The jasmine mind of a terrorist

The Moscow News has an enlightening interview with a terrorist. He is Shukhrat Masirokhunov, and is said to be the former chief of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) counterintelligence service. (One past operation he was involved in is described here.)

He is to stand trial for taking part in the events in May that led to the deaths of several hundred people. (Masirokhunov denies he was involved.)

On May 13, in the Uzbekistan city of Andijan, a protest turned violent, and at least 500 people were killed. The Crisis Group's informative report says perhaps as many as 750 were killed. The killings sparked protests from Washington and London and human rights groups. The dispute played a role in the United States leaving a base in Uzbekistan.

In this interview, Masirokhunov has many revealing things to say. Considering the source, we would be wise not to accept it all as gospel truth, but the interview is a glimpse into how terrorist networks work.

He is asked if he came from a poor family. He replied:

Well, my father was a CPSU regional committee functionary in the city of Andizhan. I never walked to or from school but went in a car. When I finished Grade 10, my father gave me a Model 6 Zhiguli sedan. I have a degree in history from the local university.

He said he had met Osama bin Laden, and that Al Qaeda might have a dirty bomb.

I have met [bin Laden] on several occasions. He addressed us in Afghanistan in 2000. He said that he was pleased to see representatives from 56 countries there and that we should unite. Some people proposed a series of attacks in a number of countries - e.g., blow up a dam near Tashkent or explode a "dirty bomb." But he said that "we will have time to do that yet." He asked whether there were any physicists among us.

There was also talk to the effect that raw materials for a "dirty bomb" had been bought in Russia and Ukraine, specifically from a scrap-yard for decommissioned nuclear submarines.

Are you saying that al-Qaeda has a "dirty bomb"?

Yes, I think it does.

I've talked before about how a key in winning the terror war is to squeeze the money supply that keeps terrorist operations going. Masirokhunov says:

I do not know about all, but we received money and weapons from the Taliban. There were no limitations: We got as much as we asked for. For their part, their funds purportedly came from donations, but that was too much money to have come from donations. Generally, money was not a problem. I spent seven years in Afghanistan and I regularly sent money home - oftentimes quite large amounts, up to $10,000. To do that, I had to travel to Iran since Western Union did not operate in Afghanistan. I often went there on business trips. We had no problem crossing the border: A vehicle from the other side would come and take us there.

Note the ease with which he says he enters Iran. Also, he says they received help from Pakistani soldiers at times.

Do you know how special operations against militants are conducted in Pakistan? They will pin us down in some place and the situation seems to be hopeless, but then Pakistani soldiers show us an escape route.

If Pakistan goes to war with us, the country will explode because the people sympathize with us. So they pretend to be helping the United States, while in fact they are helping us.

Where is bin Laden? In Pakistan. They cannot catch him? That's because they do not really want to catch him.

There is more, but Masirokhunov is indicative of the Islamic problem in the Central Asian republics. Uzbekistan has cracked down on Muslims within its borders, and perhaps has gone too far. Human rights groups, and the United States, have expressed concern. As an example, the United States and others have expressed concern that a trial of suspects in the Andijan protests was unfair.

There are Uzbek Muslims living in Iran, having fled the country. Not all of them are terrorists. They fled the crackdowns on Muslims.

On the other hand, clearly there are extremist elements at work in Uzbekistan. There was this incident just today.

Five terrorists, three of them Uzbeks, were killed in Pakistan's tribal belt on the Afghan border Thursday when a blast destroyed the house they were staying in, a government official said.

The blast happened when explosives the men were storing went off, the official said, but residents of the troubled North Waziristan region, on the Afghan border, said a helicopter fired rockets into the house.

Masirokhunov is representative of our enemy. Many in the West would probably have trouble locating Uzbekistan on a map, even today. How many average citizens knew of the country before 9/11? Yet, the extremist ideology that drives the Islamic terrorist is present there, as it is from the western Pacific and SE Asia to the Caucasus, and now creeping into Europe. Here is what he thinks about us:

The Americans will pull out of Afghanistan: There is no way they can hold on there. And they will also have to leave Iraq.

Are we, as a nation, committed to winning this war? The bad guys question our resolve. Will we prove them wrong?