I think I have been misunderstood. 1) I was not implying that the prosecution used Sterling's book as evidence against Yousef etc, in proving their connection to the bombing, but rather that legal precedence for similar acts of terrorism on US soil had been successfully prosecuted under laws against organized crime. As a result, Yousef etc had to be linked to an organized structure that had similar characteristics to organized crime syndicates. Al-Qaeda was adopted/created as a term to describe such a coherent and organized international terrorist organization with legal characteristics similar to the mob so that prosecution could proceed. Subsequently, many of the characteristics of Al-Qaeda were taken from ideas espoused by Sterling in her book, in which she focused considerable attention on KGB efforts to develop terrorist networks throughout the world in opposition to the West - an idea that still holds a strong following in neocon circles. So no, Sterling's book was not used as evidence, but the ideas she espoused were used in defining Al-Qaeda. This book had an important impact on many neocons.
2) I certainly never implied that bin Laden was a neoconservative. But I will say that he has certainly tried to use the clout of being labeled the head of Al-Qaeda (by the US) to his advantage. Jayson Funke Graduate School of Geography Clark University 950 Main Street Worcester, MA 01610 -----Original Message----- From: PEN-L list [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, July 31, 2006 2:05 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [PEN-L] what is Hizbullah? [from Juan Cole] On 7/31/06, Jayson Funke said in here pertinent part: > [T]he term ["Al-Qaeda"] as applied to a terrorist > network, was not used before prosecutors used the > term in the case against the Yousef bombing of the > World Trade Center in 1993. The creation of > Al-Qaeda (as it was then determined) arose out of > the need for the prosecution to be able to prosecute > terrorists like Yousef under the existing legal > framework of the network of organized crime. The > prosecution needed to present Yousef and his colleagues > as having characteristics similar to those of the Mob. > Most of the characteristics subscribed to Al-Qaeda by > the prosecution were predicated on the widely debunked > book The Terror Network, by Claire Sterling, * * * The prosecution of Yousef, Salameh, Ayyad, Elquisi, et. al for conspiracy to bomb and the actual bombing of the WTC was not "predicated" on Claire Sterling's book. The trial in those cases, which lasted six months of mostly full trial days, instead was actually "predicated" on the testimony of more than two-hundred witnesses and more than one-thousand documentary and photographic and other exhibits. It included testimony - not mentioned much less assertedly analyzed as if a product of Soviet Union vileness in that book - to the effect that the defendants Ajaj and Yousef traveled to the U.S. under false passports and false names; that they brought with them manuals and other materials with instructions how to construct and use explosive devices including those improvised by using urea and nitric acid and nitroglycerine; that several of the defendants had been further trained in the use of such devices and related activities in a place they knew as (when translated into English) Camp Khaldan located on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border; that those who did this had first obtained letters of introduction to that facility from camp-connected sources in Saudi Arabia stating, in substance, that the bearer of such letter be trained at that facility in the use of weapons and explosives; that, led for the project at hand mostly by Yousef, who assembled a team of trusted associates including the other defendants, they then implemented the WTC bombing plot Ajaj and Yousef hatched overseas; that Ayyad and Salameh opened a joint bank account they and Yousef used to finance the activities in furtherance of their bombing plot; and that such activities included, among other like acts, leasing a storage shed in New Jersey just across from N.Y.C., where they stored chemicals to make explosives, renting a truck which they then used as a mobile bomb, then driving the truck/bomg to and causing it to be detonated in the WTC resulting, besides in widespread fear in the populace in N.Y.C. and elsewhere in the U.S. and also abroad (s/k/a, a core element of "terrorism"), in the deaths of numerous persons, the serious injuries many others, and severe structural and other damage to the buildings. It is, in short, as kind of, "DUH!!!" sort of Thing to note ascribing these activities to Claire Sterling's or Sterling's putative source's imaginations is worse than ridiculous at best, regardless how much the cited book and like works warrant discrediting in many respects. > [M]y point is that I cringe when I see the > term Al-Qaeda being used on the Left, > because it indicates, to me, that we have > already swallowed one of the neocon/Straussian > myths they worked so hard on to promote their > world-views. Query whether this is correlatively to suggest that Osama Bin Laden is a "neocon/Straussian" or is it just to pretend that Bin Laden hasn't made and widely disseminated the many pronouncements for which he takes credit?
