The Perfect Soldier: Special Operations, Commandos, and the Future of Us Warfare by James F. Dunnigan
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Dirty Little Secrets
An Al Qaeda Grows in Germany
by James Dunnigan
June 8, 2004
Discussion Board on this DLS topic
German police and military intelligence estimate that they have about 3.45 million Moslems in the country, and that about three percent of those support al Qaeda’s objectives (Islam becoming the only religion on the planet). These Islamic radicals do not support violence, but would give aid to al Qaeda terrorists. More worrisome, the Germans believe that about 3,000 of their Moslem residents would commit terrorist acts to further the al Qaeda cause. The Germans also noted that there were 24 active Islamist groups in the country, with about 31,000 members altogether.
While there have not been any major al Qaeda terrorist acts in Germany, the intelligence agencies are trying to measure the potential for major terrorist acts. Many of those young al Qaeda enthusiasts lack the leadership and technical knowledge to pull off a major attack. While these 3,000 men are all for terrorist actions, only a few are willing to kill themselves doing it. This shows the importance of the al Qaeda bases in Afghanistan. There, al Qaeda could select and train men who could whip a bunch of local enthusiasts into a team capable of carrying out an act of mass murder. The camps also trained people to make bombs and deal with the more mundane problems of avoiding detection and capture by the police. German law prohibits preventive detention, so the best the Germans can do is try and identify the most likely al Qaeda terrorists and keep an eye on them.
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