Sidestepped
Dec 28th, 2005 at 2:52 pm by Susie
And this sort of shortsightedness is the reason why empires always fail to win guerilla wars:
The Bush administration’s surveillance policy has failed to make a dent in the war against al Qaeda.
U.S. law enforcement sources said that more than four years of surveillance by the National Security Agency has failed to capture any high-level al Qaeda operative in the United States. They said al Qaeda insurgents have long stopped using the phones and even computers to relay messages. Instead, they employ couriers.
UPDATE: Related news from Afghanistan.
There was an article in the New Yorker about a year ago about a maverick US General who was assigned to take the side of Al Qaeda in a wargame simulation. He used strategies that utterly flummoxed the “US” side of the battle, to the extent that the “victory” won by the General was pretty much covered up.
I mention this because in this exercise, he quickly figured out that phones, walkie-talkies, and the internet were really easy for the other side to intercept. So he started sending couriers on motorcycles for messaging between units. Worked brilliantly.
The old cliche is that generals are always fighting the previous war, but it this case at least one general is way ahead of Dick and Rummy.
Could it be that Al Queda isn’t doing vegan cookouts or Quaker peace meetings?
I know it’s hard to believe, but they might have other interests.