Today in Manhunting History -- August 8, 1993: Enter the IED

In response to the UNOSOM II attacks on Mohammed Farah Aideed, his Somali National Alliance escalated the violence against the international peacekeepers. On August 8, four American military policemen were killed when their Humvee was destroyed by a remotely detonated antitank mine similar to the improvised explosive devices (IEDs) that became ubiquitous in Iraq and Afghanistan a decade later. Again, Jonathan Howe asked for a strike team to snatch Aideed. Although Howe had stridently opposed a similar operation against Noriega during the Reagan administration, his obsession led one aide of Defense Secretary Les Aspin to observe Howe had “adopted Aideed as his Great White Whale,” and Howe’s nickname in Washington became “Jonathan Ahab.” Again, CENTCOM commander General Joseph Hoar did not endorse Howe’s request for Delta Force, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Colin Powell also expressed reservations regarding the aggressive pursuit of the SNA.

The remains of the Humvee destroyed by the Somali mine, which killed Sgt. Ronald N. Richerson, Sgt. Christopher K. Hilgert, Spec. Keith D. Pearson, and Spec. Mark E. Gutting.

Today in Manhunting History -- August 7, 1998: The African Embassy Bombings

On August 7, President Bill Clinton was awakened at 5:35 AM by a phone call from his National Security Advisor, Sandy Berger, who informed him of the near-simultaneous bombings of the American embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The attack in Nairobi killed 12 Americans and 201 others, almost all Kenyan staff at the embassy. The death toll would have been even worse but for the courageous actions of the security guards who denied the terrorists access to the embassy’s garage. As it was, nearly 5,000 Kenyans were injured as the blast demolished the secretarial college next to the embassy. Four minutes later, a second bomb exploded outside the embassy in Dar es Salaam, killing eleven people and injuring eighty-five. The blast was so powerful that the body of the suicide bomber driving the van was split in half, his torso still clutching the steering wheel in both hands as it hit the embassy building.

The determination was quickly made that al-Qa'ida was behind the attacks, which led to the official beginning of the hunt for Osama bin Laden.

John Kerry: "The Drone War is Ending"; Rest of U.S. Government: "Um . . . No, It Isn't, Actually"

Last Thursday Secretary of State John Kerry declared in an interview on Pakistani TV that the Drone War "will end as we have eliminated most of the threat." He added "The President has a very real timeline and we hope it's going to be very, very soon."

Of course, that same day at least three suspected al-Qa'ida militants were killed in east Yemen in a drone strike, the third such strike in Yemen in the past week. On Saturday at least four AQAP members were killed in a drone strike in Abyan province, and on Tuesday three more were killed.

Maybe Secretary Kerry was narrowly referring to Pakistan, right? Well, on Wednesday Reuters reported that a drone strike there had killed three al-Qa'ida operatives who ran a training camp in Afghanistan, and the day earlier another drone strike had killed six militants in North Waziristan.

Consequently, just hours after Secretary Kerry's interview, the State Department issued a statement directly contradicting him, saying there was no definite timetable to end the targeted killing program in Pakistan, and that "In no way would we ever deprive ourselves of a tool to fight a threat if it arises."

"Lone Survivor" Trailer Released

Okay, I'm still not technically proficient enough to figure out how to upload the video myself, but here is the trailer for "Lone Survivor" -- Marcus Luttrell's memoir of a 2005 Navy SEAL capture/kill mission in Kunar Province, Afghanistan, gone badly wrong -- on YouTube.

Forget the various controversies about Luttrell's account of Operation Red Wings.* Forget the fact that for some inexplicable reason Marky Mark plays a SOF guy in just about every movie nowadays and everybody seems okay with this.

Let's just all agree right here and now that based on the trailer, the movie looks very, very bad ass! (Bonus points for casting Eric Bana, a.k.a. Sgt. Hoot** in "Black Hawk Down" as a SEAL commander. If ever there were an actor born to play a special operator . . . ).

* Yeah, yeah, yeah, I linked to a Wikipedia page. But: a) I don't have time to link to the various sources that claim Luttrell exaggerated details of the firefight that killed his teammates, b) this is the rare Wikipedia entry that fairly summarizes the controversy; and c) even if his team did engage a smaller force, it doesn't detract from Lt. Mike Murphy's heroism, nor Luttrell's, so why pile on with multiple links?

** Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know "SGT Hoot" was a composite character, and that the movie version of "Black Hawk Down" took a lot of liberties with the facts of the battle. But his character was still bad ass, as I imagine he will be in this movie as well. Just don't make me watch The Incredible Hulk again, though.

U.S. to Shut Down Embassies Around the World on Sunday

But don't worry, al-Qa'ida is still totally on the ropes you know . . .

Where Will al-Qa'ida Emerge Next?

With a great deal of attention being paid to the resurgence of al-Qa'ida in Iraq, and the rise to prominence of al-Qa'ida affiliates in Syria, it is worth asking what other geographic areas may be ripe for al-Qa'ida expansion.

In the piece I cited earlier this week, Bruce Reidel writes: "The al Qaeda group has also begun spreading its influence into Lebanon as well. One well-informed observer reports that “from Tripoli to Akkar, and from Sidon to the heart of Beirut, black Salafi-jihadi flags and banners have been spotted in increasing numbers, a picture unseen before in Lebanon’s history.” Jamie Dettmer follows up on the spread of al-Qa'ida activities in Lebanon in this piece from Monday's Daily Beast.

Another possibility suggested by Sara Sorcher in the National Journal is the Sinai Peninsula. She writes: "Islamist militants are making their home in the rough terrain stippled with caves, launching near-daily attacks on Egypt's military and its police." Aviv Oreg, the former chief of the Israeli military intelligence's global jihad desk, calls that tough terrain "the Tora Bora of the Sinai Peninsula," and Sorcher puts the number of militants operating in the region at 2,000. (By comparison, it is believed that 4,000 Arabs total participated in the anti-Soviet jihad in Afghanistan in the 1980s).

It is always possible that journalists are jumping the gun by trying to declare a region "the next big thing" for al-Qa'ida before everyone else. (I remember attending a conference in 2004 when a reporter from The New Republic argued that the United States had to intervene in Sierra Leone before it became a sanctuary for al-Qa'ida). But this also may illustrate that there a frightening number of ungoverned, or weekly governed territories in the world where the terrorist network can dig in and exploit a local vacuum.

The Propaganda Wars

Two pieces relating to the effort to fight the War on Terror online:

Will McCants reports in Foreign Policy.com on the efforts of some "cyber jihadists" to counter the State Departments counter-propaganda office by either wrecking their Twitter feed or those of any Arabs who follow State's Digital Outreach Team. To date, the effort has failed, although it still remains unclear how effective the DOT effort has been since its founding in 2011, although as McCants suggests, if the jihadists are worried about it, perhaps it is doing something right.

On the other hand, the Defense Department's efforts to combat jihadists through strategic communications faces a different foe . . . the U.S. Senate. According to the Military Times, the Senate Armed Services Committee has voted to approve Chairman Carl Levin (D-MI)'s measure to eliminate the $19.7 million in funding for the Pentagon's Trans Regional Web Initiative (TRWI), which is run by U.S. Special Operations Command. The SASC "believes that the costs to operate the websites developed under TRWI are excessive. The effectiveness of the websites is questionable and the performance metrics do not justify the expense." The defense authorization bill will go before the full Senate sometime after August recess.

Even if these programs were working brilliantly, metrics is always a problem when trying to assess strategic communications, as it is difficult to measure how many dogs do not bark. I'd be curious to ask Senator Levin or the other committee members who support the defunding of TRWI what they propose as an alternative for countering online recruitment of terrorists during the floor debates, or whether the entire effort is folly if success can't be quantified.