Al-Qaida’s long-term strategy

In his recent column, Paul Rogers writes that al-Qaida's strategy "still seems largely unrecognised": "al-Qaida is specifically interested in inciting greater US and western military action anywhere in the Islamic world. It is not expecting to ‘defeat’ the United States in the short term. Quite the contrary – it positively seeks an increased confrontation as a means of greatly increasing support for both its medium-term and longer-term aims." Tragically, he writes, "it may take more atrocities and much more loss of life before a deeper understanding [of this strategy] begins to dawn" in Washington.