Systems Dynamics Model of Al-Qa'ida and United States "Competition"

Abstract

Since the late 1980's, al-Qa'ida expanded from a small group of mujahadeen freedom fighters combating the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan to a highly sophisticated, distributed terrorist network able to conduct large-scale, international acts of terrorism. The terrorist attacks on the United States in September 2001 brought to the fore a group of people who had a competing, devastatingly lethal philosophy to modern societies around the world. A systems dynamics model was created in order to better understand how this group attained its current status and what possible strategies the United States could take to counter al-Qa'ida's efforts.The model consists of six sub-models: one to replicate the actions taken by the United States and five to describe how al-Qa'ida recruits new members, trains these recruits, sustains their capabilities, and then executes terrorist attacks. The model was first validated by establishing that its output data closely resembled the behavior of al-Qa'ida and the United States over the period 1990-2002. Two different United States strategies are being tested against two different al-Qa'ida strategies for the period 2002-2010 to determine possible outcomes the United States may face.Results from the model indicate that despite potential successes in capturing 9,000-13,000 members of al-Qa'ida and preventing most of their attacks, the United States could still potentially suffer at least 3 additional terrorist attacks before 2010 resulting in the loss of a minimum of 2,000 lives. Even though these results are not predictive, they do pose additional questions that the United States should be asking and answering; questions such as: Will the American people "accept" 2,000 additional deaths as a cost of the global war on terrorism? and what else could and should the United States federal government be doing to ensure the security of the American people?