Indian Defence Review

Strategic Innovations: Force Multipliers

Al-Qaeda has brought in innovative concepts and practices to fine-tune its operational and organisational capabilities. These innovations are the cornerstone of its success and ability to survive. Some arose at the strategic level while others arose at the tactical level. A few of them are listed as follows.

Strategic Alliances and Mergers

As stated earlier, al-Qaeda forged close ties with many like-minded organisations across the globe. These relations increased their operational reach, effectiveness and efficiency by harnessing the expertise or strength of other groups.20 In business terms, these relations give access to new target markets, helping gain capabilities and share the financial risk. Al- Qaeda was able to operate in newer territories out of their bounds earlier. By forging alliances, it utilised the human, financial and intellectual potential of other groups. Similar to legal entities which enter into joint ventures with local partners to gain foothold in new markets, al-Qaeda started using its alliances to expand its reach. Al-Qaeda’s partnerships and alliances in various states are diagrammatically represented in Figure below.

Al-Qaeda's Affiliates

Research and Development

Most terror groups have their own styles of conducting terror operations. Some groups might target hard targets, like government combatants and government installations, which are protected, while some might target soft targets, like civilians, who are not protected. Al-Qaeda’s own signature methods have been coordinated simultaneous multiple attacks against hard targets as well as soft ones. Terror operations like the 9/11 attacks and the Tanzanian Embassy bombings need meticulous planning and execution, which rests on knowledge already possessed with respect to proposed terror operations. Al-Qaeda has specialised in learning from its failed operations conducted earlier. The September 11, 2001, terror attack in the United States and the October 2000 USS Cole attack in Yemen were the most successful ones. Many are not aware that these terror attacks were actually preceded by failed terror attacks similar to the well-known ones.

Operation Bojinka was the failed predecessor to the 9/11 attacks22 while a suicide attack similar to the successful USS Cole attack on a US naval ship failed as the boat sank because it was overladen.23 Al-Qaeda learned from its past mistakes and extracted the much needed knowledge in the form of learnings from its previous failures. It is a classic example of adaptive management, wherein al-Qaeda used its existing knowledge from its failed attacks, fine-tuned and cleared the obstacles by exploring an alternative method and conducted the attacks successfully later.

After 9/11, al-Qaeda, under Osama bin Laden, encouraged free flow of information from lower echelons to higher ones. This set the stage for new ideas emanating from lower-level cadres. This kind of liberal democratic information flow from employees in business aspects can be attributed to participative management, where employees are allowed to participate in the decision-making process facilitated by a vertical flow of information. These kinds of interactions have never been cited in other terror groups, most of which are highly tyrannical. Some experts have likened al-Qaeda to the Ford Foundation, where projects presented by researchers are evaluated and only some are funded while most are discarded.24 It has also encouraged new research and invested in new ideas. A chemical and biological weapons program called The Yoghurt Project, costing a meagre $4,000, was the brainchild of Ayman Al Zawahiri (the current leader of al-Qaeda) and can be cited as one of the instances where al-Qaeda shows an inclination towards investing in destructive research.25 Some experts have classified al-Qaeda as a multinational and its associate Islamist groups as its subsidiaries, with al-Qaeda providing venture capital.26 JI submitted a proposal to al-Qaeda to attack the Yushun Mass Rapid System in Singapore. The proposal was presented to Bin Laden and accepted in principle though it is still not clear why it was never carried out.27

By encouraging free vertical flow of information, which facilitates new ideas, and by closely monitoring earlier processes to fine-tune system lacunae, al-Qaeda has fostered evolution both structurally and organisationally. Essentially, it has created a team environment at the midmanagement level and below to protect its goal. This has also allowed the central leadership to support without participating but still have a commanding and motivating impact.

Propaganda and Public Relations

The media represents two-thirds of the battle. —Ayman Al Zawahiri

Al-Qaeda has long recognised that it must engage the enemy on several fronts simultaneously and that its media strategy is both crucial and complementary to its operational activities in achieving its strategic objectives.28 Violence as a product of ideology and capacity has been brought out well by al-Qaeda. It has used all forms of media and technology to disseminate its messages to the general public, which is its target segment. Most successful of them have been acts of violence, which by themselves are a very powerful marketing tool but with very negative connotations. It has a dedicated media committee, which handles the propaganda part (Fig. 1 above).

The organisation has used a combination of marketing communications to project its messages to the outside world. It has integrated various tools and media to market its message to active customers (members, potential members and like-minded groups) and passive customers (general public), which form the core of its effective communications strategy. Al-Qaeda has been especially adept at manipulating television through the release of videos.29 In addition, virtually every incident conducted by the terrorist organisation is talked about on its website, targeting potentials for recruitment and spreading the message of bloodshed. Al-Qaeda has successfully aimed and achieved two major returns through its programs, one is “fear” and other is “support,” the latter helping to build equity while the former helping to build resilience through fear-driven deterrence.

Conclusion

The growth trajectories of terror groups like al-Qaeda are a result of borrowing and implementing concepts from legal entities. It is now imperative for us to learn from these terror groups, who have customised and implemented these concepts to fine-tune their efficiency and activities. These terrorists groups advertently and inadvertently are imparting lessons of terror to other terror groups and to the law enforcement agencies as well.

Terror groups like al-Qaeda have shown great adaptability, nimbleness and resilience in managing their organisations. On one hand, these aspects make them competitive. On the other hand, these make them as vulnerable as business entities in a competitive business environment. Law enforcement agencies can enlighten themselves on this vulnerability aspect by studying and understanding their evolution models, which may eventually bring about their downfall. Instead of fighting terror organisations with laws and guns, nation states need to study the strength of their flexible structures, which brings about efficiency, and frame policies. These efforts have to be focused to ensure more attrition in terror groups, which will steer human capital away from these groups, causing the groups to lose their financial capital and fall into recession.

The irony is that law enforcement efforts have proved to be counterproductive, forcing these groups to transform themselves into virtual networks and making it much harder to detect and disrupt them. It is imperative that any efforts to counter these be planned taking into account their constant and consistent evolution.

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In the end, al-Qaeda has followed its objectives by evolving its goals, structure and functionality as the situation demanded and attempting to progress towards those goals. In the process, the organisation has often tasted success while failures have been far and few.