All this QUANTUM stuff reminds me of an old dissection of Die Another Day from way back-
Anyways, I was wondering how what a fictional SPECTRE-esque al-Qaeda would look like: part supervillain organization, part jihadist pipe dream, part Western hysteria.
*It would be truly be the grotesque toxic caliphate nightmare in gestation, connected to everything unwholesome and suspect in the Muslim world. Saudis? Old hat in the real world already. Saddam? The Neocons were right on that one. Syria? In this world, Baathism is just jihadism with a socialist face. Iran? What's a few succession conflicts between brothers? This ultra-aQ would be everywhere, from smuggling weapons to the Darfurian janjaweed to creating a shadow government to undermine Turkey's slipping secularist regime. Every breakaway Muslim group, from Hamas to the Chechens to the Uighurs to Kashmir to the rioters of Paris feels their unseen influence.
* It would be connected to everything unsavory and anti-West. The Aryan Nations? Not just; every racist anti-American, anti-'zog' group from the Christian Identity Movement to survivalist militias to abortion bombers to the Klan themselves are secretly funded through layers upon layers of the Bin Laden family's dummy companies. In fact, with the help of the white terrorists they were able to use Timothy McVeigh and the original WTC attack as their test runs.
* MS-13, in conjunction with several ethnic street gangs, are the ones running the southern border. Rogue elements of the Mexican army, the Zetas, are aiding them. Several hostile nuclear devices have already been smuggled onto U.S. soil.
* In a replay of the '70s and '80s, they're also collaborating with various non-Muslim nationalist separatist movements, including the IRA and ETA. Shared training and equipment, and sometimes the islamofascists like to hire a Caucasian face to blow up something.
* Deep ecology is as sinister as the conservatives claim, and radical members of Earth Now!, ELF, ALF, etc. are also receiving clandestine support from the jihadists.
*Its sleeper agents have infiltrated the upper echelons of western government, sowing discord, paranoia, and frantic fascism. PATRIOT Act? That was them. Sweden's wiretapping? Them as well. Ultra-Qaeda murdered Theo Van Gogh and created Ayan Hirsi Ali to galvanize the rightists of Holland. Daily Mail's wildest stories? Swiss xenophobes in power? Europe's overall unwillingness to assimilate an increasingly disaffected Muslim population? Yep, Qaeda.
* Islamism isn't the only goal. Ultimately, the core ideology, known only to a few, of ultra-Qaeda, is no less than bringing about a balance to the world by collapsing the West at their current pinnacle of decadence. It's all very nihilistic.
* To continue the neo-Batman links, they have a state actor friend in Kim Jong-Il, their avowed ally, a cretin who isn't looking for anything logical. He can't be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. He just wants to watch the world burn.
* To go with the "evil old rich white man" theme of recent Bond films (as well as most '90s films in the vein), ultra-Qaeda has tacit support from some of the West's economic and media luminaries. And also your usual improbable retinue of Eurotrash arm dealers, German bank robbers, disgruntled hackers, evil corporations, French crimelords, and the like. Oh, and also Chavez of Venezuela, who foolishly believes that they will allow him to create a Democratic Socialist Bolivarian paradise over the Americas.
*Osama has a giant lair in the Himalayas. Cabal of seditious Chinese generals and Russian ex-KGB officers shielding him. It's complicated.
* They may or may not have a rivalry with Al Takfir Wal Hijra.
I think I can throw in more things, such as a resurgent neo-Bushido-Yakuza Japan and reactionary American generals itching for a coup to bring Law and Order upon the besieged nation, but I'll leave it to you.
SPECTRE was like an al Qaeda unhampered by religious scruples...
And Die Another Day is another glittering toy about a rogue capitalist: Gustav Graves (Toby Stephens), considered a citizen above suspicion and knighted by the British government. Wouldn't it have been irresistible bad taste to have this new Bond villain explain that Osama bin Laden is only a No. 6 or 7 in a much bigger scheme, a SPECTRE reborn?
Anyways, I was wondering how what a fictional SPECTRE-esque al-Qaeda would look like: part supervillain organization, part jihadist pipe dream, part Western hysteria.
*It would be truly be the grotesque toxic caliphate nightmare in gestation, connected to everything unwholesome and suspect in the Muslim world. Saudis? Old hat in the real world already. Saddam? The Neocons were right on that one. Syria? In this world, Baathism is just jihadism with a socialist face. Iran? What's a few succession conflicts between brothers? This ultra-aQ would be everywhere, from smuggling weapons to the Darfurian janjaweed to creating a shadow government to undermine Turkey's slipping secularist regime. Every breakaway Muslim group, from Hamas to the Chechens to the Uighurs to Kashmir to the rioters of Paris feels their unseen influence.
* It would be connected to everything unsavory and anti-West. The Aryan Nations? Not just; every racist anti-American, anti-'zog' group from the Christian Identity Movement to survivalist militias to abortion bombers to the Klan themselves are secretly funded through layers upon layers of the Bin Laden family's dummy companies. In fact, with the help of the white terrorists they were able to use Timothy McVeigh and the original WTC attack as their test runs.
* MS-13, in conjunction with several ethnic street gangs, are the ones running the southern border. Rogue elements of the Mexican army, the Zetas, are aiding them. Several hostile nuclear devices have already been smuggled onto U.S. soil.
* In a replay of the '70s and '80s, they're also collaborating with various non-Muslim nationalist separatist movements, including the IRA and ETA. Shared training and equipment, and sometimes the islamofascists like to hire a Caucasian face to blow up something.
* Deep ecology is as sinister as the conservatives claim, and radical members of Earth Now!, ELF, ALF, etc. are also receiving clandestine support from the jihadists.
*Its sleeper agents have infiltrated the upper echelons of western government, sowing discord, paranoia, and frantic fascism. PATRIOT Act? That was them. Sweden's wiretapping? Them as well. Ultra-Qaeda murdered Theo Van Gogh and created Ayan Hirsi Ali to galvanize the rightists of Holland. Daily Mail's wildest stories? Swiss xenophobes in power? Europe's overall unwillingness to assimilate an increasingly disaffected Muslim population? Yep, Qaeda.
* Islamism isn't the only goal. Ultimately, the core ideology, known only to a few, of ultra-Qaeda, is no less than bringing about a balance to the world by collapsing the West at their current pinnacle of decadence. It's all very nihilistic.
* To continue the neo-Batman links, they have a state actor friend in Kim Jong-Il, their avowed ally, a cretin who isn't looking for anything logical. He can't be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. He just wants to watch the world burn.
* To go with the "evil old rich white man" theme of recent Bond films (as well as most '90s films in the vein), ultra-Qaeda has tacit support from some of the West's economic and media luminaries. And also your usual improbable retinue of Eurotrash arm dealers, German bank robbers, disgruntled hackers, evil corporations, French crimelords, and the like. Oh, and also Chavez of Venezuela, who foolishly believes that they will allow him to create a Democratic Socialist Bolivarian paradise over the Americas.
*Osama has a giant lair in the Himalayas. Cabal of seditious Chinese generals and Russian ex-KGB officers shielding him. It's complicated.
* They may or may not have a rivalry with Al Takfir Wal Hijra.
I think I can throw in more things, such as a resurgent neo-Bushido-Yakuza Japan and reactionary American generals itching for a coup to bring Law and Order upon the besieged nation, but I'll leave it to you.