Letter Offers Insight to al Qaeda, Points to Role of the Brotherhood
By Douglas Farah
Today's Washington Post has a fascinating look into the Salafist jihadi movements. The internal letter from the al Qaeda leadership to Zarqawi from December 2005 was translated and provided by the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point and is available here.
The most interesting element is the dismay of the "core" al Qaeda leadership (bin Laden, Zawahiri et al) at the Zarqawi tactics of killing other Muslims, especially Sunnis, and the insistence on following a much broader overall political policy, rather than just attacking the enemy militarily.
Written by a senior al Qaeda commander using the name Atiya, the letter clearly shows that Zarqawi (and most likely his successor in Iraq) are subordinate to bin Laden and Zawahiri in the conception of the core al Qaeda leadership. This indicates a structured, hierarchical structure, at least among these groups. The letter orders Zarqawi to do many things, rather than requesting the actions. This is somewhat different than the al Qaeda often protrayed as isolated, dispersed and decentralized.
While clearly the overall jihadi movement is decentralized, self-starting etc., the core group is clearly deeply involved in Iraq and has a clear command and control structure. My full blog is here.
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