Bush "War on Terrorism" Stumbles With New Attacks, Lack Of Support

by Jim Lobe

While the White House succeeded last week in winning Congress's approval for an assault on Iraq, a spate of attacks on key Western targets has suggested that, despite its defeat in Afghanistan, al-Qaeda and its supporters may be far from finished.

Saturday night's devastating car-bombing of a night club on the Indonesian paradise island of Bali capped two weeks of lethal attacks from Yemen to the Philippines that were possibly organized or inspired by al-Qaeda or its allies.

The sudden appearance of an audio tape by al-Qaeda's number two, Egyptian Ayman al-Zawahiri, last week, as well as a purported statement by Osama bin Laden that hailed the recent attacks in Kuwait and Yemen and was broadcast over Qatar's Al Jazeera television station Monday, have stunned Washington.

U.S. and allied intelligence agencies are trying to determine the authenticity of both communications, as well as the perpetrators of the recent attacks. They must also deal with the international political fallout from the incidents

The Bush administration remains furious that German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder won re-election last month by stressing his refusal to participate in a U.S. invasion of Iraq, which he called an "adventure."

"We would expect that in France, but not in Germany," said one official, who understandably asked not to be identified.

Even more distressing, particularly for those running the war against terror, was last Thursday's vote in Pakistan, when a coalition of Islamist parties, some openly sympathetic to al-Qaeda, emerged with much greater support than anyone had predicted.

The United Council for Action's (MMA) biggest success came in Baluchistan and the Pashtun-dominated Northwest Frontier province bordering Afghanistan, where they won an outright majority in the provincial assembly.

"Seeing an electoral majority on a border province that is probably the most sensitive province in Pakistan for U.S. military operations will obviously have implications," Samina Ahmed, Pakistan project director for the International Crisis Group, told The New York Times this weekend.

More to the point, the MMA's platform called for Pakistan to stop permitting U.S. military and intelligence forces to use Pakistani territory as a base for rooting out the remnants of al-Qaeda and the Taliban, Afghanistan's former regime.

Another national election in the region also has U.S. officials on edge, this one in Turkey, a key ally in any war against Iraq. The Justice and Development Party (AKP), the latest incarnation of an Islamist party that has been banned repeatedly for violating the country's secularist constitution, is poised to win at least a third of the popular vote and emerge as the nation's largest party by far.

Experts say its popularity is due far more to the corruption and inefficiency of its secular rivals than to hostility to Washington or the war on terrorism. But growing anger in Turkey about Israel's actions against Palestinians, Washington's strong backing for Israel, and the perception that Bush is forcing Turkey to support a risky war against Iraq has reportedly added to expectations about the AKP's showing.

While its leaders have stressed that the AKP will cooperate with U.S. strategy in the region and the International Monetary Fund's efforts to bail out its staggering economy, a sweeping victory by the party could set up a new confrontation with Turkey's staunchly pro-U.S. and pro-Israel military that was behind the peaceful ouster of the last Islamist government in 1997.

While the Nov. 3 congressional elections in the U.S. are still more than two weeks away, the administration is clearly more focused on the new attacks.

Just a week ago, a French oil tanker was badly damaged in an explosion in Aden harbour in Yemen. The government, which has also received several hundred members of U.S. special operations forces to advise them on counter-insurgency operations against alleged al-Qaeda members or their allies, insisted at first that the explosion was due to a fire on the ship.

But investigators now appear convinced by eyewitness reports that a small craft set off that explosion in the same way that the U.S. Navy warship Cole was attacked by al-Qaeda operatives while docked there in 2000.

Two days after the attack on the French tanker, two gunmen in a pickup truck killed one U.S. marine and injured another in an assault carried out on a Kuwaiti island during U.S. training exercises. The following day, another marine fired on a vehicle from which he said a gunman was poised to shoot.

Despite Kuwait's alliance with the United States -- indeed, the sheikhdom is expected to be the main launching pad for any U.S. invasion of Iraq -- recent reports have indicated growing anti-U.S. sentiment, particularly within followers of the main Islamist Party, which holds a third of the seats in the Kuwaiti Parliament.

While fingers quickly pointed to al-Qaeda -- or what Washington alleges is its local ally in Indonesia, Jemaah Islamiyah -- as the likeliest suspect in the Bali blast, Jemaah leader Abu Bakar Baasyir vehemently denied any involvement.

One Indonesia expert here, University of Washington Prof. Dan Lev, said the fact that it took place on a predominantly Hindu island and in a spot that would be little frequented by Muslims did suggest the possibility of an Islamist connection.

But Lev said it could also have been a provocation by elements in the army, whose close ties to Jemaah go back almost 30 years. Such an incident could be used to demonstrate to both Indonesians and Washington that "you really need the army to restore stability throughout the country."