SPIEGEL ONLINE LOOKING FOR AL QAEDA

Yassin Musharbash at Spiegel Online marked the anniversary of 9/11 by conducting the following exercise:
… there is no single, clear image of al-Qaida or its current status. It has changed from an organization of militias into something nobody recognizes.
Is it more of a movement? Are al-Qaida’s capabilities weaker than before, or is another 9/11 still possible?
Are there fewer members of al-Qaida now, or more?
For the seventh anniversary of 9/11, SPIEGEL ONLINE has asked seven renowned terrorism experts from seven different countries for their opinions of the threat al-Qaida still poses. They are all influential analysts, authors and observers of the global jihad movement. They agree on many things, but disagree on such basic principles as the network’s future goals and the success of Western measures against terrorism.
Read Hoffman, Paz, Gunaratna, Ranstorp & Co. here.
Already mentioned on this blog, but Richard Barrett’s Seven Years after 9/11: Al-Qaida’s Strengths and Vulnerabilities [PDF] has now been picked up by Tom Barnett and is also well worth reading.