 First edition | |
| Author | Peter Bergen |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Political |
| Publisher | Free Press |
Publication date | June 28, 2011 |
| Media type | |
| ISBN | 978-0-7432-7893-5 |
The Longest War: The Enduring Conflict Between America and Al Qaeda is a book written by CNN's Peter Bergen. It was published in 2011 and became a New York Times bestseller. [1]
Bergen’s book covers the events which led up to the September 11 attacks and continues on, concluding with an account of the raid which killed Osama bin Laden. While Bergen’s past works focused more on bin Laden and the rise of Al-Qaeda, The Longest War sheds new light on American actions in the War on Terror.
From the outset, Bergen builds a strong case against the incompetence of the George W. Bush administration during the early years of the war, from the failure to capture or kill bin Laden at Tora Bora, to the bungled early days of the Iraq War and the CIA's controversial use of enhanced interrogation techniques that often yielded little beyond what had been gathered using standard approaches. However, Bergen notes that by the end of President Bush’s second term in office, Al-Qaeda’s own strategic failings were causing it to lose Muslim hearts and minds in the Middle East. Indeed, as Bergen puts it, Al-Qaeda’s continued destruction of Muslim lives in the name of jihad, coupled with its inability to morph into a broader movement with any real vision of governance, is its own undoing.
Michiko Kakutani of The New York Times writes that The Longest War is an "essential book" which provides a "succinct and compelling overview" of the War on Terror. [2]
Thomas E. Ricks, also writing for The New York Times, declares that Bergen "covers it all," from Al-Qaeda’s lethal aspirations and the Bush administration’s ineptitude, to the "continued unhelpful role of Pakistan" in the fight against jihadist terrorism. [3] Ricks notes that Bergen deftly explores the "miscalculations and misunderstandings of both sides in 2001," from bin Laden’s underestimation of the United States’ strength and resolve, to President Bush’s misguided attempt to characterize bin Laden’s motivation as a war "on our freedoms." Ricks adds, "For years, I tried to read every new novel about how 9/11 affected our lives. None of the novels were as effective or moving as The Longest War, which is a history of our time."
Jason Burke writes in The Guardian that "few rival Bergen’s . . . ability to explain, patiently and intelligibly, the complicated concepts" relating to Al-Qaeda, and Islamic militancy in general. [4] Burke calls The Longest War’s discussion of the inner workings of al-Qaeda "revelatory," noting that some members of al-Qaeda actually opposed carrying out the 9/11 attacks because they had the sense that the U.S.’s likely response would shut down their safe haven in Afghanistan.
Al-Qaeda, officially known as Qaedat al-Jihad, is a multinational militant Sunni Islamic extremist network composed of Salafist jihadists. Its members are mostly composed of Arabs, but may also include other peoples. Al-Qaeda has mounted attacks on civilian and military targets in various countries, including the 1998 United States embassy bombings, the September 11 attacks, and the 2002 Bali bombings; it has been designated as a terrorist group by the United Nations Security Council, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the European Union, India, and various other countries.
Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden, also transliterated as Usama bin Ladin, was a Saudi Arabian-born militant, mastermind behind the September 11 attacks and founder of the Pan-Islamic militant organization al-Qaeda. The group is designated as a terrorist group by the United Nations Security Council, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the European Union, and various countries. Under bin Laden, al-Qaeda was responsible for the September 11 attacks in the United States and many other mass-casualty attacks worldwide. On 2 May 2011, he was killed by U.S. special operations forces at his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan.
The following timeline is a chronological list of all the major events leading up to, during, and immediately following the September 11 attacks against the United States in 2001 timeline starts with the completion of the first World Trade Center tower in 1970 through the first anniversary of the attacks in 2002.
Ayman Mohammed Rabie al-Zawahiri was an Egyptian-born terrorist, and physician who served as the second emir of al-Qaeda from June 16, 2011, until his death.
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Michael F. Scheuer, is an American former intelligence officer for the Central Intelligence Agency, blogger, author, commentator and former adjunct professor at Georgetown University's Center for Peace and Security Studies. One assignment during his 22-year career was serving as Chief of the Bin Laden Issue Station from 1996 to 1999. He also served as Special Advisor to the Chief of Alec Station from September 2001 to November 2004.
The Saddam–al-Qaeda conspiracy theory was a conspiracy theory based on allegations made by U.S. government officials, who claimed that a highly secretive relationship existed between Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and the radical Islamist militant organization Al-Qaeda between 1992 and 2003, specifically through a series of meetings reportedly involving the Iraqi Intelligence Service (IIS). In the lead-up to the Iraq War, George W. Bush administration officials alleged that the Saddam Hussein regime had an operational relationship with al-Qaeda, basing the administration's rationale for war, in part, on this allegation and others.
Richard Miniter is an investigative journalist and author whose articles have appeared in Politico, The New York Times, The Washington Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic Monthly, Newsweek, The New Republic, National Review, PJ Media, and Reader’s Digest. A former editorial writer and columnist for The Wall Street Journal in Europe, as well as a member of the investigative reporting team of the Sunday Times of London, he is currently the National Security columnist for Forbes. He also authored three New York Times best-selling books, Losing bin Laden, Shadow War, Leading From Behind, and most recently Eyes On Target. In April 2014, Miniter was included by CSPAN's Brian Lamb in his book Sundays At Eight, as one of Lamb's top 40 book author interviews of the past 25 years for Miniter's investigative work on 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed.
Holy War, Inc.: Inside the Secret World of Bin Laden is a book by CNN investigative journalist and documentarian Peter Bergen. It was published in November 2001, two months after the September 11 attacks, and was a New York Times Best Seller in 2001.
The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by the militant Islamist extremist network al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners scheduled to travel from the Northeastern United States to California. The hijackers crashed the first two planes into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, and the third plane into the Pentagon in Arlington County, Virginia. The fourth plane was intended to hit a federal government building in Washington, D.C., but crashed in a field following a passenger revolt. The attacks killed nearly 3,000 people and instigated the global war on terror.
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Peter Bergen is an American journalist, author, and producer who serves as CNN's national security analyst and as New America's vice president. He produced the first television interview with Osama bin Laden in 1997, which aired on CNN.
The Battle of Tora Bora was a military engagement that took place in the cave complex of Tora Bora, eastern Afghanistan, from December 6–17, 2001, during the opening stages of the United States invasion of Afghanistan. It was launched by the United States and its allies with the objective to capture or kill Osama bin Laden, the founder and leader of the militant organization al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda and bin Laden were suspected of being responsible for the September 11 attacks three months prior. Tora Bora is located in the White Mountains near the Khyber Pass. The U.S. stated that al-Qaeda had its headquarters there and that it was Bin Laden's location at the time.
Peter Bergen's The Osama bin Laden I Know (ISBN 978-0-7432-7891-1) is a book published in 2006. It is a comprehensive collection of personal accounts by people who have met Osama bin Laden or worked with him at various stages of his terrorist career.
Some sources have alleged that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had ties with Osama Bin Laden's al-Qaeda and its "Afghan Arab" fighters when it armed Mujahideen groups to fight the Soviet Union during the Soviet–Afghan War.
Bill Roggio is an American commentator on military affairs, and the managing editor of The Long War Journal. Prior to leading a team of online commentators, Roggio published the online weblog The Fourth Rail. Roggio was an active duty soldier in the United States Army in the 1990s.
The September 11 attacks in the United States in 2001 were carried out by 19 hijackers of the militant Islamist terrorist organization al-Qaeda. In the 1990s, al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden declared a holy war against the United States, and issued two fatāwā in 1996 and 1998. In these fatāwā, bin Laden sharply criticized the financial contributions of the American government to the Saudi royal family as well as American military intervention in the Arab world.
Manhunt: The Ten Year Search for Bin Laden From 9/11 to Abbottabad is Peter Bergen's fourth book on the subject of Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda. It was originally published in 2012 and became a New York Times bestseller later that year. It would then become the basis for an HBO documentary, Manhunt: The Search for Bin Laden.
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