Sono riuscito finalmente a completare la lettura di questo notevole saggio della RAND Corporation: "An Economic Analysis of the Financial Records of al-Qaida in Iraq".
Come si evince anche dal titolo gli autori hanno esaminato una raccolta di documenti "amministrativi" appartenenti al gruppo terroristico "Al Qaeda in Iraq" (AQI) e ritrovati tra il 2005 ed il 2006. L'analisi è molto approfondita ed i risultati alquanto interessanti, sia per la comprensione dei meccanismi operativi propri del gruppo iraqeno sia, più in generale, per le attività di contro-terrorismo.
Cito dalla prefazione: "The records show that AQI was a bureaucratic, hierarchical organization that exercised tight financial control over its largely criminally derived revenue streams. Using attack reports and AQI’s spending data, we find that attacks statistically increased at a rate of one per every $2,700 sent by the provincial administration to a sector group within the province, suggesting that AQI paid not only for materiel but also for important expenses related to organizational sustainment, such as compensation and rents. AQI members were paid less and simultaneously faced a much greater risk of death than the general Anbar population, which suggests that financial rewards were not a primary reason for joining the group. Our findings imply that financial interdiction is one useful tool for slowing and disrupting militant attacks, but that neither interdiction nor material demobilization incentives on their own will be effective in ending a militant group."