Around the Web - Snow Day Edition

It's back!  Around the Web has returned (I know you've missed it).  After thinking about it for some time, I admit that it's still the best way for me to keep up with the daily fire hose of information.  And after a day of cooking (chicken chili soup anyone?), I’m ready to pick through the web for a little counter-terrorism fun. 

Let's begin then...

One of the more intriguing recently thwarted plots comes to us from Bosnia
.

New jihadi blog. New to me, anyway: http://madkhalis.com/

Hey, check out Aaron, all grown up and writing for Studies in Conflict and Terrorism: "Comparison of Visual Motifs in Jihadi and Cholo Videos on YouTube," Volume 32, Issue 12 December 2009 , pages 1066 – 1074

Yeah, I’d say it was cheeky.  It's also wonderful.

What this suggests to me is that we need to be able to speak / read not only spoken or written languages of our sources, suspects, informants and opponents — but also the language or underlying logic of their thought.

Charles, I call this “thinking with the adversary.”  It’s a modification of an old Catholic theological principle.

Around Current Intelligence

Mike on Histories of Violence.  Tim on the Congo.   John on Niall.  Charli on drones.  Christopher on the Navy.  Tim (once again) on the possibility of a digital Pearl Harbor.

On to other items...

2d rule of jihadi media: let the adversary tell you whether something is radical or not.

I know this is old in blog-time, but I can’t resist writing this sentence: It was never 2000, and it’s not 50 now, and it was never 30 and it’s not 200 now.  The numbers have always been in the 5 or 10s.  Bradford’s law extends even to jihobbyists.

Strawmen? Check. Condescension?  Check. Bored analyst. Yawn.

In related news: "Al-Qaida's Zawahiri Hails KSM, Ramzi Yousef, and Others Held in U.S. Prisons."

What were those Uighurs doing in Cambodia in the first place?

The level of willful ignorance it takes to write something like this is astounding.

Of course it is.

Yes, we have NoVa radicals.  We have NoVa radicals today.

New Yemeni Blog (via Waq al-Waq) ...and a new report on AQAP

Reason #904820531 why lawfare is inadequate.

“The Financial Times actually wrote a fairly balanced story on Shariah finance for a change.”

Yeah. I would say that massive money laundering schemes will have their growing pains.

Two down, ? to go

Countering Thinktankistan, one blog post at a time

Reminding everyone that there is still a conflict in Kashmir.

A little late, don’t you think?

Is this an example of a Medinan strategy at work?  To a safehaven?

Perhaps they should just save the ink and trees and quit issuing worthless fatawa.

Prison News
http://forums.islamicawakening.com/prisoners/

Letter From Ismail Royerî ìI Am Going to Super-Maxî
http://umarlee.com/2009/12/21/letter-from-ismail-royer-i-am-going-to-super-max/

Meanwhile in Africa

From East

Somalian conflict is a war being fought on a global scale, because so many Somalians no longer live there.

Assessing the threat in Somalia (via ISN)

AP reported on the improving tactics in Somalia

A recent example of Al-Shabaab putting Salafist-Jihadism governance into action...and apparently consolidating its media message.

To West

The most interesting Africa-centered report in the last several months is the recent arrests in Ghana of AQIM suspects accused of smuggling drugs to finance the group’s operations.

Apparently, drug smuggling remains inadequate source of income.

CT progress in Mauritania?

Death in absentia in Algeria