Cargo-plane bombs: Al Qaida’s new strategy

“It’s too early to panic,” said Robert Baer in Time, but last week’s foiled al Qaida plot to bomb cargo planes bound for the U.S. may be our first taste of “a new, more dangerous wave of terrorism.” Security experts say the bombs—sophisticated devices based on the lethal but malleable explosive PETN—were well concealed inside laser-printer toner cartridges, and showed a much “higher degree of professionalism” than seen in the past. More worrying, though, is the “whole new dynamic” revealed by this failed plot: The bombs were mailed from Yemen, which seems to have replaced Pakistan’s tribal areas as the source of attacks on the West. “Yemen’s well-armed and notoriously independent tribes” won’t put up with a sustained government assault against the militants in their midst, and if angered, will surely try to topple the somewhat American-friendly central government.

Al Qaida’s tactics may also be changing, said Mark Trumbull in The Christian Science Monitor. These latest bombs were deliberately planted on cargo planes, on which only about 20 percent of freight is screened. In circumventing the heightened security on passenger planes, al Qaida may be signaling it’s now willing to focus on numerous “small-scale attacks” rather than one-off “spectaculars.” If a few cargo planes blow up and rain fiery debris over populated areas, it could disrupt the whole global economy. Add in a wave of Mumbai-style machine gun attacks on crowded public places, like the plot recently uncovered in Europe, and the net effect could be as traumatizing and as economically damaging as another 9/11.

The best defense is more offense, said The Wall Street Journal in an editorial. Clearly, by targeting cargo planes, al Qaida is probing “weak spots” in our security, and will exploit any opportunity to inflict “mass murder.” The plotters of this attack—including the American-born Imam Anwar al-Awlaki—are in Yemen, so President Obama is fully justified in targeting “al-Awlaki and other al Qaida leaders there with Predator drone attacks.” Actually, that’s “a really bad idea,” said Robert Dreyfuss in The Nation. Yemen is “a hornet’s nest,” currently torn by two separate civil wars and brimming with resentment of the West. Any heavy-handed U.S. engagement could backfire, turning Yemen into precisely the kind of failed state that terrorists love. If we truly want to defeat al Qaida, the West and Saudi Arabia should “rescue Yemen” with a massive infusion of food and aid—not start yet another war.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up