In search of a Dracula

Meidyatama Suryodiningrat , The Jakarta Post , Jakarta | Wed, 07/22/2009 11:34 AM | Headlines

Was it Jamaah Islamiyah (JI)? Or was it, as President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said based on his intelligence — “not gossip or rumor” — a group “who may not be from the network we currently know of”?

After the initial shock of the attack, compounded by the confusion of Yudhoyono’s own statement of a plot to sabotage the election and his re-nomination, the conventional wisdom behind the attack quickly turned to the traditional nemesis of JI.

Ansyaad Mbai, head of the antiterrorism desk at the Office of the Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal and Security Affairs, has now gone on record as saying Indonesia’s most wanted man, Noordin M.

Top, is connected to Friday’s twin bombings.

So is Noordin M. Top the Nosferatu that Yudhoyono was referring to when he said Friday that “the state will not allow them to escape to become Draculas and spread death”?

Four days later, there has been no further explanation on what the President meant by his remark. A comment some have construed as a jibe at another contender in the recently concluded presidential election. Or perhaps Yudhoyono was still referring to splinter groups of JI who were also bent on disrupting his re-election?

The most interesting facts to emerge from the latest attack are not the similarity in the modus to other JI bombings, but the way the perpetrators have adapted and improvised to changing circumstances.

If it is JI, as most suspect, then it is frightening to think how resilient they are to have evolved and become an effective learning organization, despite being an underground anti-establishment group constantly on the run, evading detection and capture.

The fact that they checked into the hotel at least three days in advance, were able to smuggle the bomb materials into their room and construct the explosive device within hotel premises, shows the kind of resourcefulness and ingenuity not previously seen. And while it has yet to be clearly established, there is growing indication that the attack may have pinpointed certain targets (meetings), which means the perpetrators would have needed “intelligence” of their own, with thorough knowledge of location, time and access routes.

Add to that the kind of audacity to posthumously mock the bombing’s postmortem as investigators discover that one of the assailants enjoyed the last days of his life constructing the bomb in a plush US$200 a night room using the same first name — “Nurdin” — as the country’s most wanted terrorist.

A growing level of sophistication from “simple” car bombs and the random incendiary device, to targeted infiltration and detonation.

Most alarming and now obvious to all is the pattern established of how consecutive multiple attacks, which have been a signature since the 2002 Bali bombings, allows the option of conducting a precision strike, as Friday’s JW Marriott bombing seems to suggest, or one that inflicts as much casualties by setting off a first decoy device to attract a crowd before the second primary device is ignited among the gathered mass.

The latter objective of mass casualties has largely been deferred since the 2003 JW Marriott bombing, which claimed many local victims and proved self-defeating to their “cause”. Either one, though, ultimately achieves the objective of spreading terror.

In the past two years, we have witnessed an open ideological debate from the internal publications of underground groups like JI on the appropriate mode to pursue their cause with a growing focus on outreach rather than violence. It is also clear from these debates and various other reports that there are fissures and splinters in the so-called JI network.

In some way, Yudhoyono may still be right when he said the terrorists were from a group “who may not be from the network we currently know of”.

While our past knowledge of the JI network over the past decade provides clear insight, it becomes clear that security services cannot necessarily repeat the same strategies of the past. This is in all likelihood a mutated strain of JI, more ideologically independent, resourceful and cunning than before.

Incarcerating the ideological head, closure of certain Islamic school, or decapitating its leadership, though it could dent the network’s effectiveness, may no longer suffice in vanquishing the threat of terrorism in this country.