September 19, 2006

Ansar al Sunnah to Join MSC?

Ansar al Sunnah has worked with al Qaeda in the past. A couple of times we even saw Zarqawi operatives on Ansar al Sunna murder videos. It looks like Ansar may be formally coming into the jihadi big tent. CT blog:

As-yet unsubstantiated reports have begun circulating on radical Arabic-language Internet chat forums that a major effort is now underway to bring the notorious Ansar al-Sunnah Army in Iraq officially under the umbrella of Al-Qaida's Mujahideen Shura Council (MSC).
Read the rest if you are interested in how jihadis organize terror in Iraq. Evan seems to think that Ansar formally joining the MSC is a bad sign.

Personally, I don't think it matters either way. What the second phase of the Iraq war has shown us is that operational control really is insignificant and that the tactics of al Qaeda 3.0 are even more effective than that of al Qaeda 3.0, perfected under Zarqawi.

Also, it seems to me that the MSC is nothing more than a unified PR front. Instead of Ansar issuing their own statements, they will simply feed their propaganda through the MSC machinery.

Lastly, from a counter-terror standpoint, Ansar joining the MSC could be used to our advantage. For those who think about these things, let me leave it at: Kirkuk, Peshmerga, fahget about the Geneva Conventions, and then connect the dots from there.

By Rusty Shackleford, Ph.D. at 08:58 AM | |