THE NEW CRUSADE - Know the Enemy

HIGHLIGHT: In an Asia gripped by political and economic upheaval, radical Islam is on the march. Should we be worried?

The trail is not exactly covert, but it draws on a very personal network. It leads to the Kuala Lumpur office of a Malaysian property developer whom we'll call Haji Yusof. An urbane man in his 50s, Yusof is surrounded by the trappings of a successful businessman -- computers, mobile phones, private secretaries. White-haired, he nevertheless has the demeanor of someone who can handle himself physically. At Asiaweek's request, Yusof calls up a leader of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the top Muslim separatist group in the Philippines. Wanted on murder charges by the Philippine government, the MILF man, Ghazali Jaafar, agrees to talk to Asiaweek in Mindanao in a few days' time. Subject: the rise of radical Islam in Southeast Asia.

Immediate business concluded, Yusof then brings out pictures taken last year of Ghazali sitting down with Malaysian Information Minister Khalil Yaakob. A Muslim rebel having friendly chats with a senior politician from another ASEAN country? Yusof, both conduit and donor, doesn't blink. "There is private support for the Moros among all Muslim," he says unapologetically. "I do what I can, quietly, like other Malaysian businessmen." Such alliances ring alarm bells across the region. The specter of an organized, radical army of Islam has already spooked Western countries. Now it's Asia's turn to fret. In restive Muslim areas such as Mindanao in the southern Philippines, Aceh in Sumatra and the southern provinces of Thailand, low-level wars for independence have raged for decades -- centuries in the case of the Moros. In the past year, fighting has surged afresh.

Muslim-majority countries in the region also face new challenges from religious radicals. In Malaysia, political sentiment among many Malays is shifting from secularism to a more orthodox Islamic code. Indonesia's slow-burning social disintegration has unleashed gangs of Muslim youths who trash un-Islamic discos and bars -- and journeyman armies (laskars) who "protect" their brothers as religious slaughter in the Maluku Islands continues. Indeed, militant Islamic firestorms are igniting constantly in the wake of Asia's economic and political upheavals. Says National University of Malaysia professor A. B. Shamsul: "What it reflects is that regionalism has a new platform -- Islam."

Has the brotherhood hit town? Are there hidden hands connecting and fanning these spot fires? On the surface, the outbreaks seem to have little in common. The dispossessed and impoverished want their own Islamic states. The pious seek an end to corruption and decadence. Thugs indulge in religious genocide. Ruthless anti-Christian mobs in Indonesia are far removed from the peaceful, election-winning Islamists in Malaysia's northern states of Kedah, Kelantan and Trengganu. Thailand's dogged Pattani secessionists contrast oddly with the well-heeled, but intolerant conservatives of Brunei. The newly assertive Malay-Muslim professionals of Singapore are worlds apart from the militias of Java, West Kalimantan and Sumatra, or Aceh's devout independence fighters.

But in rallying behind the green flag of Islam, the growing numbers of dissatisfied and disenfranchised have the makings of a unified crusade. And they do have ties. Says Australian National University professor J. N. May, an expert on Asia's Muslim groups: "Leaders of the various movements have often studied and sometimes trained or been in exile together." Many of Asia's Muslim fighters met in Afghanistan, where they helped overthrow the 1979-89 Soviet occupation. Intellectuals gravitated toward Cairo's Al-Azhar University, where they studied Islamic law.

These links may be loose and informal -- so far -- but the fact that they exist causes increasing concern among secular Muslims and non-Muslims. They fear that the uncompromisingly moral hand of Islam will create societies less willing to tolerate human foibles. They dread, too, the prospect of an Iran-style Islamic revolution.

Sectarian bickerings aside, the fraternity of Islam has always been strong. Add ethnic ties in parts of Asia, and the network becomes more enmeshed. "In Kelantan, there is a lot of sympathy for Muslims in Thailand," confirms Harold Crouch, the Jakarta-based Indonesia project director for the International Crisis Group. "And you would expect that Malays of Acehnese descent in Penang and Kedah would have sympathy for the Acehnese struggle. But I don't see any evidence of them organizing a foreign legion to go there to fight."

Nevertheless, the bonds that link these groups are growing tighter. The largest concentration of the Acehnese diaspora is in Kedah, the home state of Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad. The head of Aceh's rebel military wing is based in Thailand. On the Thai-Malaysian border, Pattani guerrillas relay messages of clerical sympathy to the Acehnese. Fighters in the Philippines pray for their counterparts in Thailand. Bombers in Jakarta are accused of being cozy with the MILF.

At a safe house in Mindanao, MILF military commander Al-Haji Murad, who is wanted for murder, is frank about his pedigree. Around him are MILF soldiers with polished boots and modern machineguns. "My deputy and I did a year of special training for guerrilla warfare in Malaysia in the early 1970s," says Murad. "Later we trained in Afghanistan."

Malaysian government support for Muslim rebels in the region has officially ceased, but contacts remain at the topmost levels. "Assistance to the Free Aceh Movement comes, in part, from Islamic conservative circles in Malaysia," says Carlyle Thayer, a regional expert from the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies in Hawaii. "The connections and linkages that do exist are highly personal and based on trusted networks."

Admits MILF vice chairman Ghazali: "We get moral and political support from our Muslim brothers in the region and also voluntary support from individual sympathizers who make private contributions." These backers are mainly in Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia. Governments in both the Philippines and Thailand complain about this support, but there can be payoffs. When Bangkok agreed to build a gas pipeline across the south to Malaysia in 1998, it found Kuala Lumpur willing to hand over some senior Thai rebels.

Still, the many differences among the region's Islamic movements mitigate fears about an organized arc. Indeed, the Acehnese are aghast at the mobs of Indonesian youths who claim to be waging a holy struggle (jihad) for Islam. Unemployed and insecure, the gangs are widely suspected to be tools of forces trying to undermine President Abdurrahman Wahid. "We don't agree with the laskar jihads," says a leader of the Free Aceh Movement, T. Kamaruzzaman. "We have Christian churches here and none have been attacked."

But according to the commander of Indonesia's most radical militia, the country needs his help. Jaffar Umar Thalib, head of the Java-based Laskar Jihad, speaks from a house in Ambon City, scene of the worst communal violence in Maluku. "We must protect Indonesia's sovereignty," he says. "If the military cannot support the [Muslim] community, then they should leave it to the religious leaders to lead the fight against the infidels."

The vast majority of Muslim groups do not support violence, but the peaceful face of Islam can cause as much alarm as any ragtag army with tenuous regional connections. Malaysia's Pan-Islamic Party (Pas), the country's largest opposition group, has already changed the national complexion via the ballot box. It now controls two states, where it has introduced strict Islamic administrations. This represents the electoral overthrow of the dominant United Malays National Organization, which paints Pas as a bunch of extremists. Yet the party increasingly attracts young, educated professionals. "They are revivalist," says the National University of Malaysia's Shamsul. "What they are doing is reinaugurating theological thinking and awareness among Muslims."

True. But the same political and economic troubles that have helped revive the spiritual side of Islam will also spur other -- often violent -- Muslim agendas. "We are progressing militarily, politically and economically," says the MILF's Murad. "It is just a matter of time." The MILF is unlikely to win its war anytime soon. But the ability of such groups to give the governments they oppose heartburn will grow stronger by the day.

I've been looking at articles from before 911.

This pan-Islamic thing does seem to have bin Laden at its core.

Articles such as these provide an overview of what is happening and how the war will be approached.

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