of December.
In fact, Zawahiri had remained almost entirely silent on the subject of ISIS and its presumptive caliphate as weeks stretched into months, to the considerable frustration of his supporters.45 His public silence did little to offset the growing perception that the core al Qaeda had been weakened and thrown off balance by ISIS’s dramatic military advances and its audacious demand for the allegiance of the world’s jihadists.
In September, al Qaeda finally released the first new message from Zawahiri since the caliphate announcement. It was strangely tangential, announcing the formation of a new al Qaeda branch in the Indian subcontinent. Although the region, which included Pakistan and India, was flush with preexisting jihadist organizations, none were named as participants in the new venture.
Some observers rushed to portray the move as an attempt to counter the perception that ISIS had rendered al Qaeda irrelevant.46 While the rise of ISIS may have been a factor in the timing and the framing of the announcement, Zawahiri claimed the affiliate had been in development for two years. And as analyst Arif Rafiq noted, there was perhaps a more likely explanation: The new branch assured a continuing presence for al Qaeda in the region if Zawahiri was killed and al Qaeda Central relocated to another part of the world.47
Nevertheless, ISIS was the elephant in the room. Throughout the fifty-five minutes of Zawahiri’s typically dry and long-winded rhetoric, he made no explicit reference to ISIS or the challenge it presented, furthering the impression that Zawahiri was out of touch or simply too weak to deal with the crisis. The response from al Qaeda supporters online was muted, and Zawahiri fell silent once more.48
Zawahiri’s absenteeism was driven in part by oper
ational security concerns. Despite the rise of ISIS, he remained the world’s most wanted terrorist. Zawahiri may believe that ISIS will self-destruct due to its own excesses and that his best play is to minimize any infighting or splintering of al Qaeda until that happens. And he is not necessarily wrong about that.
But the weakness of this position leaves room for ISIS to exploit one of the fundamental risks that terrorist organizations face—decapitation.
As previously noted, bayah extends from leader to leader, not organization to organization. When one of the leaders of an affiliate is killed, the new leader of the affiliate is required to make a new oath to Zawahiri and have that oath acknowledged in order to stay in the network.
In the event of a death at the leadership level, an al Qaeda affiliate could choose to drop its official affiliation with al Qaeda and realign with ISIS, or even opt for independence from both. And in the event of the death of Zawahiri himself, all bets are off. All of the al Qaeda affiliates would have the option to switch allegiances.
It is by no means certain this would happen. Al Qaeda survived its first major test in the post-ISIS era in September 2014, when a U.S. air strike killed Ahmed Godane, the leader of the Somali al Qaeda affiliate al Shabab.
Al Shabab moved swiftly to replace Godane, and its new leader immediately pledged continued allegiance to Zawahiri. However, the insurgent group remained under heavy pressure in Somalia, and the long history of infighting among Somali jihadist groups left the question only temporarily settled.49
It is decidedly unclear whether other affiliates would stay in line in the event that their own leaders or Zawahiri is killed. The current U.S. strategy against terrorism, which is heavily focused on decapitation, could eventually prove to be ISIS’s greatest asset. If a drone strike kills the leader of AQAP or AQIM, the uncertainties of succession could result in powerful new allies for ISIS.
TERROR RECRUITS AND LONE WOLVES
In the eyes of many Westerners, the competition between al Qaeda and ISIS is a battle for survival and relevance. During the Arab Spring and after the death of Osama bin Laden, pundits as well as some serious students of terrorism were happy enough to write al Qaeda’s obituary, if prematurely.
As ISIS commanded a greater and greater share of the headlines, many observers decamped into opposing factions, arguing either that ISIS had made al Qaeda mostly or completely irrelevant, or on the other side, that ISIS was an unsustainable flash in the pan, and al Qaeda remained the chief global terrorist threat.
In the heat of this debate, many glossed over the fundamental reality of terrorism. Asymmetrical warfare is defined by asymmetry. Any terrorist ideology that can attract five recruits and the contents of their checking accounts can make headlines for months. A terrorist group with twenty willing recruits and half a million dollars can make headlines for years. Although ISIS was dominating the headlines and attracting more recruits, al Qaeda was still quite capable of carrying out terrorist attacks.
Extremist and terrorist groups do fade, but it can take an extraordinarily long time for them to fade completely away. Consider the Ku Klux Klan, which was supplanted in the 1980s and 1990s by the more violent and extreme racist neo-Nazi movement. The Klan did not cease to exist, nor did it cease to carry out plots and violence. But the center of gravity for the white supremacist movement shifted away from the KKK, and it has not returned.
At this stage, either al Qaeda or ISIS could entirely collapse or be subsumed into the other as a result of the conflict, but neither of those outcomes is necessarily likely. The risk of total collapse is likely greater for ISIS, which is younger and less risk-averse than al Qaeda, but at this stage, there is a good chance both will continue in some form.
The battle is not simply between the organizations but between the visions they represent for the future of the jihadist movement.
Al Qaeda represents the intellectual side of the jihadist movement. While its ideology runs counter to hundreds of years of Islamic scholarship, it is nevertheless carefully constructed and has been articulated over the years in considerable detail.
Al Qaeda’s vision for the restoration of the Islamic caliphate is framed squarely in the long term. Its most frequently cited theme is a classic extremist trope—the defense of one’s own identity group against aggression. Its most charismatic leaders are dead. Those who remain are prone to deliver long hectoring speeches while sitting barely animate in a chair.
The net result of all these elements is most visible in recruiting. Despite its distorted worldview and its willingness to kill civilians, al Qaeda’s recruitment message is ultimately intended to appear “reasonable” and to resonate with a wide audience of thinking people.
Al Qaeda and other old-school jihadists often exploited tragic and evocative situations to attract fighters. In Bosnia, for instance, mainstream Western media paid close attention to the unfolding genocide, with a steady drumbeat asking, “Why aren’t we doing more?” Al Qaeda asked the same question. The decision to go to Bosnia and try to help did not seem especially radical in a mainstream context. But when volunteers arrived in the country, they were exposed to and allied with jihadists with a much more extreme agenda. For many, violent radicalization was not the reason for fighting in Bosnia, it was the outcome.
In Syria, the same dynamic unfolded, at first. Analyst Aaron Weisburd noted in November 2013 that the desire to participate in the Syrian conflict was not especially “extreme” for either Shi’a or Sunni foreign recruits. The statement was striking coming from someone known for his hard-nosed and unyielding pursuit of violent extremists online. Radicalization, he wrote, would depend on where the fighter landed, and with whom he surrounded himself.50
Al Qaeda’s broad foreign fighter model—the 2013 model—was to attract people to relatable causes, then radicalize them later. This approach is more likely to result in foreign fighters who are relatively discriminating and possess some manner of moral compass; people who are more likely to set limits on their actions.
These are the foreign fighters studied by Hegghammer (Chapter 4)—those who were certainly more likely than the average person to engage in terrorism, but still not all that likely to engage in terrorism.
Al Qaeda’s focus on that wider and more legitimate audience also worked against its efforts to attract individual jihadists, the so-called lone wolves. Over the last decade, al Qaeda–inspired lone wolves have frequently focused on military or government targets, although not without exception.
Many nonnetworked terrorists who were inspired by al Qaeda openly discussed their discomfort targeting civilians, even though al Qaeda was famous for the tactic and frequently encouraged it. These self-radicalized recruits experienced cognitive dissonance and made a choice they believed was morally defensible, even if it meant the target would be more difficult to strike.51
The same trend can be seen at the organizational level. While al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has been the most active affiliate in pursuing traditional civilian-focused terrorism against Western targets, it has devoted remarkably few resources to this goal, spending only a handful of men and a tiny fraction of its war chest. It has to date focused the vast majority of its resources on fighting the Yemeni government and Shi’a movements.52
Of course, al Qaeda has seen more than its share of bottom feeders over the years. Terrorist groups naturally attract a certain number of thugs and violence junkies. But there is now a more natural home for members of that demographic—the Islamic State.
ISIS too has an articulated ideology with texts and an underlying high-level analysis.53 Its so-called caliph holds a doctorate in Islamic studies—considerably more religious education than Osama bin Laden. When it is expedient, ISIS indulges in religious argument, for example, to justify its capture and sale of sexual slaves.
But its messaging betrays a different kind of sophistication. Where al Qaeda framed its pitch to potential recruits in more relatable terms as “doing the right thing,” ISIS seeks to stimulat
e more than to convince. Its propaganda and recruiting materials are overwhelmingly visceral, from scenes of graphic violence to pastoral visions of a utopian society that seems to thrive, somehow, in the midst of a war zone.
Its calls to religious authority turned heavily toward the apocalyptic. For instance, an article in Dabiq that justified the enslavement of Iraq’s Yazidi minority by ISIS cites a prophecy saying that slavery will return before the end times begin. Such themes are surely not unique in the modern jihadist movement, but they are now being deployed loudly and effectively (see Chapters 5 and 7).
As discussed in previous chapters, ISIS also distinguishes itself with a projection of strength and an appeal to populism—the gates are open for anyone who wants to join. All of these elements have coalesced into a unique offering in the world of extremism.
Identity-based extremism is frequently concerned with themes of purification, and the message of ISIS was extremism itself, purified. No more rationalizations about self-defense; instead, talk of revenge. No more subtle and embedded assumptions of weakness. Instead, aggression, shocking violence and strength. No more talk of a generational war to restore the caliphate. It was here, now.
After the Arab Spring, the Muslim Brotherhood had taken power in Egypt and was almost immediately confronted by political failure. Mark Lynch, director of the Institute for Middle East Studies at George Washington University, wrote that the Brotherhood “was profoundly shaped at every level—organization, ideology, identity, strategy—by its clear understanding that taking power was not an option. Removing that constraint proved more radically destabilizing than might have been rationally expected.”54
Al Qaeda’s organization, ideology, identity, strategy, and messaging were also predicated on the expectation that it would not take power. It stood for an idealized future that its leaders did not expect to see realized in their lifetimes.
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