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ISLAMABAD (AP) — One of the deadliest militant groups in Afghanistan, the Haqqani network, has developed a sophisticated, "mafia"-style financing operation that relies on extortion, kidnapping, smuggling and ties to legitimate businesses, according to a new report by a U.S.-based think tank. The report by the Combating Terrorism Center in West Point, N.Y., suggests the system has become so lucrative that maintaining it could be as much of a goal for the group as driving foreign forces out of Afghanistan. That could complicate U.S. efforts to negotiate an end to the war since much of the network's cash flow is...

As thousands of refugees flee violence inside of Syria, foreign fighters are streaming into it. "So long as (Syrian President Bashar) Assad refuses to go and Syria's transition is blocked, the danger grows of more foreign fighters, including extremists of the al Qaeda type infiltrating Syria," State Department counterterrorism chief Daniel Benjamin told reporters Tuesday.

The Persian Gulf States have launched efforts to protect their territorial waters amid tension with neighboring Iran and threats from Al Qaida. Over the last two years, several Gulf Cooperation Council coast guards or navies have acquired or ordered fast patrol boats. They included Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Officials said the Gulf Arab countries were investing to expand their coast guards. "There is concern that terrorists could sneak into the area and carry out a major attack on energy installations," a GCC source said. The enhanced maritime security has resulted in confrontations between fishermen and...

Al-Qaida operatives who have been detained for years in Iran have been making their way quietly in and out of the country, raising the prospect that Iran is loosening its grip on the terror group so it can replenish its ranks, former and current U.S. intelligence officials say. This movement could indicate that Iran is re-examining its murky relationship with al-Qaida at a time when the U.S. is stepping up drone attacks in Pakistan and weakening the group's leadership. Any influx of manpower could hand al-Qaida a boost in morale and expertise and threaten to disrupt stability in the region.

KABUL -- The United States is monitoring reconciliation talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government but will not participate unless the insurgents renounce al-Qaida, a top U.S. diplomat said Wednesday. The comments by Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, came the same day that a Maldives government spokesman said delegations representing the Taliban and the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai held talks late last month in the island nation. Spokesman Mohamed Zuhair said the delegations held three days of face-to-face talks to forge a peaceful solution to the eight-year-old Afghan conflict. The talks did not...

Are Middle Eastern terrorists posing as Mexican immigrants? Click to watch video A warning from some Texas congressmen: Middle Eastern terrorists may be trying to pose as Mexican immigrants. But is it a warning based on fact or politics? Some people in Houston are worried about the message. You couldn’t miss it during the election. Texas politicians saying the border needed protection, not just to stop undocumented workers, but terrorists. A month before the election, Mike McCaul, a congressman from a district northwest of Houston, released a report (snip) The FBI director has confirmed that there’s Middle Easterners with known...

KABUL, Afghanistan - Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Sunday his government will give weapons to local tribesmen so they can help fight the biggest increase in Taliban violence in years. [0] A U.S.-led coalition soldier and seven Afghan civilians were killed in the latest violence in the country's south, which has been hardest hit by the surge in insurgent attacks. Speaking to a group of tribal elders from eastern Afghanistan, Karzai said he did not want to form militias that could clash with rival tribes. "We just want to strengthen the districts to safeguard them from terrorist attack," he said....

Sorry it has been five months since my last update, but then, we have been busy. Let me give you the bottom-line up front (BLUF), and then catch you up on things. Feel free to forward this to whomever, since we still can’t seem to get the press to tell folks what is going on. This is how the fight is going from my foxhole, and it is much more than the bombings, US casualties, and rumors of civil war the press seems to be focused on.

The DNC's mantra that President Bush "misled the nation into war" is losing whatever clout it once had as more and more people become better informed. The massive post-invasion evidence mounts confirming that it was the mainstream media and leading Democrats -- not the Bush Administration -- who lied to the American people on the issue of pre-war ties between Saddam Hussein's regime and al-Qaida terrorists. We now know that during the years before 9/11/01 and the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, over 8,000 terrorists were trained inside Iraq by the Iraqi military.

The U.S. Predator strike inside Pakistan's border area, aimed at al-Zawahri's possible stay in a village may or may not have missed its target. But the missile attack triggered a series of political explosions in the region. In short, the issues are out. I addressed them in a series of interviews over the weekend. Here is a summary:

Al Qaida abuses young operatives To the long list of Al Qaida's sins against humanity, add one more: child abuse. Al Qaida chief Abu Mussib Al Zarqawi abuses children. His network brainwashes them through abuse and deprivation and forces them to do any number of depraved things. U.S. forces are learning of this as they raid Al Qaida safe houses where these kids are basically held as slaves. Particularly informative was a raid of an Al Qaida safe house east of Tal Afar on Oct. 28. U.S. forces discovered that Al Zarqawi was forcing youngsters to conduct attacks against U.S....

In the middle of the War on Terror, October 15 was a great achievement of the United States, but above all an Iraqi victory. If we divide the number of US soldiers who died in the conflict till October 15, we'd realize that for each fallen hero, 4,500 Iraqi voters were given the right to vote against Terror. In the global conflict with Jihadism, U.S. efforts and sacrifices are triggering greater resources against the empire projected by Ayman Thawahiri and Usama Bin Laden.

An interesting Newsweek story this week – that references CT Blog among its sources – claims scoring a point against what it paints as a “questionable” Bush administration portrayal of Abu Azzam. In short, the authors of the article, Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball claim the Administration’s leaders aggrandized the real importance of the killed al Qaida commander basing their conclusion on a number of non-identified U.S. counter-terrorism officials and a report posted by our colleague Evan Kohlman on the blog. The “charge” by Newsweek is about the hierarchy of the man. Was he or was he not the “number...

There's a lot I don't understand about the current hysteria over our prison facility at Guantanamo Bay. At the top of the list is why no one has mentioned Louis Pepe or Mamdouh Mahmud Salim. Salim, a reputed top lieutenant of Osama Bin Laden, was being held at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, a high security federal jail in lower Manhattan. Pepe was a guard there. On November 1, 2000, Salim plunged a sharpened comb into Pepe's left eye and three inches into his brain. Salim and a compatriot also beat Pepe savagely, in their effort to get the guard's keys...

Does al-Qaida have nukes? SPECIAL REPORT Publishing date: 12.05.2005 20:03 Intelligence specialist alarmed by WMD Commission Report By LTC Joseph C. Myers Does al-Qaida have a nuclear weapon? With all of our pressing focus on events in the War on Terror overseas, that is the most important question here at home. Historically the pattern of WMD proliferation in the world has been principally state to state: China to Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and possibly North Korea; or North Korea to Pakistan, and maybe a former Soviet Republic to North Korea. I would have assessed it as a “low probability” that al-Qaida...

Globalterroralert.com (4/14/05): Sources in the Arabian Peninsula are now claiming that one of the four Al-Qaida suicide bombers who attacked a U.S. base in the western Iraqi town of Al-Qaim on April 11 was Saudi national Hadi bin Mubarak al-Qahtani. According to a statement marking his death, Hadi had grown "eager to martyr himself" after witnessing the example of the "19 heroes" and their "holy attack that demolished the foolish infidel Americans and caused many young men to awaken from their deep sleep." Click to view English translation c/o Globalterroralert.com

...Even during ongoing military campaigns, Mr. Rumsfeld never wavered from his transformational objectives.... Mr. Rumsfeld, with the brilliant leadership of General Schoomaker, was able to move personnel from noncombat to combat units, enabling them with additional reorganization to create 15 newly restructured combat brigades. Also, because of Mr. Rumsfeld's successful plan, our military is more flexible, more agile and better able to fight unconventional enemies. A new civilian personnel system was designed to reward merit, reduce force stress and replace a bureaucratic culture of risk aversion with one of innovation. Moreover, he was able to move military personnel out of...

Globalterroralert.com translation and analysis Audio Excerpt #1Audio Excerpt #2 Globalterroralert.com (12/15/04): Alleged representatives of Al-Qaida's Committee in the Arabian Peninsula have released a purported audio recording of the December 6 terrorist attack on the U.S. Consulate in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. The audio, which appears to have been made with a cell phone or radio transmitter, captures the voices of terrorist operatives as they attempted to overwhelm security and kill "Christian" hostages.

http://www.globalterroralert.com/zarqawi-britbomb.wmv http://www.globalterroralert.com Globalterroralert.com (11/7/04): Al-Qaida's Committee in Mesopotamia (led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has released video footage of a November 4 suicide car bombing attack on a patrol manned by the Scottish Black Watch, one of the British military units currently deployed in central Iraq. The soldiers were manning a vehicle checkpoint on a road east of the Euphrates River when the bomber detonated his vehicle; the attack was followed shortly thereafter by insurgent mortar attacks on the same position. Three members of the Black Watch and an Iraqi translator (who had postponed his own wedding in order to serve...

http://www.globalterroralert.com/amriki911.wmvhttp://www.globalterroralert.comGlobalterroralert.com (10/31/04): The voice of an alleged American Al-Qaida terrorist operative featured in a video broadcast last week has been matched to audio taken from a previous As-Sahab video production documenting the planning behind the September 11, 2001 suicide hijackings. During the latter video from November 2001, "Azzam al-Amriki" applauds the mission of the 9/11 hijackers to "destroy the economic fortresses" of America.