The foused and unswerving efforts of the Bush administration over the years since 9-11 are starting to combine to fracture Al Qaeda’s strength. We can see this in the popular support of the Afghan and Iraqi political processes which are establishing democratic governments. We see it in strengthened alliances with middle east nations like The United Arab Emirites. And we see it in many of the news articles coming out now noting the pressure fractures in Al Qaeda. For example, take a look at Fareed Zakaria’s article in Newsweek:

Al Qaeda Central, by which I mean the dwindling band of brothers on the Afghan-Pakistani border, appears to have turned into a communications company. It’s capable of producing the occasional jihadist cassette, but not actual jihad.

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Bin Laden’s most recent appeal is a mishmash of argument and detail, and seems slightly crazed. He has broadened his verbal attacks against the “Zionist-Crusaders” to include the United Nations and China. The latter he condemns because it “represents the Buddhists and Pagans of the world.”Like Hitler crazily declaring war on the United States after Pearl Harbor, bin Laden is adding to his slew of formidable enemies…

Zakaria is right, Bin Laden seems to have lost all of his composure and is clearly grasping like a drowning man. Zakaria points to a real blunder by Bin Laden in the Sudan:

Bin Laden also makes some plaintive appeals to Muslims to rise up and attack the “crusaders” in the west of Sudan. This shows desperation because there are no “crusaders” in Sudan. The troops there are African Union peacekeepers. But more interestingly, the victims in Darfur are Muslim.

I am guessing there are a lot of Muslims scratching their heads over this and re-assessing their idolic views about Bin Laden, The Savior. Zakaria goes on to point out what I have been saying for some time, the brutality against Muslims who do not toe the Al Qaeda line are a strategic blunder of epoch proportions. We see more and more evidence that Al Qaeda is being turned in to authorities in Iraq (previously here and here). Today’s evidence is the results of more attacks on insurgetns from tips from the Iraqis:

American and Iraqi forces have killed more than 20 insurgents during raids in areas used by militants to stage attacks in Baghdad, the U.S. military said Sunday.

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The U.S. military said the raids have taken place in and around Youssifiyah, a town about 12 miles south of Baghdad, where an American helicopter apparently was shot down by insurgents nearly a month ago, killing the two soldiers aboard.

In the latest operations Saturday, U.S. and Iraqi forces attacked buildings used by foreign insurgent groups such as al-Qaida in Iraq, capturing seven militants and detaining more than 50 suspects, the U.S. command said.

Insurgents have been using the Youssifiyah region as a staging ground for suicide attacks Baghdad, the command said. Several of the 20 insurgents killed in the last few weeks were wearing suicide vests, it said.

Amazing news if one looks at the big picture and sees where this news is hopefully aking us.