Behind al Qaeda's attacks in Iraq, Syria

Con Coughlin:

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At first glance, it appears that the bombers responsible for the recent attacks in Damascus and Baghdad were motivated by very different objectives.

In Syria, last week’s carefully executed bombing of the National Security headquarters, which killed President Bashar al-Assad’s brother-in-law, as well as the country’s defence minister, was in all probability the act of groups working for the Free Syrian Army, a mainly Sunni Muslim force that is seeking to overthrow Assad’s minority Allawite regime, which has ruled the country for more than four decades.

In Baghdad, on the other hand, the recent well-coordinated series of bombings and shootings against a number of government targets in 15 different cities and towns was carried out by Iraqi Sunni extremists. Many of them are disaffected members of Saddam’s Ba’athist tyranny who are trying to force the government of Nouri al-Maliki, Iraq’s Shi’ite Muslim prime minister, to establish a more inclusive regime, one that represents the interests of the Sunni and Kurdish minorities, rather than simply feathering the nests of the majority Shi’ite Muslim population.

But while the objectives of these anti-government activists may differ, there is a chilling similarity in the tactics they employ in their respective quarrels with the ruling cliques in Iraq and Syria.

In both countries, the recent wave of bombings bears all the hallmarks of al-Qaeda terror cells, both in terms of their planning and the execution. Indeed, the group responsible for the Iraqi bombings, al-Qaeda in Iraq, makes no secret of its allegiance to the organisation originally founded by Osama bin Laden.

In a statement issued shortly after the attacks, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who claims to be the leader of the Iraqi cell, deliberately sought to link the violence in Iraq to the Sunni revolt in neighbouring Syria. According to al-Baghdadi, al-Qaeda has launched a campaign it calls “Breaking Down the Walls”, whereby it aims to overthrow the established governments in Baghdad and Damascus and replace them with regimes more in tune with the group’s strict Islamist agenda.

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Al Qaeda;s strategy begins and ends with creating chaos.  They hope to profit form the chaos they create by getting their allies in control of the countries.  They see chaos as behind the early success of the Taliban in Afghanistan and they seek to repeat that patter where it appears they may have an opportunity.  Obama's bungling in both countries has given them a chance.