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Title: Inside Al Qaeda by Rohan Gunaratna ISBN: 0-231-12692-1 Publisher: Columbia University Press Pub. Date: 15 May, 2002 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $23.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4 (15 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Promptly Returned It (slightly revised)
Comment: I bought this book with high hopes. I thought it might join the very small library of books that are authoritative accounts of Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda which aren't tainted with conspiracy theories.
I credit the author for not producing a book that blames Al-Qaeda for the accidental crash of TWA 800 and does not link Terry Nichols with Ramzi Yousef to "prove" a hidden hand behind the Oklahoma City Bombing.
What I have to fault him and his editors for are errors that rise above the category of "typos." I encountered two in reading just ten pages and for me that was enough to conclude that "Inside Al-Qaeda" desperately needs a heavy editing job that it will hopefully receive in later editions. Perhaps then it can truly claim to be an in-depth analysis of the world's most dangerous terrorist organization:
Error Number 1: The author confuses "ulema" (Islamic scholars) with "ummah" (the community of believers).
Error Number 2: The author refers to twenty hijackers going to their deaths on September 11. Excuse me? I think there have been about a million news stories that state there were 19 hijackers on September 11. I'd like to think that if this book had received a serious edit, such an incredibly glaring error would have stuck out like a neon sign. If I were a teacher grading the author's book like an academic paper, I'd mark him down half a grade for making a mistake like that.
{I'd also like to briefly respond to the argument that a close reading of the book would have revealed that the author was including Zacharias Moussaoui when he referred to the "twenty" hijackers. That cannot be correct. On page 7 of the book, the author categorically states that twenty hijackers went willingly to their deaths. Moussaoui is very much alive. So he could not have been one of the "twenty" men who died.}
There are some people who will probably disagree with me about this book. They may very well consider it to be very well written. But given the prices we pay these days for books, I think we readers deserve ones prepared with great care and mistakes like the ones I've cited above put "Inside Al-Qaeda" outside that category.
(note: In 2003, a paperback edition came out. I was sorry to see that the author and the publishers had still not corrected the "twenty" hijackers mistake. One is left with the impression that they just did not care about that basic error and that is another indictment of this book.)
Rating: 5
Summary: Authoritative and Well Researched Overview of Al Qaeda
Comment: Excellent book. A well researched and overview of Al Qaeda. Provides excellent insights into the ideology and methods of operation for one of the world's most dangerous terrorist groups. Unlike other books on this subject, this work is superbly footnoted, perhaps reflecting the author's academic background. This is essential for a truly authoritative work of non-fiction, something sadly lacking in many other books in this genre. The section on Al Qaeda's operations in Southeast Asia is groundbreaking, providing information not seen anywhere else. Tellingly much of what the author described about Al Qaeda operations in Asia was subsequently demonstrated in spades in Bali last October. The general reader might find this book somewhat dense, the print is small and the reading somewhat dry. For the serious student of modern terrrorism, however, this book is a must have. Other authors should take a lesson from Gunaratna's footnoting. Well worth the price!!
Rating: 5
Summary: The DEFINITIVE BOOK proven more correct every single day
Comment: This is THE definitive book so far on Al Qadea for several reasons. One of the biggest is that since it came out in 2002 (it is now in paperback too) it has proven more correct every single day. If you've heard some of this information before or read some of it before it's mainly because this is the book that clearly has been the authorative source for many of journalists (I was a journalist and know how that works!)who do not attribute their on-the-air brilliance to the fact that they read this book. It's all HERE. And more and more of this book is proving to be correct every single day.
The latest sign of author Rohan Gunaratna's solid scholarship, analysis and nuts-and-bolts-inside-info in Inside Al Qaeda has been displayed on the front page of the Los Angeles Times which ran a story about how the terrorist organization is undergoing a "major shift" in strategy -- mutating into more of a decentralized network, relying on an array of regional and local allies to launch more frequent attacks on targets. If you read the book before, you KNEW that this network was in place -- and that this development was coming.
Guanaratna painstakingly lays out the huge worldwide network of terrorist groups that are directly or indirectly allied with Al Qaeda. He breaks it down into regions and countries. In fact, this book is a virtual directory: see an event in the newspapers, then look it up in this book and you have all the background to sound like an on the air expert (but you won't get paid big bucks).
No, it does not read like a novel. But this superb book is highly readable -- reading like a straightfoward newsmagazine report. There is not a word of filler or ideological rhetoric in it -- the author only lays out....facts. When he states that there is no evidence of a solid connection between Iraq and 911 he has 100 percent credibility due to what has come before. He's NOT proclaming it due to any political agenda.
The book details it all: the bloody and highly political rise of Osama Bin Laden, Bin Laden's motives and goals (basically achieve a political goal by garnering a high victim body count, and whether that includes civilians, women, children or Muslims is absolutely irrelevant); the skyrocketing rise of militant Islam; how slights from fellow Muslim national leaders created and radicalized the Al Qaeda into a terrorism Frankenstein; an account of 911 from an operational standpoint; predictions on what is likely to come; and the highly detailed profiles of various cells.
To those who are not sympathetic to Bin Laden or Al Qaeda's political goals (in other words, those who do feel upset if they see innocents intentionally murdered to make a political statement)this book is depressing, as it documents Al Qaeda's highly fluid and adaptable "multidimensional" nature -- which you now see in newscycles each day. Nor will it vanish soon. Writes Gunaratna: "Al Qaeda's leadership, membership and supporters firmly believe that everything happens according to God's will."
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Title: The Age of Sacred Terror by Daniel Benjamin, Steven Simon ISBN: 0375508597 Publisher: Random House Pub. Date: 01 October, 2002 List Price(USD): $25.95 |
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Title: The Cell: Inside the 9/11 Plot, And Why the FBI and CIA Failed to Stop It by John Miller, Michael Stone ISBN: 0786869003 Publisher: Hyperion Press Pub. Date: 14 August, 2002 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Inside Terrorism by Bruce Hoffman ISBN: 0231114699 Publisher: Columbia University Press Pub. Date: 15 April, 1999 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Through Our Enemies' Eyes: Osama Bin Laden, Radical Islam and the Future of America by Anonymous ISBN: 1574885529 Publisher: Brasseys, Inc. Pub. Date: June, 2002 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia by Ahmed Rashid ISBN: 0300089023 Publisher: Yale Univ Pr Pub. Date: 01 March, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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