Terrorism came into being as soon as humanity appeared, but the US special services turned it into a threat of global scale. The end of the 1970s can be considered as the starting point. Back then the Central Intelligence Agency launched a training program for «Islamic brigades» to entangle the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic into the war in Afghanistan.
In 1998 Zbigniew Brzezinski wrote, «According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the Mujahedeen began during 1980, that is to say, after the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan, 24 Dec 1979. But the reality, secretly guarded until now, is completely otherwise. Indeed, it was July 3, 1979 that President Carter signed the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Kabul. And that very day, I wrote a note to the president in which I explained to him that in my opinion this aid was going to induce a Soviet military intervention». That was the time Osama bin Laden was recruited.
According to Shamseddin Yusef, one of Chechen leaders, the former Foreign Secretary in Dudaev’s government, bin Laden visited Chechnya in 1992 holding a US passport. He said it was later when bin Laden fell out with the United States government. No surprise the family of George Bush has rubbed shoulders with the «terrorist N 1». The US supported Afghan mujahedeen to embroil all the Muslim countries into the war against the USSR.
In 1982-1992 citizens of approximately 40 Muslim states fought in Afghanistan. In March 1985 US President Ronald Reagan signed National Security Decision Directive 166, which authorized stepped-up covert military aid to the mujahedeen and it made clear that the secret Afghan war had a new goal: to defeat Soviet troops in Afghanistan through covert action and encourage a Soviet withdrawal.
The new covert U.S. assistance began with a dramatic increase in arms supplies – a steady rise to 65,000 tons annually by 1987,… as well as a ‘ceaseless stream’ of CIA and Pentagon specialists who traveled to the secret headquarters of Pakistan’s ISI on the main road near Rawalpindi, Pakistan. According to Abdel Monam Saidali, of the Al-Aram Center for Strategic Studies in Cairo, bin Laden and the «Afghan Arabs» had been imparted «with very sophisticated types of training that was allowed to them by the CIA».
As «the foreign legion of the West» Al Qaeda militants were involved in the war in Yugoslavia. In 1997 the US Senate Republican Policy Committeemade no bones about it accusing the Clinton administration for «helping to turn Bosnia into an Islamic militants base».
The «Bosnian pattern» described in the 1997 Congressional RPC report was replicated in Kosovo with the complicity of NATO and the US State Department. Mujahedeen mercenaries from the Middle East and Central Asia were recruited to fight in the ranks of the KLA in 1998-99, largely supporting NATO’s war effort. Confirmed by British military sources, the task of arming and training of the KLA had been entrusted in 1998 to the US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and Britain’s Secret Intelligence Services MI6.
Washington who provided support for the international terrorist networks diplomatic recognition. It was nobody else but Madeleine Albright who forced the pace of international diplomacy: the KLA had been spearheaded intoplaying a central role in the failed «peace negotiations» at Rambouillet in early 1999.
9/11 – no reason to refuse support for terrorists
The war on terror declared by the United States on September 11 only made international terrorist groups stronger and even made them come to power in some countries. Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria became victims of US anti-terror fight. In particular, the United States arms Sunni groups to allegedly fight Al Qaeda. American officers who take part in these «bridges building» program say many of Sunnis had been close to the Mesopotamia’s branch of Al Qaeda. (8)
According to John F. Sopko, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, the United States has paid more than $150 million to companies in Afghanistan that are accused of helping to finance terrorist attacks on American soldiers and facilities.
Independent journalist and historian Doug Wissing has published the book called Funding the enemy: How US taxpayers bankroll the Taliban. According to him, « Security firms commonly contract with Afghan insurgents to protect U.S.-funded development projects. The notoriously wasteful 64-mile-long Khost-Gardez road project is expected to cost taxpayers $176 million. Over $43 million went to a security firm, which then hired an insurgent leader who was on the U.S. JPEL «kill or capture» list. They paid the jihadi $160,000 a month to provide security against himself».
But these are separate cases. There are much more interesting ways the US employs to allow terrorists take the reins of power. In his Islam and the Arab Awakening Tariq Ramadan adduces examples of professional training received by Arab youth in special facilities at the expense of US budget. As far back as 2007 such training facilities appeared in the Caucasus and Serbia.
Actually the unrest in all the countries affected was spurred by Facebook, Twitter, Hotmail, Yahoo и Gmail e-mails and posts to spark a «flash-mob» effect. The headquarters of the above mentioned companies are located in the Unites States. As a result, in all cases radicals Islamists have come to power.
Today Al-Nusra Front, an Al Qaeda affiliated armed group, formally listed as a terrorist organization by US State Department, is a United States leading partner in Syria. No surprise the White House policy evoked protest among US military making Congress bombarded with e-mail protests «Obama, I will not deploy to fight for your al-Qaida rebels in Syria»…
US terror war against Russia
These are the words repeated after former FBI translator Cybil Edmonds, which precisely reflect the scale of the terror war unleashed by the United States against Russia. According to CIA agent Abu Bakr, (3) he was assigned to deal with the Chechen issue as far back as the 1960s. Right after the USSR dismemberment, the Al Qaeda emissaries, including bin Laden, and US instructors under the guise of «servants of Islam» came into Chechnya in droves.
Together with their partners from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey Americans provided training for Chechen militants. Shamil Basaev and some other Chechen warlords have gone through an intensive course of ideological inculcation and combat training in the camp located in the Afghan Province of Khost.
The training facility was built in the early 1980s by the US Central Intelligence Agency and Pakistani intelligence service ISI. Later Basayev was transferred to Markaz-i-Dawar camp in Pakistan to hone his guerilla warfare skills. (2)
Tamerlan Tsarnaev, accused of perpetrating a terrorist act in Boston, was affiliated with the FBI and went through a CIA-sponsored seminar training course in Georgia held under the auspices of the Jamestown Foundation as part of policy aimed at destabilizing the North Caucasus.
The United States hosts hundreds of organizations which support terrorism in Russia. According to the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, over 60 international extremist organizations, about 100 foreign companies and 10 banking groups participate in providing financial, material and other assistance to the terrorists «touring» the Northern Caucasus. In the U.S. alone, almost 50 organizations are raising funds for North Caucasian extremists.
Their offices are predominantly based in the United States and Europe. In the US only around fifty organizations are involved in collecting funds for North Caucasian extremists, including the Muslim American Bar Association; the Islamic American Center, the Muslim American Bar Association; the Islamic American Center, the Muslim American Council; Islamic Relief/Chechnya appeal, Islamic City Relief; the Islamic-American Zakat Foundation, the Islamic Action Center, the Chechen-Ingush Society of America, also known as Chechen relief expenses, with a division called Chechen Relief, the international Muslim organization Al-Ehsan Charitable Relief Organization, the International Relief Association, Islamic Relief Worldwide, Mercy International and the Benevolence International Foundation.
They are not just underground communities. The role of the organization American Muslim Assistance (AMA) deserves special mention. It is registered with the U.S. State Department, and its main task is «helping our Muslim brothers throughout the world».
The director of AMA, Sheikh Hisham Muhammad Kabbani, who is also the chairman of the influential Islamic Supreme Council of America, chairman of the As-Sunna Foundation of America, and the founder and chairman of the Haqqani Islamic Trust for New Muslims, is known as the author of many works on Islam. AMA operates in the Northern Caucasus and conducts active propaganda to discredit the actions of the Russian authorities. AMA often acts under the cover of other Muslim organizations, in particular, the Islamic Supreme Council of America, which unites 15 million Muslims living in the U.S.
In 1999 the American Committee for Peace in the Caucasus came into being co-chaired by: by Zbigniew Brzezinski, Alexander M. Haig, former US State Secretary, James Wolsey, former Central Intelligence Agency director, Richard Perle, former Assistant Secretary of State, Kenneth Adelman, deputy U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Bruce Jackson, former Vice President for Strategy and Planning at Lockheed Martin, the founder and President of the non-government Project on Transitional Democracies, former President of the US Committee on NATO, a non-profit organization that promoted NATO expansion and strengthening the US-European Relationship, Caspar Weinberger, former Secretary of Defense, Robert McFarlane, National Security Advisor to President Ronald Reagan, Elliot Abrams, a well-known American diplomat, lawyer and political scientist who served in foreign policy positions for both U.S. Presidents, Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. (13)
The American Committee for Peace in the Caucasus is a Freedom House initiative that bills itself as the»only private, nongovernmental organization in North America exclusively dedicated to promoting the peaceful resolution of the Russo-Chechen war.
The activities aimed at instigating terrorist activities in Russia enjoy impressive amount of funding. Estimates of the funds which belong to the institutions «inspired» by Islamic preacher Fethullah Gülen, whose headquarters are located in Pennsylvania, vary widely. Those based on American court records have ranged from $20 billion to $50 billion.
Hundreds of madrasahs and mosques built by his organization in Central Asia and Russia have become a breeding ground for extremists and serve as a cover for CIA clandestine activities.
Gülen owes the giddy career promotion in the United States to Graham E. Fuller, an American author and political analyst, specializing in Islamic extremism, who also served as Station Chief in Kabul for the CIA, and Morton Isaac Abramowitz, an American diplomat and former State Department official, a member of Chechen Committee.
The both are prominent figures taking part in shady activities of the United States and NATO. As an expert on Orient, Graham Fuller advocates reliance on political Islam in foreign policy.
In Russia his name became known after the Boston terrorist acts. Ruslan Tsarnaev, the outspoken uncle of the brothers was married to Samantha A. Fuller until 2004. Tsarnaev headed an Islamic organization which funnels funds to the Caucasian branch of Al Qaeda. Doku Umarov is suspected of having relation to the Volgograd terrorist acts committed before the 2014 New Year. He owns the Kavkaz Center website and the calls himself the «emir of Russia’s North Caucasus».
The website had been funded by the US Central Intelligence Agency till 2011 when the United Nations listed Umarov as a terrorist affiliated with Al Qaeda.
Citing US intelligence sources, the Washington Times wrote then that, «Two suicide bombings targeting Russian civilians just weeks from the opening of Winter Olympics have renewed fears that a Chechen terrorist known as the «Russian bin Laden« may be bent on committing or inspiring more attacks on so-called soft targets, and possibly major international sporting events. Such concerns reared their head in April amid evidence that one of the two young Chechen immigrants who executed two deadly bombings at the Boston Marathon drew inspiration from Doku Umarov, the 49-year-old leader of the regional terrorist network known as the Caucasus Emirate whose stated goal is to establish an Islamic state inside Russia. U.S. and Russian intelligence are attempting to discern how much more of an active role Umarov, whom the U.S. listed as a «specially designated global terrorist» in 2010, may have played in plotting and ordering the two suicide bombings in Volgograd that killed 29 people».
What does US need terrorists for?
At first glance there is no reason to foster international terrorism which results in great human death toll, including US citizens.
But the likes of Brzezinski think differently. Asked if he regretted the United States fostered Islamic fundamentalism, he said, «Regret what? That secret operation was an excellent idea. It had the effect of drawing the Russians into the Afghan trap and you want me to regret it? The day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter. We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam War. Indeed, for almost 10 years, Moscow had to carry on a war unsupportable by the government, a conflict that brought about the demoralization and finally the breakup of the Soviet empire».
That’s why a recent Gallup poll shows the United States is seen globally as the main supporter of terrorists. The «Western foreign legion» represented by terrorists allows the United States to achieve a number of objectives, including weakening the chief competitors – Russia and China.
The spread of terrorism under the banner of Islam hinders the process of Islamic world unification. Divided, warring and weakened, the Arab world directly benefits the economy of the United States. It’s not an occasion that the Arab Spring set in immediately after Muammar Gaddafi started to take practical steps to introduce gold dinar.
The myth of «fight against terrorism» creates a pretext for United States intervention against any other state having accused it of supporting terrorists. At that, the critical state of US economy makes international terrorism an effective instrument of intimidating Americans and introducing police state.
Under the guise of preventing terrorist acts, the United States government and Congress have adopted a string of laws since 2001 which practically have eliminated civil liberties in the country. The current «anti-terrorist» legislature allows eavesdropping. Today private phone calls are tapped, private correspondence is intercepted, the suspicious persons, who from time to time even dare to criticize the US policy, are put behind bars without trial, new jails are built to accommodate millions, property is expropriated…
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The foreign policy achievements Russia reached last year, the progressive implementation of Eurasian integration, gradual rise of Russia to the status of world power – it all has made Washington talk about the need for joint fight against terrorism. No doubt, this battle should be waged with no mercy for the enemy but not according to the instructions issued by those who have fostered the terrorism to be fought.
Russia with millions of its Muslim citizens is able to pursue its own way of countering the terrorism, which exists under the guise of defending Islam, and facilitate the emergence of new geopolitical reality…
By Olga Shedrova, Strategic Culture Foundation