LOL: Pirates as Part of a Grand Jihadi Conspiracy
Look, Walid’s a nice guy but this is a laughable caricature of institutional legacy thinking:
Here is why: these so-called Somali pirates are strategically different from their historical predecessors in the Caribbean, or from their contemporary colleagues in archipelagoes around the world. They aren’t a vast collection of individual thugs, acting as bands replicating what successful sea gangs have accomplished for centuries before them. They are too many, operating from extremely long shores, all using similar methods, and are backed from hinterland forces.
They may seem like pirates as they seize ships and negotiate for the ransom. But these water thugs actually belong to a wider chess game. The grand ensemble of the army of little boats is in fact part of a regional Jihadi apparatus being deployed in the Horn of Africa and beyond. The Jihadi grand circle building in the region is not limited to the pirates but involves hostile forces from the mid-Red Sea to East Africa. The Somali pirates are merely one facet of this grand circle.
This is nothing more than a maritime Jihad striking at the Western/international lifeline on high seas to bring about a change in balance of power.
(Emphasis mine.)
-Shlok
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