CX237_6FC8_9.JPG?alias=standard_600x400' alt='Al Qaeda Nuclear Program In North' title='Al Qaeda Nuclear Program In North' />THE illegal tobacco trade is helping to prop up Kim Jonguns nuclear program as well as the worlds biggest terror groups, according to a US security chief. National security news and U. S. military news from The Washington Post. Full coverage of national security, the Pentagon, Department of Defense, defense budgets, and. North Korea is years beyond the nuclear breakout the US so fears in Iran. Pyongyangs first nuclear test was more than a decade ago. Four more have followed. Iran on Tuesday warned that it could rev up its nuclear program if the US continues threats and sanctions against the country and. Watch Al Jazeera Americas groundbreaking investigative reports, thoughtprovoking profiles, and interviews with prominent newsmakers. AlQaeda Participant in the Global War on Terrorism, War in Afghanistan, War in NorthWest Pakistan, Somali Civil War, Insurgency in the Maghreb, Iraq. From alQaeda Terrorist To CIA Freedom Fighter One Mans Journey From Europe To Libya. Whats In A Name U. S. Takes Syrias AlQaeda Off Terror Watchlists. By changing its name to Hayat Tahrir alSham HTS, the Syrian branch of alQaeda. Praljak drank poison seconds after United Nations judges turned down his appeal against a 20year sentence for war crimes against Bosnian Muslims. A Short History Foreign Policy Ever since launching the war on terror in 2. United States has struggled to define let alone defeat what has proved to be a maddeningly amorphous enemy. Al Qaeda, once a relatively defined and hierarchical group, has metastasized into a multinational movement with franchise operations in at least 1. Mali to Syria, Yemen to Nigeria. These so called affiliates have largely replaced the Pakistan based mothership now known as al Qaeda core or al Qaeda central as the driving force of global jihad. That distinction, between the original terrorist group and its offshoots, has recently grown in political significance as U. S. President Barack Obama touts his decimation of al Qaedas core leadership even if each new start up renders that victory less and less reassuring. August 1. 98. 8 After years of supporting the Afghan mujahideen, Osama bin Laden and some of his top associates meet in a suburb of Peshawar, Pakistan. With Soviet forces withdrawing from Afghanistan, the idea of a global jihad suddenly seems possible, and al Qaeda, literally the Base, is born. We used to call the training camp al Qaeda, bin Laden would later recall. And the name stayed. Bin Laden moves his base of operations to Sudan, where he forges links with militants across the Middle East and North Africa who play a role in numerous terrorist attacks, including the 1. World Trade Center. In February 1. 99. Sudan and returning to Afghanistan, he issues a fatwa against the United States. Later that year, he orders the U. S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, which kill 2. October 7, 2. 00. U. S. and British forces attack Afghanistan after the Taliban regime fails to produce bin Laden, who is accused of masterminding the 91. Within months, the bulk of al Qaeda has been driven into Pakistan, where the organization reconstitutes itself and proceeds to play a role in bombings from Bali in 2. Madrid in 2. 00. 4 to London in 2. May 1. 2, 2. 00. 3 Al Qaeda launches a sustained insurgency against Saudi Arabia, carrying out a series of bombings in Riyadh. In November, the indigenous wing of bin Ladens organization becomes the first to take on the al Qaeda in formulation, dubbing itself al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula AQAP. Over the next three years, AQAP kills hundreds before Saudi security forces are able to stomp it out. October 1. 7, 2. 00. Abu Musab al Zarqawi, whose terrorist group has perpetrated some of the most dramatic attacks of the Iraq war, pledges allegiance to bin Laden and founds al Qaeda in Iraq AQI. Around this time, the CIA begins using the term AQCore, for al Qaeda core, to distinguish bin Ladens Pakistan based group from such offshoots. July 2. 00. 5 Bin Ladens deputy, Ayman al Zawahiri, chastises Zarqawi for his extreme tactics, warning that AQIs brutal beheading videos could alienate potential supporters. Terrorism analysts see this as evidence that al Qaeda core is not in control of its affiliates. February 3, 2. 00. Twenty three al Qaeda suspects escape from a Yemeni prison. Widely considered the moment of conception for a new AQAP one of the inmates, Nasser al Wuhayshi, would go on to lead the organization after its official founding in 2. Qaedas presence in Yemen. September 1. 1, 2. Zawahiri announces the union of al Qaeda and the Group for Preaching and Combat GSPC, a militant Salafi organization with roots in the Algerian civil war. Four months later, GSPC rebrands itself al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb AQIM and carries out a series of deadly attacks in Algeria. By 2. 01. 2, AQIM has established footholds in Niger and Mauritania and has briefly joined forces with Tuareg rebels to seize control of northern Mali. December 2. 5, 2. As Northwest Airlines Flight 2. Detroit, passenger Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab attempts to detonate plastic explosives sewn into his underwear. The attack, which would have been the first on American soil by an al Qaeda affiliate, fails. He tells the FBI that he received training and the explosive device from AQAP. But there is no evidence that the group coordinated the plot with al Qaeda core. July October 2. 01. Bin Laden asks a senior al Qaeda associate in Pakistan to draft a memorandum requiring regional al Qaeda affiliates brothers to consult with al Qaeda central before carrying out operations another apparent sign that the core is losing control of the periphery. May 2, 2. 01. 1 U. S. Navy SEALs storm a nondescript compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and kill bin Laden. Zawahiri is tapped to succeed him, but the death of its longtime leader is seen as a near knockout blow for al Qaeda core. January 3. 1, 2. 01. As long as we sustain the pressure on it, we judge that core al Qaeda will be of largely symbolic importance to the global jihadist movement, National Director of Intelligence James Clapper tells the U. S. Senate. But regional affiliates and, to a lesser extent, small cells and individuals will drive the global jihad agenda. February 2. Al Qaeda merges with Somali insurgent group al Shabab, with which it had long maintained close ties. The following year, al Shabab kills 6. Nairobis Westgate mall. September 2. 01. 2 Zawahiri calls on his followers to exploit the violence in Syria, where rebels are battling Bashar al Assads regime. Seven months later, al Qaeda in Iraq changes its name to the Islamic State of Iraq and al Sham ISIS to emphasize its growing involvement in the Syrian conflict. But ISIS soon begins to feud with another al Qaeda affiliate in Syria, Jabhat al Nusra. June 1. 5, 2. 01. ISIS becomes the first al Qaeda affiliate to go rogue, defying an order from Zawahiri to quit fighting in Syria and return to Iraq. I have to choose between the rule of God and the rule of al Zawahiri, and I choose the rule of God, ISIS leader Abu Bakr al Baghdadi declares. In February 2. 01. Qaedas central command washes its hands of ISIS, saying it is not a branch of the al Qaeda group. August 2. Zawahiri promotes AQAP chief Wuhayshi to the No. Qaedas core and orders him to carry out an attack, triggering the closure of 2. U. S. embassies across the Muslim world. The promotion discredits the widespread claim that al Qaedas core is based solely in the Afghanistan Pakistan border area, notes the Long War Journal. January 3, 2. 01. As Iraq slides toward civil war, ISIS captures the city of Fallujah. The police and the Army have abandoned the city, a local journalist tells the Washington Post. Al Qaeda has taken down all the Iraqi flags and burned them, and it has raised its own flag on all the buildings. January 2. Terrorism experts Peter Bergen and Jennifer Rowland report that, with recent gains in Syria and Iraq, al Qaeda and its affiliates control more territory in the Arab world than at any time in its history. Obama later argues, There is a distinction between the capacity and reach of a bin Laden and a network that is actively planning major terrorist plots against the homeland versus jihadists who are engaged in various local power struggles and disputes, often sectarian. His analogy If a jayvee team puts on Lakers uniforms, that doesnt make them Kobe Bryant. March 1. This article originally misstated that Ayman al Zawahiri announced the union of al Qaeda and the Armed Islamic Group GIA. The union was between al Qaeda and the Group for Preaching and Combat GSPC, which had previously broken away from GIA. National Security The Washington Post. Joomla Templates Artistic. Success Check your inbox for details. You might also like Please enter a valid email address.