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CNN Live Sunday

Interview With Jim Walsh

Aired November 23, 2003 - 10:05   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN ANCHOR: Well, since 9/11, authorities have tied al Qaeda to bombings and other attacks across the globe. Major attacks have taken place from Indonesia to Kenya, Pakistan to Saudi Arabia. The death toll is in the hundreds.
With us now from Boston, Jim Walsh, from Harvard University. He is an expert on terrorism and international security.

Good morning to you, Mr. Walsh.

JIM WALSH, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: Good morning, Andrea. Good to see you.

KOPPEL: Good to see you. So to what can we attribute what seems to be an up-tick in these more scattered attacks around the world?

WALSH: Well, I think there are a couple of things going on. One is, al Qaeda, which was always functioned as a holding company, a foundation for terrorism, providing training and support and building alliances with terrorists in other parts of the world, they have now become more of a distributed network, where they are providing that training and support and local affiliates, local franchisees, if you will, are carrying out these attacks. They've lost their core bases in Afghanistan, and so they've spread out and they are acting locally.

KOPPEL: Now, in many instances, they've not only lost their core training bases, Afghanistan and other spots, but they've also lost some of the top leaders in al Qaeda who were under arrest in detention around the world. Does that make this an organization that is more difficult to crack?

WALSH: Well, I think there are a couple of things going on here. They are both weaker. They've suffered significant losses, as you point out. A big percentage of their hierarchy has been either killed or arrested.

On the other hand, they've adapted. They're a flat organization that moves quickly, unlike the United States government, for example, which is a big organization that moves slowly in reaction to events. They are able to react quickly on the ground because of their small cell structure. And it does make it more difficult to catch them.

On the other hand, because they've adjusted, that means they lose certain capabilities. It is harder for them to pull off a big attack on the U.S., for example, if they're scattered across the globe acting locally. KOPPEL: Well, actually, that dovetails nicely into my next question. I was going to ask you, to what do you attribute the fact that we haven't seen any additional attacks since 9/11 here on U.S. soil?

WALSH: Well, it's a good question, Andrea. It's a question that analysts are constantly asking themselves. It has been over two years now and we've had no attempted major attacks on U.S. soil. There are a couple of ideas or theories that people have about that.

First of all, it may be that al Qaeda has suffered significantly and they've changed the nature of their organization as we've just been discussing. A second possibility is that they're working on two different tracks. On the one track are all those attacks you see in Turkey, around the world, and Indonesia, and those are short term or intermediate term.

The other thing that could be happening is, at the same time, the senior leadership is working on a long-range attack. An attack that would happen at some point in the distant future here in the U.S. It is worth bearing in mind that both the first World Trade Center attack and the second World Trade Center attack on 9/11 were years in the making, years in planning, training, and then finally execution. And it may be that they're just biding their time and waiting for a more opportune moment.

KOPPEL: How does a government -- and obviously the United States is cooperating and sharing intelligence like never before since 9/11 with governments around the world -- but how can these other governments get their arms around these often indigenous cells that are operating right under their noses?

WALSH: Well, you have to go back to good old-fashioned police work. You know, terrorism is not a new phenomenon. As much as we think it's a post Cold War issue, we've had terrorism, thousands of attacks of terrorism throughout the modern decades. In fact, terrorism was increasing through the 1970s and '80s, and began to decline somewhat.

And I say that to say this, we've had terrorism before and we've had success against terrorism. In Europe, for example, police successfully over time were able to stop the Red Brigade, the Red Army, other terrorist groups. So you can have success, but it does take good police work and it does take time.

KOPPEL: Jim Walsh, we appreciate you coming in this Sunday morning and wish you and your family a very happy Thanksgiving.

WALSH: Thank you. Same to you, too.

KOPPEL: Thank you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired November 23, 2003 - 10:05   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN ANCHOR: Well, since 9/11, authorities have tied al Qaeda to bombings and other attacks across the globe. Major attacks have taken place from Indonesia to Kenya, Pakistan to Saudi Arabia. The death toll is in the hundreds.
With us now from Boston, Jim Walsh, from Harvard University. He is an expert on terrorism and international security.

Good morning to you, Mr. Walsh.

JIM WALSH, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: Good morning, Andrea. Good to see you.

KOPPEL: Good to see you. So to what can we attribute what seems to be an up-tick in these more scattered attacks around the world?

WALSH: Well, I think there are a couple of things going on. One is, al Qaeda, which was always functioned as a holding company, a foundation for terrorism, providing training and support and building alliances with terrorists in other parts of the world, they have now become more of a distributed network, where they are providing that training and support and local affiliates, local franchisees, if you will, are carrying out these attacks. They've lost their core bases in Afghanistan, and so they've spread out and they are acting locally.

KOPPEL: Now, in many instances, they've not only lost their core training bases, Afghanistan and other spots, but they've also lost some of the top leaders in al Qaeda who were under arrest in detention around the world. Does that make this an organization that is more difficult to crack?

WALSH: Well, I think there are a couple of things going on here. They are both weaker. They've suffered significant losses, as you point out. A big percentage of their hierarchy has been either killed or arrested.

On the other hand, they've adapted. They're a flat organization that moves quickly, unlike the United States government, for example, which is a big organization that moves slowly in reaction to events. They are able to react quickly on the ground because of their small cell structure. And it does make it more difficult to catch them.

On the other hand, because they've adjusted, that means they lose certain capabilities. It is harder for them to pull off a big attack on the U.S., for example, if they're scattered across the globe acting locally. KOPPEL: Well, actually, that dovetails nicely into my next question. I was going to ask you, to what do you attribute the fact that we haven't seen any additional attacks since 9/11 here on U.S. soil?

WALSH: Well, it's a good question, Andrea. It's a question that analysts are constantly asking themselves. It has been over two years now and we've had no attempted major attacks on U.S. soil. There are a couple of ideas or theories that people have about that.

First of all, it may be that al Qaeda has suffered significantly and they've changed the nature of their organization as we've just been discussing. A second possibility is that they're working on two different tracks. On the one track are all those attacks you see in Turkey, around the world, and Indonesia, and those are short term or intermediate term.

The other thing that could be happening is, at the same time, the senior leadership is working on a long-range attack. An attack that would happen at some point in the distant future here in the U.S. It is worth bearing in mind that both the first World Trade Center attack and the second World Trade Center attack on 9/11 were years in the making, years in planning, training, and then finally execution. And it may be that they're just biding their time and waiting for a more opportune moment.

KOPPEL: How does a government -- and obviously the United States is cooperating and sharing intelligence like never before since 9/11 with governments around the world -- but how can these other governments get their arms around these often indigenous cells that are operating right under their noses?

WALSH: Well, you have to go back to good old-fashioned police work. You know, terrorism is not a new phenomenon. As much as we think it's a post Cold War issue, we've had terrorism, thousands of attacks of terrorism throughout the modern decades. In fact, terrorism was increasing through the 1970s and '80s, and began to decline somewhat.

And I say that to say this, we've had terrorism before and we've had success against terrorism. In Europe, for example, police successfully over time were able to stop the Red Brigade, the Red Army, other terrorist groups. So you can have success, but it does take good police work and it does take time.

KOPPEL: Jim Walsh, we appreciate you coming in this Sunday morning and wish you and your family a very happy Thanksgiving.

WALSH: Thank you. Same to you, too.

KOPPEL: Thank you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com