Paul L. Williams argues that Osama bin Laden had wanted to conduct a nuclear strike against the U.S., with 7 to 10 strategic nukes set to go off in major cities at the same time. According to Williams, if bin Laden had wanted a simple radiological assault instead, it would have already occurred. He posits that this would have been within the capacity of his supporters years ago. As for the progress toward the larger goal, there is the following to consider. Per Williams, U.S. intelligence estimates that there had been up to twenty-four tactical nukes floating around the United States - at least, Abu Mohamed al-Masry Saad al-Sharif corroborated such estimates. Assuming his claims to be true, it would appear the nukes had been smuggled across the U.S.-Mexican border with relative ease, which is alarming.
The idea that bin Laden had pursued something bigger goes back to the allegation that he wanted to kill ten million Americans, and this would have required at least a strategic nuke. According to Williams, six Pakistani scientists, including Bashiruddin Mahmood, were confronted by bin Laden regarding the construction of such a weapon. It is not clear what sort of information was exchanged during the meeting, but Williams asserts that, in 1996, there were over seven hundred instances of nuke-related material purchases, all routed through Germany to bin Laden. In 2003, a terrorist suspect named Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was arrested and reportedly had his laptop confiscated with documents detailing these orders. It sounds almost too unreal, but Williams claims that the plans for the "American Hiroshima" were right there, on the laptop. Adnan Gulshair el-Shukrijumah was one of the individuals implicated in connection with the discovery. A Guyanese nuclear technician and accomplished pilot, Shukrijumah was considered to be "extremely dangerous" by the CIA, and Williams predicted that he would play a role in the next attack.
Of course, that has yet to happen, and one might dismiss Williams as a propagandist of sorts who is spreading sensational claims about suspects under investigation. Already, in October 2003, Williams was sued for libel after alleging that Shukrijumah had attempted to steal nuclear material at a certain university in Canada. The university claimed that Williams' reports were damaging to its reputation and had no basis in fact. Williams lost the case.
Others might dismiss the claims as fanciful altogether. After all, would such an elaborate plan by Islamic Fundamentalists not require a network of supportive actors within the target state? But there is more than meets the eye here. By proclaiming to be waging war on abortion, liberalism, hyperconsumerism, smut and the rest of the "cultural pollution" from the Western world, the Islamic jihad movement has achieved a surprising level of support from Muslim communities. That is especially true in Saudi Arabia, where 90% of educated Saudis between the ages of 19 and 45 support jihad and bin Laden. Part of that may have to do with Wahhabi Islam, the religion of Saudi Arabia since 1932. Unlike the reformed versions of Islam, it affords strict interpretations of the Koran that contribute to anti-American sentiments. Incidentally, in 2001, out of the 1400 mosques in the U.S., eighty percent were established and funded by Wahhabis, and a survey by a Pew Research group reported that an estimated thirty percent of the Muslim community in the U.S. was not against the idea of suicide bombings. Islam is also the fastest-growing religion in the United States, so the support network, at least in theory, is present.
Ironically, the growth of Wahhabist communities in the U.S. could be one of the reasons that the "American Hiroshima" plan Williams foresaw never came to fruition; after all, why risk your own community getting glassed, along with everyone else, during a nuclear explosion? Why risk every Muslim being expelled for a lone-wolf's jihad when every Muslim already in the Western world - or intending to get there - can just have some dozen children, raise each to create another dozen children, and gradually take over the infertile and infantile West? This is the much more efficient pathway toward total domination. Furthermore, as presented, it is living evidence that not living according to Islam is inferior and Allah's will is served. As a Muslim who believes these tenets, what more could you want?
And so, it seems a battle of births, ideals and social philosophies is now underway instead - a soft-power struggle between the ideologues of the Islamic Fundamentalist political movement, to build and retain influence in Muslim immigrant communities and the monied individuals who shape initiatives in the Western world. I predict we will see the culmination of this struggle in our lifetimes. Of course, most people in the Western world are too busy chasing money or pursuing impulsive whims or vices to see this unfolding or care. In that sense, they shape their own destiny; in the West, especially in Europe, this same indifference allowed Muslims to slip into the country without much protest or demand for vetting in the first place. And, the ideals the West pedestalizes, which Wahhabism stands against - things like feminism, abortion, smut and hypermaterialism, for example - well, these are the very things destroying family and contributing to low native-birth populations, giving traditional Muslims a definite edge in the "battle for births". Yet nobody wants to change these behaviors or stop promoting the lifestyles that, inevitably, somebody somewhere is making money through - whether in promoting smut, degeneracy or hyper-individualist crass consumerism.
Make no mistake, seeing the world as nothing but a market to conquer to dump products in is a big part of the mentality that suggests the West will be replaced. But the mindset that the world is a raw economic forum, with resources like oil or opium to control and procure, is not so far off the mark - and a big part of the animosity towards the West that has made a mess of the world. So everything comes full circle. That said, it is important to remember who is making money from this, just as it is important to think about who operates border-transcending smut industries and sells crooked morality and hypermaterialism associated with their products around the clock. In case I've lost you, it's those who currently control the West - those who, facing an "American Hiroshima", would surely have dodged underground and left everyone else above to suffer. Hopefully, on some brighter day, these people will be brought to justice. And hopefully, in Europe - where Muslims stand to become the majority - that means something other than nationalist and Islamist communities at each other's throats in the streets, seeking to take control of the collapsing liberal society around them. Unfortunately, this end scenario is no less likely to be a fiction than "America Hiroshima" was; we can only hope that, unlike "American Hiroshima", the course will lead to a more favorable end.
