Al Qaeda In Their Own Words

One question that's commonly asked about Al Qaeda : what exactly do they hope to gain by some of their actions? Things like bombing oil pipelines, schools, trying to disrupt industry in islamic countries, massacring Americans and Jews whenever they can, and in general making the world a nastier, more ignorant and impoverished place.

They're doing it for the good of our souls, bless them.

Here's some words about an Al Qaeda equivalent of Mein Kampf, 'The Future of Iraq and The Arabian Peninsula After The Fall of Baghdad', authored by The Late Yussuf al-Ayyeri, one of Osama bin Laden's closest associates :

"It is not the American war machine that should be of the utmost concern to Muslims. What threatens the future of Islam, in fact its very survival, is American democracy." ... Al-Ayyeri argues that the history of mankind is the story of "perpetual war between belief and unbelief." Over the millennia, both have appeared in different guises. As far as belief is concerned, the absolutely final version is represented by Islam, which "annuls all other religions and creeds." Thus, Muslims can have only one goal: converting all humanity to Islam and "effacing the final traces of all other religions, creeds and ideologies."
[...]
If established in any Muslim country for a reasonably long time, democracy could lead to economic prosperity, which, in turn, would make Muslims "reluctant to die in martyrdom" in defense of their faith.

Democracy and Prosperity are anathema to their philosophy, which relies upon poor, ignorant and politically powerless masses to die for the Cause.

As for the provenance of the book, as Amir Taheri said in the New York Post:

The book is published by The Centre for Islamic Research and Studies, a company set up by bin Laden in 1995 with branches in New York and London (now closed). Over the past eight years, it has published more than 40 books by al Qaeda "thinkers and researchers" including militants such as Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's No. 2.

And how is this Caliphate to be established? How is the world's population to be persuaded to follow Islam? From the Frontispiece of another document, an Al Qaeda Training manual :

- * - The confrontation that we are calling for with the apostate regimes does not know Socratic debates..., Platonic ideals..., nor Aristotelian diplomacy. But it knows the dialogue of bullets, the ideals of assassination, bombing, and destruction, and the diplomacy of the cannon and machine-gun.
***...
Islamic governments have never and will never be established through peaceful solutions and cooperative councils. They are established as they [always] have been
by pen and gun
by word and bullet
by tongue and teeth

And by psychopathic megalomaniacs.

Had more people read 'Mein Kampf' and actually believed what was said in it, rather than it being dismissed as obviously exaggerated rhetoric, the world would have been spared tens of millions of dead. It's always revealing when evaluating any group to read not just what their enemies say about them, but what they say about themselves. Just don't make the mistake of thinking it's all talk.

Al Qaeda is a cult. A Death Cult, one that believes in Human Sacrifice. How else to describe the Nick Berg Decapitation, to the shouts of 'Allahu Akbar', 'God is Great' throughout the whole business? It wasn't a political statement, it was a religious service.

In most ways, Al Qaeda is to mainstream Islam what the People's Temple was to mainstream Christianity.

Except the analogy fails in one crucial respect. You don't hear sermons being preached throughout Christendom on the Saintiness of Jim Jones, or the merits of drinking Flavor Aid as a route to Salvation. Islam has a big problem there, one that only Muslims can solve.

Personally, I'd commend Jim Jones' recipe for Grape Flavor-Aid to all members of Al Qaeda - it's Halal, after all. It may not give the drinker much benefit, but it would sure help the rest of us.