Complex Global Microstructures

THE NEW terrorism, as the 9/11 Commission Report of the US Congress and President terms it, is sophisticated, patient, disciplined and lethal (Kean and Hamilton, 2004: xvi, 47fI; see also Hall, 2004). The 9111 attack was a complex international operation that could not have been mounted by just anyone in any place. Such an operation required, the Commission states at the end of a long and detailed investigation, a logistics network able to manage the movement of operatives and money. It had to find and transport resources, and it had to have reliable communication between coordinators and operatives, a command structure, planning, the ability to test plans, recruitment and training (Kean and Hamilton, 2004: 365-6). Such operations demand a sophisticated global counterterrorism strategy it will not suffice to simply launch a war (e.g. against Afghanistan) or to mobilize a nation in homeland defense. Countering terrorism will have to become a truly global effort involving a coalition of governments, extending to remote regions of the world, engaging the global struggle of ideas, and translating short-term concerns into long-term internal and external commitments (2004: 363ff.). And yet what makes this formidable mobilization necessary is not an omnipotent evil empire, a massive multinational corporate structure or a military-industrial complex. The Commission speaks of the active support of , thousands' of young Muslims for bin Laden's message, not of millions (2004: 362). It also states that the group of conspirators that brought off the attacks was at the same time fragile, dependent on a few key personalities, and occasionally left vulnerable by the marginal, unstable people often attracted to such causes (2004: 364).