Did Bin Laden Read Mao Correctly?

Abstract

The Global War on Terror has consumed a great deal of American resources since 2001. Operating within Iraq and Afghanistan for almost two decades, the US has failed so far to put together a plan for war termination in the Middle East. This raises the question of whether, or not, al Qaeda’s – along with associated movements’ – strategy and related operations have been successful since war was declared on the United States. To respond to the question, we compared elements of al Qaeda’s plans and actions with Mao Zedong’s theory on how to carry out a protracted war in three stages. By doing so, it sounded reasonable to state that al Qaeda, although fairly successful in implementing its stage 1, failed to evolve its own army-like to deal with stages 2 and 3. It was also observed that neither al Qaeda nor al Qaeda in Iraq have timely reassessed their failing strategy.