Report Sample on Al-Qaeda Attacks in the United States

Introduction

Terrorism is a tactic used by individuals or groups to kill and destroy. Al-Qaeda (AQ) is a widespread militant Islamic organization founded by Osama Bin Laden in 1980 (Beres, 1995). The group started as an operational network supporting Muslims fighting against the Soviet Union during the Afghan war. Laden created a computer database in 1988 listing the names of the volunteers for the Afghan war. These were the same people who later on became members of Al-Qaeda. This particular group's primary goal is martyrdom and death. As their spokesman, Maulana once said, 'The Americans love Pepsi-cola, we love death. 'They feel very disappointed when prevented from killing themselves and others. Their presence has been felt in the United States by the outcome of their attacks, both physically and psychologically. (Beres, 1995).

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

Islamic World

The group recruited other members throughout the Islamic world. At the end of the 20th century, the group is believed to have had thousands of extremists worldwide in various nations such as Libya, the Philippines, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen. When the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989, the Al-Qaeda continued to grow and went ahead to stand against the corrupt and foreign Islamic authorities such as the United States presence in the Islamic land (Basile, 2004)

In the early 1990s, Al-Qaeda was located in Sudan though they later relocated to Afghanistan, where they established their headquarters under the Taliban militia's leadership. Later on, the group united with other militant Islamist groups, which includes Egypt's Islamic Jihad. Osama Bin Laden and other Islamic terrorist leaders come from a tradition of great intolerance stream of the minority Islam, mostly the Ibn Taimiyyah. That sub-group is strictly formed on a religious basis and does not differentiate politics from religion. (Basile, 2004)

On many occasions, leaders of Al-Qaeda declared Holy war against the United States of America based on some issues that had been put across by Osama and wildly felt throughout the Muslim world. They all spoke in one voice that the United States is the genesis of all evil, and for this reason, it had to convert and destroyed.

Back in 1996, Osama issued two Fatwas, and these are Arabic religious opinions. In those documents, he declared a Holy war against the United States. The justification behind this holy war was some accusations against the United States. One of the accusations was that the United States was looting the Muslim world's natural resources, such as oil. The group also felt that the United States had taken some of their territories by occupying the Arabian Peninsula. The peninsula had the holy sites of Islam. The al-Qaeda was offended by the government supporting sycophantic to United States interest to the Middle East.

Provoking Reasons

All these reasons provoked the Al-Qaeda to target drawing the United States into a large scale war in the Muslim world. That would bring down the order in the world as a whole and come up with a single Islamic state. It has led to numerous al-Qaeda attacks that include the bombings of the United States embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar-as-salaam in Tanzania, which claimed 224 lives in combination 1998. The bombings were followed by a suicide terrorist attack against the United States warship Cole in Aden, Yemen, in 2000, and 17 sailors were killed.

In 2001, Al-Qaeda militia planned another attack against the United States, which was executed on September 11th. These series of attacks hit the united states very hard to the extent of making counter-terrorism their top national security priority. The initiative was fully supported by the congress, media, and the citizens in the United States.

On the government side, they set aside very many resources of the National Security to help combat terrorism. The budget prepared before the 11th September attack is evident to this. In 2004, the total combined defense hiked expenditure by more than 50 % from $354 billion to about $547 Billion. The United States government also revenged by attacking the Taliban and the Al-Qaeda forces in Afghanistan. In these attacks, followers of Al-Qaeda were killed, and others held captive in thousands. Some of the affected members were the perpetrators of the September 11th attack.

During this revenge attack, some of the Al-Qaeda captains were forced to hide, including Bin Laden, whom the FBI had issued $25 million for his head. The attack paralyzed AL-Qaeda's training, communication network operations, and financial transaction between the militants and the leaders. The United States National security became very strict in examining foreign frontiers and weighing the State's opposing groups. With such heightened security, the terrorist had to assemble in large to achieve its mission.

Measures

However, all these measures did not weaken the Al-Qaeda because, with time, they forged weapons of war, conscripted armies, trained more militias, and positioned them. More attacks were experienced than before the September 11th attack and exceeded for about six years. It seemed that the United States counter-attack only made the Al-Qaeda terrorist smarter.

The team inclined their use of the internet to communicate and enroll more members through video messages, broadcasts, and propaganda. It proved that the media played a critical role in expanding the Al-Qaeda terror group's activities and execution of their mission. In 1988 Osama had created a computer database in which he head listed the names of volunteers for the Afghan war who later became part and parcel of the Al-Qaeda. They use modern means of communication, such as satellite television and user-generated content on the internet. The fast internet delivers their messages fast and directly to millions of people around the world. All their new posts and forwarded links dominate cyberspace. They post messages repeatedly for them to reach their targeted audience. All these eventualities portray how media participates in increasing the number of terror attacks and the formation of terror groups worldwide.

Terrorist groups are known to use legal businesses as their source of finance. Finance enables them to run their activities smoothly. This method is very tricky for law enforcement agencies to detect. Al-Qaeda is not an exception because there was a big honey business owned by one Al Shia in the United States, generating money for the group via the legal economy. This honey production also provided a crucial means for the transportation of weapons and money hidden in the honey shipments. It was made possible by the smell of honey, making it easy to hide weapons and drugs in the shipment.

The other sponsor of Al-Qaeda Company is Maram. Maram is a Turkish firm established when the Al-Qaeda was spreading in Europe (Abuza, 2003). The firm enhanced both travel agencies and import-export services. It was thought to be assisting the Al-Qaeda in its operation between Europe and Afghanistan. The United States leadership found out that the Marram helped the Al-Qaeda in their movements and accessed parts of the nuclear weapon's construction.

The Patron himself- Osama Bin Laden, was believed to be a son of a millionaire, and thus he was able to support the group financially and provide weapons and fighters for them. On the other hand, he had a holding company known as Wadi Al Aqiq in Sudan. For example, the company and others, Import-Export Ladin International Company and the Foreign Exchange Trader Taba investment were leading corporations.

The Al-Qaeda also thrived from Islamic charities and well placed financial facilitators who gained money from witting and unwitting donors. Money acquired from these sources amounted to about $30 million per year. In 1994 when Osama was working towards increasing the members of Al-Qaeda and training the Islamic militants in participating in further attacks, Saudi Arabia froze his properties, forcing him to depend on outside sources for financial support (Abuza, 2003).

Conclusion

Terrorist groups are well known to be pursuing their political, religious, and ideological beliefs. The Al-Qaeda militants seem to be defending their religious rights in the United States. Some of their complaints, in my opinion, seem to be legitimate. This is because the United States had already shown its intention in murdering Muslims. It happened when they served the Jews petty State then later diverted their attention from occupying Jerusalem. The United States later killed Muslims in Jerusalem. (Burke, 2004). The U.S had shown its clear target in destroying all the nations of Islamic religion such as Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt. Those immoral behaviors that had become the order of the day motivated Al-Qaeda to attack the United States. There were also cases of oppression, lies, and injustices that proved the Al-Qaeda to attack the U.S. these justifications doesn't mean that there are people who deserved to lose their lives over this. I feel that the Al-Qaeda would have expressed their complaints in moderation and a more humane manner.