Opinion: French terrorism sleuth sees crisis growing beyond control

Former French anti-terrorist judge Jean-Louis Bruguiere attends a news conference following the launch of his book "Ce que je n'ai pas pu dire" (What I was not Allowed to Say) in Paris, Nov. 9, 2009. (Charles Platiau/Reuters)

PARIS, France — The implacable French cop-judge who for years terrorized terrorists across the globe now sees a growing wave of splinter cells and loners all but beyond control.

“Authorities stop some, but they are also creating more,” Jean-Louis Bruguiere says. “As resentment and hostility grow, volunteers join up or act on their own.”

We talked not long before that young Nigerian nearly blew up a Christmas flight from Amsterdam over Detroit. As usual, Bruguiere was ahead of the game.

He warned that West Africa was a fertile new breeding ground, in cities but also across the Sahara where arms and drugs to pay for them move freely over ancient salt trails.

And, he added, so are parts of Southeast Asia and Latin America, as well as disaffected neighborhoods in the heart of Europe.

In the Evil Empire days, the terrorism he battled was a state monopoly, usually with links to Moscow. If Western agents could not prevent it, they could follow its tracks.

Now, he said, religious fervor is fed by bitterness over such tactics as torture and air strikes that kill innocents. “It’s much more dangerous, harder to control.”

Recruiters find suicide bombers in mosques but also via coded internet sites. Al Qaeda provides independent cells with material support and instruction.

Iran gives sophisticated help to terrorists from Algeria to Argentina to keep the West off balance. Its policy of indirect action has not changed for decades, Bruguiere says, but it is now far more dangerous.

With all of this, Pakistan’s senior command includes extremists who protect the Taliban and Al Qaeda and could gain eventual access to nukes.

The man who knows summed it up: “We have never been so close to nuclear terrorism.”

Heftily built and pit-bull tenacious, Bruguiere comes from a line of judges dating back to Napoleon. Under the French system, he does both law and order. Since 2007, he has commuted to Washington on a task force to follow money.

In his new role, he cushions criticism with diplomacy. Still, his message is clear.

"What I Could Not Say," his new book published in Paris, spills the beans on past world-class cases and also hammers the Bush administration for making things worse.

He says fighting terror was much easier in 2002 before Dick Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz set out on what a self-styled quasi-divine mission with little thought to delicate political balances.

He describes how Pakistani officers misled CIA inspectors at military camps, hiding young zealots who they then dispatched on terrorist missions to Western countries.

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/worldview/091230/jean-louis-bruguiere-terrorism-growing