Michael J. Totten's Blog, page 61

Al Qaeda is the Weak Horse

“When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature, they will like the strong horse.” – Osama bin Laden

Remember after 9/11 when the more pacifist-minded among us wrung their hands and fretted that for every terrorist we killed, ten more would rise up to replace him?

Obviously that didn’t happen. Al Qaeda would have mushroomed in size if it had.

Most of us instinctively understood why the idea was preposterous. Osama bin Laden himself understood why it was preposterous. It’s hard for an...

Fake Terrorist Attacks in Syria

No one who follows Middle East conflicts should be shocked to discover that the Syrian government is staging terrorist attacks against itself.

For a year now the Assad regime has claimed it’s fighting our war against radical Islamist terrorist “gangs,” even though we all know Damascus is the biggest state-sponsor of radical Islamist terrorism in the Arab world. And those of us who followed and reported on the 2006 war in Lebanon, Operation Cast Lead in Gaza, and the Second Intifada in Israel a...

Lebanon Seizes Libyan Weapons

The Lebanese army seized a Sierra Leone-flagged ship stocked with weapons from Libya that were apparently bound for the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli.

Tripoli (not to be mistaken for Libya’s capital) is a mostly Sunni city between Beirut and Syria’s Mediterranean border with Lebanon. Some Sunni residents have been engaging in on-again off-again warfare with the small Alawite minority that lives there. Those Libyan guns were almost certainly intended to be used by Tripoli's Sunnis, shipped...

Slow Blogging

Blogging is a bit slow at the moment because I’m writing a pair of long analytical essays, one for City Journal and the other for the print edition of World Affairs. I’ll be back here in force shortly and in the meantime will try to post links to interesting material.

Syria on the Brink

I was recently interviewed on the program Real News from the Blaze about the violence in Syria and what the U.S. can do about it. You can watch below. The clip starts in the middle of things when one of the hosts, Buck Sexton, and I misunderstood each other slightly, but we worked it out.

Assad Really Ought to Retire in Tunis

Tunisia’s president Moncef al-Marzouki says Syria’s Bashar al-Assad is “finished” and “will go one way or another…dead or alive.”

Maybe, maybe not. I don’t know. I do know, however, that Tunisia’s offer of asylum for Assad and his family is most likely the best offer they’re going to get. The country is spectacularly beautiful, it has a sophisticated high culture, it has a nice Mediterranean climate, its people speak Arabic, and it hosts millions of tourists each year. Odds are very small inde...

Jihadists Arrive in Syria

This was all but inevitable:

Activists and rebel soldiers based inside Syria say a small but growing number of Islamist radicals affiliated with global jihadi movements have been arriving in opposition strongholds in recent weeks and attempting to rally support among disaffected residents.

Western diplomats say they have tracked a steady trickle of jihadists flowing into Syria from Iraq, and Jordan’s government last week detained at least four alleged Jordanian militants accused of trying to sn...

Will Turkey Invoke Article Five?

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, according to the New York Times, says Turkey may invoke Article Five of the NATO treaty against Syria since Bashar al-Assad fired artillery shells over the border last week.

Unless Assad keeps at it, that would be a big stretch. Most likely the Turks are just dialing up the pressure and hoping Assad will retire to Moscow. Who knows? It might even work. The best way to get him out of there is to convince him he’ll die if he stays. If he thinks outside interve...

Beyond the New Carthage, Part I

My first impression of Tunisia after being gone for eight years was not good.

I wasn’t sure what to expect in the country that kicked off the Arab Spring at the tail end of 2010. More freedom? More Islamization? Perhaps a little of both? What I first found instead was more crime.

As is typical outside the United States, shady individuals approached me in the airport and asked if I wanted a taxi. They’re supposed to wait in line at the taxi stand, but the impatient and unlicensed will venture in...

Why Syria is Still a War Zone

United Nations envoy Kofi Annan’s ceasefire deadline has come and gone, but the fighting in Syria has only slowed down. Bashar al-Assad’s government resumed its shelling of Homs almost at once and is now allegedly using attack helicopters, as well.

“What cease-fire?” the Wall Street Journal quotes an activist saying. “There's an explosion every five to six minutes.”

Diplomacy won’t end the conflict, but Kofi Annan has no other tools in his box. As the old saying goes, when all you have is a ham...