Al Queda's Economic War Against the United States [View All]

[AnnInLa]

http://207.44.245.159/article7818.htm (article on InformationClearinghouse.com)

The war on radical Islam is no different. Osama bin Laden plans strategies based on his victory over the Soviets in Afghanistan during the 1980s. Feasibility aside, he believes the way to bring down a superpower is to weaken its economy through protracted guerilla warfare. We "bled Russia for ten years until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat," bin Laden boasted in his October 2004 videotape.

The October video, released just before the U.S. election, offers a glimpse into the jihadist strategy. "We are continuing in the same policy to make America bleed profusely to the point of bankruptcy," said bin Laden. His logic is simple: To bring the U.S. to suffer a fate similar to that of the Soviet Union, the terrorists need to drain America's resources and bring it to the point it can no longer afford to preserve its military and economic dominance. As the U.S. loses standing in the Middle East, the jihadists can gain ground and remove from power regimes they view as corrupt and illegitimate while defeating other infidels who inhabit the land of Islam.