How Analysts Cognitively “Connect the Dots” by Silendo

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Il vigliacco attacco di Londra è il sintesi del terrorismo fai-da-te. E ne contiene tutte le caratteristiche portate all’estremo. Innanzitutto il bersaglio: un militare in una città occidentale dove non si aspetta certo di essere aggredito ma che comunque è un bersaglio per la divisa che indossa. Poi le armi: non avendo a disposizione una pistola o fucile, i terroristi hanno usato dei coltellacci. Non servono manuali per organizzare l’agguato, solo la determinazione.
«NON SARETE MAI AL SICURO» – Sembra anche che, imitando quanto già visto in altri scacchieri, abbiano provato ad usare la loro vettura come ariete. Infine la motivazione: se sono vere le parole dell’assassino, ha colpito per dimostrare che gli occidentali “non saranno mai al sicuro”, così come non lo sono i musulmani dove l’Occidente partecipa a operazioni militari. Un tema caro al jihadismo che l’attentatore ha rilanciato in modo efferato con la confessione registrata da un telefonino. Un’immagine che, ne siamo certi, verrà scaricata e vista da molti simpatizzanti.

COME GLI APPELLI QAEDISTI – Tutto questo, anche se le indagini sono ancora aperte, ricorda gli appelli degli ideologi qaedisti ad agire in modo individuale con quello che si trova. Se non sei in grado di fare una bomba – suggeriscono i manuali online – prendi una mannaia e vai all’attacco. Questo non significa che, necessariamente, esista un vincolo con il movimento di Bin Laden. Anzi, per ora, nulla lo fa pensare. Siamo davanti a esplosioni di violenza legate ad una matrice jihadista (spesso vaga), sostenute da una radicalizzazione repentina, condotte da figure dai profili incerti, approssimativi, ma comunque terroristi nei comportamenti. Infine un dato evidente e allarmante. Contro questo tipo di avversario c’è ben poco da fare. E saranno problemi seri per chi li deve contrastare.

In memoria degli agenti di scorta Vito Schifani, Antonio Montinaro e Rocco Dicillo ecco la motivazione della medaglia d’oro al valor civile loro conferita il 5 agosto 1992:

«Preposto al servizio di scorta del giudice Giovani Falcone, assolveva il proprio compito con alto senso del dovere e serena dedizione, pur consapevole dei rischi personali connessi con la recrudescenza degli attentati contro rappresentanti dell’ordine giudiziario e delle Forze di Polizia. Barbaramente trucidato in un proditorio agguato di stampo mafioso, sacrificava la giovane vita a difesa dello Stato e delle Istituzioni. Palermo, 23 maggio 1992.»

[...] It is more accurate, however, to see the region entering an age of proxy wars, on a scale that is likely to dwarf the Arab Cold War that pitted Saudi Arabia against Egypt in the 1950s and 1960s.
While Iran and Saudi Arabia are major antagonists in the unfolding battles, they are not the only ones. The emerging wars are genuinely multipolar, and U.S. policy and practice will need to adapt to this emerging reality.
The most active proxy war is in Syria, where a range of regional and global powers seeks to shape the future of the country. What is surprising is not so much the scale of that assistance as its diversity. Support flows from governments, institutions, and individuals to a dizzying array of actors. Some are principally armed and others are principally political; some are disciplined and others seem determined to sow terror.
More than two years into the conflict, there is remarkably little strategic coordination among the parties supporting Syrian opposition forces, contributing to sustained disarray and infighting among the forces themselves.
Support does not follow clear sectarian or religious lines. Saudi Arabia and Qatar, two Wahhabi states, appear to support different clients in Syria. The Saudi government fears trained and networked jihadi fighters flowing back into the kingdom as they did after the Afghan war in the 1980s, and it fears inspiring a politicized Islamist opposition. It acts with some caution in Syria, and this avowedly religious government appears to favor secular nationalists.
Qatar appears confident that a jihadi wave will not threaten the emirate and is casting bets widely to hasten Bashar al-Assad’s fall. The United Arab Emirates, deeply distrustful of political Islam of any stripe, is among the most cautious of the Gulf states, seeking to check Iran without supporting Islamist fighters. Iran, of course, is betting heavily on the Assad government, while rumors spread that Russia is looking for a solution that preserves Syria’s integrity even if it does not preserve Assad. Western countries have their own preferences and red lines, and each has its own clients.
The proxy war extends far beyond Syria, however. Egypt’s major political parties reportedly receive extensive outside funding, with Qatar heavily bankrolling the Muslim Brotherhood and Saudi Arabia reportedly supporting salafi parties.
Among a range of Arab forces, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates invested especially heavily in the effort to depose Muammar el-Qaddafi in Libya, supporting different troops on the ground under the protection of NATO airstrikes. They backed different parties in 2011 and continue to do so.
There are many antagonists in tiny Bahrain—with only 600,000 citizens—but Saudi Arabia and Iran are the most active, supporting the Sunni and Shiʽite communities respectively. [...]

Una situazione molto complessa, insomma, che necessita di un’attenta analisi e di una puntuale pianificazione.

Insomma, assieme ai due testi precedentemente scritti da Pherson può costituire la trilogia di un corso sull’analisi di intelligence. Dalle fondamenta del “pensiero critico” agli elementi più avanzati delle tecniche strutturate.

For all the agonising in Western capitals about whether to channel weapons to “moderate” rebel militias in Syria and the renewed attempts to find a diplomatic solution to the civil war, one issue above all others is dominating the thinking of military planners, intelligence agencies and their political masters: the increasing danger of the regime’s vast stock of chemical weapons getting into the hands of groups with links to al-Qaeda. [...]
Though the regime is believed to have tried desperately to consolidate its stocks of chemical weapons in areas it still controls, it has so much of the stuff—around 1,000 tonnes of mustard gas, sarin and the even more lethal VX held at about 12 sites—that in the chaos engulfing the country some will almost inevitably fall into rebel hands sooner rather than later unless something is done. Indeed, Jabhat al-Nusra, the most powerful rebel faction and the one with closest links to al-Qaeda, reportedly came very close to capturing a stockpile near Aleppo earlier this year. A senior NATO official argues that, whereas it is premature to talk about al-Qaeda getting hold of chemical weapons, conditions on the ground make it increasingly likely.
Some analysts question the value of Syria’s chemical weapons to terrorists, because skilled technicians are needed to mix the components into a deadly concoction, and the canisters containing it are designed to be fired from artillery and rockets. In other words, they were intended for military use and not for the clandestine portability that terrorists favour. But al-Qaeda has always said it would use chemical weapons against Western targets if it had them, and regime defectors could well provide the expertise to turn them into effective terrorist weapons. [...]
In the absence of UN authorisation to remove those weapons, which would require the acquiescence of Russia and China, no good options are available. Under any plausible scenario, seizing or destroying the chemical weapons would almost certainly require boots on the ground (though not a full-scale invasion) as well as air strikes that could risk spreading some of the poison. Confidence that every site containing the weapons would be quickly found would also not be high.
But the feeling is growing that time is running out. The longer the delay in tackling the problem, the greater the risk of failure. For Mr Obama, who likes to weigh every possibility before taking action, the stakes could not be higher. But as a senior NATO official puts it: “The light has gone on. We can’t not deal with it.”

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