It seems unlikely that the insurgents in Iraq want the Democrats to win the congressional elections. In fact, they may be hoping for the chaos of the occupation to continue. Former Wall Street Journal reporter and George Tenet apologist par excellence Ron Suskind said as much in his new book, The One Percent Doctrine, published in June.
In one of the book's climactic moments (it's written in the style of a Tom Clancy or Robert Ludlum thriller), Suskind discusses the October, 2004 message from Osama bin Laden in which he bashes Mr Bush. CIA analysis of the tape - performed by the same unit that analyzes all such tapes - concluded that it was specifically designed to assist in the re-election of Mr Bush. Suskind quotes the Deputy Assistant Director of Intelligence as saying, "Certainly [Bin Laden] would want Bush to keep doing what he's doing for a few more years."
Why? Well, for one, Suskind points out that Bush's approval ratings in America tracked with Osama's in the Middle East between 9/11 and when the book was published (the correllation has since disappeared). More important, however, would be Lawrence Wright's assertion in The Looming Tower that Al Qaeda had long hoped for America to become embroiled in a war in the Middle East. (Like Suskind, Wright is no madman or liberal nutcase.) Al Qaeda hoped a large American presence in the region would radicalize Muslims around the world and only weaken the United States' position. By Wright's logic, Bin Laden wanted the U.S. to stay in Iraq, and feared Kerry would take troops out.
Of course, the CIA has been known to be wrong in the past. But Wright's analysis of Qaeda goals (based on documents and propaganda distributed by the terrorist group before the invasion) is pretty compelling.
