It is difficult too understand how the US measures the strength of
al-Qaeda at any given time, but the US State Department is saying that
the group remains as deadly and active worldwide as it has ever been, and that they are not any weaker than they were during the 9//11 attack.
Arguing that well-established enemies are as strong as ever makes sense
from one perspective, as it allows the administration to continue to
justify huge military spending to confront their global war on terror.
At the same time, admitting al-Qaeda isn’t substantially weakened from
9/11, despite 18 solid years of US wars against them, doesn’t exactly
put the wars in a very positive light, and seems all but an admission of
failure.
This is particularly true since the US wars aren’t broadly against
al-Qaeda anyhow. A generation of war that was meant to degrade and
defeat al-Qaeda has ultimately done neither, and the US is still
entangled in multiple wars for its trouble.
The correct response to 9/11 would have been to say to the security agencies: you’re not doing the job you’re supposed to do. We’re going to reorganize you and you won’t like it. Instead it went : “here is all our money and here are all our civil rights , now do whatever you want”. So 20 years later it goes like ‘yeah you know, Al Qaeda is maybe 100 times larger than it used to be but don’t worry, the real problem is the Russians. We need more money and btw, we need more of your civil rights too. We’re redefining dissenting speech as russian desinformation and fake news.’ . So we go ‘yes please’ or what?
Well on second thought a factor 100-200 is just for Idlib alone. I could make it a thousand worldwide but with the franchise idea you could probably put highly variable numbers on it. And then I’m not including the ISIS franchise.
Obvious failure by military or “intelligence” leadership is never punished by government leaders. Too embarrassing. Also might have to shoulder blame for selecting them as leaders. Hence, failure is not punished, sometimes even rewarded as “failing upwards” becomes the norm. This is how the State differs from most private institutions, where failure means ouster.
So long as the failures support the current propaganda line, leadership failures are dismissed or mumbled away. So long as failure and error are rewarded as much or even more than actual success, this will continue.
one trillion dollars spent, result nothing? Hmm maybe there is another way.