Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #197858 in Books
• Published on: 2007-11-30
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

Customer Reviews

Know Your Enemy
This is a must read book that is a definitive guide to the phenomenon called 'al Qaeda' and a careful dissection of the U.S. so-called 'War on Terrorism' including the policies behind it. What this book is not is a partisan attack on the current Bush administration or an overt call for change in the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC). As its title implies it is a harsh, but merited attack on the arrogance and ignorance which has informed U.S. policies towards the Islamic World (Dar al Islam) for the last several decades. It is also a scathing denunciation of the thinking that is guiding the U.S. war on Terrorism. The author makes no secret of the disgust he or she feels towards the ignorance and moral cowardice shown by senior military and civilian leaders in trying to develop a response to what they insist on calling the terrorist threat. The author also holds the opinion that the invasion and occupation of Iraq was monumentally foolish action has done incredible harm to U.S.-Islamic relations. In addition, the author rather bravely raises the sensitive issue of U.S.-Israeli relations and makes clear that from an objective geo-political perspective this relationship makes no sense.

Probably the most important insight the author provides is that the U.S. is not fighting a small body of crazed terrorists who want to destroy the American way of life. Rather, the U.S. has contrived to become the object of a worldwide Islamic defensive war (Jihad) that is trying to defend the Islamic way of life that is perceived to be under dire threat from U.S. actions and policies in the Middle East. In the author's analysis, the al Qaeda movement is an insurgency based on a clear ideology and with well defined achievable goals. Thus the author would probably conclude that al Qaeda is more analogous to the WWII underground forces fighting the Nazi war machine than a small gang of fanatics who delight in the destruction of all things western.

In short this is a unique and important book written by an experienced U.S. intelligence analyst turned manager who is clearly a real expert on the related subjects of Islam, Afghanistan and the Islamic brand of terrorism. This alone makes the book worth reading.

The Insider
When a Senior CIA official stationed in Pakistan for the better part of the 90s during the emergence of the Taliban and al Qaeda releases a book outlining the failings of his former employer, it's bound to create a bit of controversy.

The inside information that "Mike" produces here is unprecedented and extraordinary to say the least. However, his opinions on Islamic Fundamentalism and his justification of US hatred give one the impression of a disgruntled former employee.

A good read overall simply for the disclosure of such highly classified information if one can separate the author's bias from the facts.

Co-opting the Antiwar Message about the Causes of Terrorism
I recommend this book for the interesting information the author provides and for his no-nonsense writing style. However, there is a glaring problem with the author's argument, which was pointed out by the reviewer who called this book schizophrenic. I'd like to explore this charge, since it's accurate and it calls for more explanation.

The author argues against the Bush administration and even, in effect, against John Kerry, that bin Laden and al Qaeda oppose the U.S. not because the insurgents hate the American way of life and wish insanely to destroy Western civilization. The violence against Americans and their interests occurs, rather, for exactly the reasons bin Laden presents in his writings and interviews: the violence is in response to disastrous one-sided U.S. policies in the Middle East, to the threat perceived by millions of Muslims that Islam itself is under attack around the world by crusaders who, for cheap oil, support corrupt, oppressive governments of Muslim countries and who also support Israel in its ruthless handling of Palestinians. The author presents this case in great detail on page after page, disagreeing with Bernard Lewis and with the failed civilization hypothesis (110), quoting bin Laden at length, and pointing out that the mujahedin never launched an offensive jihad against the Soviet Union even though they hated atheism and communism, but merely responded to the invasion of Afghanistan (10).

Antiwar liberals might feel secure since the author, a senior central intelligence analyst specializing in Afghanistan and militant Islam, agrees with their assessment. The author has carefully analyzed the causes of terrorism and concluded that the official American position is not just mistaken but dangerous. And just here the liberal, anti-war folks learn of a fork in the road which they never knew existed, one which indeed they might have thought couldn't be aligned with the foregoing path. The author never says that American foreign policies should not be changed, although he expresses doubt that they ever will be so. While presenting the true reasons for the Islamic insurgency, the author is also careful not to agree fully with these reasons, but to stress that they are justified from a non-American, Muslim perspective even while he sometimes buttresses them with remarks such as that al Qaeda has a point here and can't be gainsaid there.

Nevertheless, the author parts company with the anti-war crowd, having apparently co-opted its message. This parting of ways is crystallized by a couple of sentences that come late in the book. Speaking of Americans' failure to discern that most Muslims hate America's foreign policies rather than its values, the author writes that "The urgent need to eliminate this perceptual shortcoming is purely to ensure that America is prepared to defend itself, not to increase its empathy for the complaints and troubles of non-Americans. Even less is it meant to imply that Americans should feel more debilitating guilt about events outside North America" (167).

As soon as the author correctly diagnoses the causes of "terrorism," he prescribes the grim medicine of unrepentant, blood-soaked war against al Qaeda--even after showing that al Qaeda is supported by a majority of Muslims worldwide. The author writes that "The severe cost to Muslims and Americans of such action [of "relentless, brutal, and, yes, blood-soaked offensive military actions"] could be lessened by changes in U.S. foreign policy toward the Islamic world--new policies would cut the Islamists' support--but because frank debate on the changes needed is unlikely, America will literally have to stick to its guns. A policy status quo, in essence, leaves America no choice but a war of annihilation" (85).

The book's main point is that the false, self-congratulatory assessment of terrorists as mere haters of American freedoms prevents precisely a U.S. victory in the war against militant Islam. Accurate analysis of al Qaeda will help Americans perceive the real danger and thus the need for total war for the sake of their sheer self-preservation.

What is schizophrenic about this? Surely the Bush administration knows al Qaeda's official reasons for its violence against the U.S.--as the author points out, these reasons are published all over the internet--and surely these reasons are formidable given familiarity with the one-sided U.S. policies toward Muslim countries. Why then does Bush maintain the fictional account of terrorism instead of telling Americans the truth? If the book's author is correct, the truth will help the U.S. win the war, whereas the false account of terrorism is a major reason why the insurgents are presently winning.

The answer is plain. Were Americans to come to believe that the author's analysis of the causes of terrorism is correct, they could demand overwhelmingly that these guilty foreign policies be changed. Indeed, this demand for change would not at all be incompatible with Americans' fear for their survival. The official U.S. position, though, is that the U.S. doesn't negotiate with terrorists. So long as there is any chance of decisive pressure on U.S. foreign policy, the safest way to conduct the war is to lie to the American people, to demonize the terrorists so that Americans can feel comfortable with U.S. militarism. Negotiation with al Qaeda would be seen by Bush or by Kerry as capitulation, as an end to the war with a defeat for the U.S.

In other words, the book's author would surely be thought by the Bush or Kerry administration to be dead wrong. The safest way to fight the insurgents is to tell lies about them. Otherwise, the war could end with capitulation and with massive U.S. withdrawal. Instead of making a coherent argument, the author co-opts the antiwar message about the unflattering causes of terrorism. To conceal the gap between this message and the prescription of a war of annihilation, the author claims that spreading the truth about the Islamic insurgency would bolster the war effort, since knowledge of the genuine threat would terrify Americans into taking up an emergency stance, one focused simply on self-preservation. Were this so, however, Bush or Kerry would not hesitate to spread the truth. Instead, the war on terrorism thrives on fictions about bin Laden and al Qaeda--just as most wars depend on domestic disinformation campaigns, something the C.I.A. knows a lot about.