Customer Reviews

Seeds of Terror: An Eyewitness Account of Al-Qaeda's Newest Center of Operations in Southeast Asia

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I currently work as a security professional for an international firm in Asia. I was also a former military counterintelligence officer engaged in force protection in Southeast Asia(and East Africa). I have read many books on the subject of international terrorism and terrorism in the Asia Pacific region. I remain vitally interested in this subject and the threat terrorism poses to US commercial interests in the region. I found "Seeds Of Terror" to be one of the most complete, thoroughly researched and informative books that I have read on the terrorist threat in Southeast Asia. It is clear to me from this book that the region was, and remains, a key battleground in the West's war on terror. Ms. Ressa's literary work in "Seeds Of Terror" is as outstanding as her television journalism on the same subject. The only reason I did not give this 5 stars (you don't have 4.5 ratings) is because I thought the material in the book would have been enchanced with photographs and perhaps charts that graphically portrayed the Jemaah Islamiah organization. Perhaps in later editions. Bravo Ms. Ressa!!!

In this fascinating book, investigative reporter for CNN, Maria Ressa traces the evolution of terrorist movements in Southeast Asia from the early 1990s to the present. While the American government slept, Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda helped Muslim terrorist groups form in such countries as Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines. It organized these groups, trained them, armed them, and provided them with expertise which is often beyond anything that their host countries can conceive, much less deal with.

With sparkling clarity, the author puts all of the known information about Muslim terrorism in Southeast Asia into chronological order, showing what was done, how and why. Most frighteningly, Ms. Ressa shows that these terrorist organizations are firmly entrenched in their host countries, sometimes with their governments' connivance, and are planning and training for more and bigger acts of terror.

I must say that this is not a happy book! The author paints a frightening picture of the Muslim groups in Southeast Asia, their abilities and their plans. It does go to show that the war against terrorism is far from over, and round two might be heading our way.

Admittedly, at the end the author drops her factual recapitulation of the history of these groups, and wanders into political editorializing. But, considering her position as an employee of CNN, this is hardly surprising. Overall, I found this to be a fascinating and highly informative book, not to mention a rather frightening one! If you are interested in the war on terror, and wish to read about a theater of operations not often talked about, then this book is for you!

Maria's book is well researched (although at times highly questionable ; as in her assertion that the OKC bombing may have been linked to Al Qaeda). Her style is a little too much a reflection of her work at CNN - lots of hyperbole and drama and use of the first person. On the whole a fast read that offers some insights amid a lot of self-back patting.

CNN Reporter Maria Ressa has written a wonderful first hand look at the links between Al Qaeda and the home grown Muslim Insurgency Movements in Southeast. Anyone who is interested in this region or wishes to know more about terror networks should read this book. In a rather short book (221 readable pages), Ressa provides a succinct and fact based treatise on the origin of fundamentalist terror networks in Southeast Asia and their links to Al Qaeda. Anyone who doesn't think that such links exist, will most definitely change their minds after reading this book.

While the book does not provide an in depth historical view, it does bring to light the development of these networks in the 1990's and how they were coopted by Al Qaeda. To Ressa's credit, she does not write the book as if she were reporting from the front lines and the occasional references to her own experiences in the area only serve to reinforce her points. Unfortunately, at the end of the book, Ressa does tend to get a little preachy and gets caught up in the anti-U.S. sentiment regarding the current war in Iraq. While her points are well-taken and may be even proven correct eventually, they detract from the overall thesis she presents, which is that terror networks in Southeast Asia are the next battleground in the war on terror and one that will be much harder to displace then they were in Afghanistan or Somalia.

Most of all, Ressa, a Filipina-American, has been able to bridge the gap between these two cultures and enable all of us outside of this region to more fully appreciate its complexities and problems. I would also recommend this book to anyone who will be traveling to this region.

This is a frightening book, giving an authoritative view of Al-Qaeda and associated terrorist groups. It makes a convincing case that the danger of terrorism comes more from Southeast Asia than from the Middle East, where the US is focusing its efforts. It's well written and as timely as a newspaper report. It describes the amorphous structure of the organizations and the difficulties in combatting them, including the mindset and the fanaticism of the members and the weakness of the central governments in Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines where they operate. The author knows a lot about this complicated organization and it's difficult to keep the individual terrorists straight but if it's hard to keep them straight in a book, how much more difficult to identify and track them in the world!? The book is excellent and a "must read" for anyone who wants to understand the threat that faces the US and the world.

Maria Ressa is a long-time CNN correspondent in Southeast Asia which is home to an underappreciated terrorist network. She has reported on numerous terrorist groups in the region, and in this book, she reveals the reasons for the rise to prominence of such groups as the Abu Sayyaf in the Philippines and the Indonesian-based Jemaah Islamiyah. Most people are only aware of bin Laden's al-Qaeda network, but Ressa's book clearly shows that the extremist network in the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore is just as dangerous.

Ressa enumerates the reason for the reasons for the rise of Islamic extremism in Southeast Asia: establishment of religious schools that double as recruiting centers for terrorism, widespread police and military corruption, lack of strong intelligence, and the governments' unwillingness to crack down on terrorist groups for fear of being labelled anti-Islamic. 9/11 may have been the most significant terrorist attack in recent history, but the Bali blasts, the multiple simultaneous bombings in Singapore a few years back, and the terrorist-backed uprisings in places such as Ambon, Indonesia signify a possibly greater threat arising in Southeast Asia.

Ressa clearly outlines the connections between terrorist groups in Southeast Asia with al-Qaeda. An Indonesian, Hambali, sits on al-Qaeda's governing council. Funds channeled from al-Qaeda helped fund both the bombings in Bali and Singapore. Many terrorists in the region trained under and met Osama bin Laden during the "jihad" in Afghanistan, and many are products of al-Qaeda's many training camps.

The importance of this book is that it awakens us to the dangers that are arising in Southeast Asia. Ressa does a fantastic job on reporting on these pressing issues because she has access to many politicians, bureaucrats, and other leaders that few get to speak to, and she even presents evidence never before published.

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in understanding the dangers that have not directly affected the US yet but are sure to hurt us in the future if not stopped now.

The Seeds of Terror: An Eyewitness Account of Al-Qaeda;s Newest Center of Operations in Southeast Asia, Maria Ressa (Free Press: New York, 2003)

Maria Ressa has walked the walk and now is ready to talk the talk and put pen to paper to tell the real story of terrorism in Southeast Asia. Few journalists, and for that matter, few military and intelligence professionals are as qualified to analyze and assess the threats in Southeast Asia as Maria Ressa. She has written a book that must be read by every professional in the military and the government who has a role in the War on Terrorism. However, concerned and interested citizens and anyone with business, family, social, or political connections to Southeast Asia will also find this book extremely enlightening and valuable.

What she has done is to fuse together information and analysis from many sources throughout Southeast Asia that is in many ways superior to that provided by intelligence services of any single country. Her access to high level sources in and out of governments in the region as well as the trust she has established with many well-connected civilians from all walks of life has allowed her to piece together the complex mosaic of how Al Qaeda has emerged as the over-arching threat in Southeast Asia. No single intelligence service could match her work and unless all the intelligence services in Southeast Asia are willing to cooperate and share information they will not rival Maria Ressa's analysis of the War on Terrorism in Southeast Asia.

One of the most valuable contributions this book makes is the assessment of the West's weaknesses that if not understood and addressed will allow Al Qaeda to continue to operate and expand its influence and connections with other terrorist organizations such as Jemaah Islamiyah, the Abu Sayyef Group, and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) to name a few. Her assessments also could rival any counter-insurgency expert. While the world focuses on the counter-terrorism aspect of the War on Terrorism she correctly understands that it must be viewed as an insurgency on a global scale and that the West must do a better job of fighting ideology with ideology because law enforcement and tactical military operations will not be enough to defeat this threat. The center of gravity is the moderate Muslims of the world and the West must embrace them and ask to help support their efforts to eradicate the radical elements that are perverting the Islamic faith for their own power and ideals. We have much to fear from Al Qaeda because according to its own manual Islamic governments "are established ...by pen and gun, by word and bullet..." Mao Zedong believed that power grew out of the barrel of a gun too, but despite this belief communism has been discredited and neutralized around the world because of the superiority of the ideology of freedom and self-determination. The real question that Maria implies but does not ask is can the West use the same skills and have the same determination and patience in defeating the Al Qaeda ideology as it did to defeat communism?

This book must be read and studied by anyone who wants to think critically about the War on Terrorism.

This book was written by another TV correspondent who has gained some expertise in a particular area of the conflict with Al Quaeda. In this case, Maria Ressa is an expatriate Filipina who was educated at Princeton, raised in New Jersey, and became a CNN correspondent (eventually their "bureau chief" in Jakarta). Her background and experience apparently have given her some insight into the politics in the region, and into the various Muslim extremist groups that are trying to establish their Islamic paradise there.

The book is chopped into chapters on the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore, with 2-3 chapters on the former two countries and only one on each of the latter two. The discussion seems very well-informed, and her point of view seems objective. She seems to admire the leadership of Singapore, especially, and thinks that the extremists will have a tougher time gaining a large following there than in Indonesia, for instance.

Where I disagreed with the book was in her analysis of the situation in the world. I was surprised to see one of the reviewers say that it looked like she was applying to Fox; in fact, she takes the obligatory U.S. journalist view that the war in Iraq was a large mistake, and that it's incited violence in the region towards Americans. Whether this is true or not, it's not like the extremists in Islam weren't upset with us before the Iraq war, and they weren't exactly unsuccessful. After all, the embassy bombings in Africa, the Cole bombing, and 9/11 all happened *before* the war with Iraq started.

One side-note. I recently reviewed Jayna Davis's book The Third Terrorist. One reviewer dismisses Ressa's book in that the author refers to the Oklahoma City bombings and rumors that Terry Nichols learned bomb-making in the Philippines, and that he and McVeigh had assistance from Islamic extremists. Ms. Davis makes it clear that this is clearly a strong possibility, and has a lot of evidence to back her up. One weakness of Davis's book is the poor writing. Ressa's book is much better constructed and put together, and reads very well, by comparison.

I enjoyed this book, and would recommend it to anyone interested in the region or the subject.

JI is an active terrorist organization, but there just aren't many of them and their influence on Indonesian society is quite small. However, Ressa makes a number of sloppy connections as she tries to argue otherwise. Though the Ba'asyir interview has some fascinating tidbits, this book by and large reads like an audition for Fox; few people with any expertise or experience in Indonesia lend it much credence.

This woman should have been listened to years ago. Why is it that our USA media refuses to develope stories as she was writing. Along with Robert Baer, Ahmad Rashid and now Miss Peters who has a book of the same name someone should give this woman and her information a Cronkite Award!!